Sherri Cummings

Dr. Sherri Cummings is an Assistant Professor at Rhode Island College, jointly appointed in the Department of History and the Africana Studies Program. She also serves as the Historian and Director of Community Outreach for the Rhode Island Black Heritage Society, contributing to exhibitions and public history projects focused on colonialism, slavery, and their legacies.

• Education: Ph.D. from Brown University (2022), M.A. in History (2016), Graduate Certificate in Africana Studies (2018), and B.A. in Africana Studies with minors in History and English (2015).

Her research spans Africa and the Black Atlantic, Early African American History, and Africana Intellectual History, with a focus on enslaved women's agency, medical practices in the diaspora, and the global legacies of colonialism. Her publications include analyses of cultural practices in colonial Saint Domingue and historiographical studies on Tituba, the enslaved woman associated with the Salem Witch Trials.

Dr. Cummings has collaborated on curatorial projects with institutions like the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice at Brown University. Her work interrogates themes of sovereignty, abolition, and the racialized dynamics of medical experimentation.

• Scientific Awards: Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship.