Christen A. Smith

Christen A. Smith is an Associate Professor of Anthropology and Black Studies at Yale University. Her research as a Black feminist anthropologist centers on race, gender, violence, and Blackness across the African diaspora, with a focus on Brazil and the Americas.

She earned her Ph.D. in Cultural and Social Anthropology from Stanford University.

Smith's scholarly work is anchored in two interconnected strands: first, the transnational and gendered dimensions of anti-Black state violence, particularly police violence in Brazil; and second, the intellectual contributions of Black women to the Americas through transnational Black feminism. She founded the Cite Black Women movement to combat the erasure of Black women's scholarship.

Her publications, including Afro-Paradise (2016) and the 2023 releases The Dialectic is in the Sea and Black Feminist Constellations, demonstrate a trajectory from analyzing state violence through performance to centering Black women's intellectual traditions. These works collectively advance African diaspora studies and Black feminist theory.

Active in academic service, Smith is associate editor of Transforming Anthropology and teaches courses on African diaspora anthropology, Black feminisms, and violence and memory.