Dr. Shatima J. Jones

Dr. Shatima Jones is a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University. She is interested in the intersection of race, space, gender, and culture. Shatima is writing a book manuscript, under contract, University of Chicago Press, called The Headmasters of Brooklyn: Barbering, Blackness, and Brotherhood. Her manuscript focuses on how Black people interpret and perform their racial identity, the processes by which they create community based on these understandings, and the significance of place and space in shaping these sentiments.  The bulk of Shatima’s research employs ethnographic methods to uncover what Black people believe constitutes an “authentic” racial identity, how they signal this to others in everyday interaction, and how racially exclusive places shape understandings and performances of race. Shatima has embarked on a new ethnographic project focusing on women’s hair salons in order to explore gender differences in racial performance.