Ashley Crooks-Allen named 2022 Anti-Racism Collaborative Postdoctoral Fellow

Ashley Crooks-Allen (They/Them) is a Dubois-Mandela Rodney / Anti-Racism Collaborative Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Michigan, with joint appointments in the Department of Afoamerican and African Studies and the National Center for Institutional Diversity.

Dr. Crooks-Allen recently obtained their PhD from the University of Georgia, where they focused on Black ethnic identity, social movements, and social media. Their dissertation is titled, “Mestizaje Undone: A Qualitative Social Media Analysis of Afro-Latinx Identity & Social Movements.” This work takes a qualitative approach to understanding how Afro-Latinx people use social media to make identity claims in relation to the Black Lives Matter movement.

Dr. Crooks-Allen's master's research, also at the University of Georgia, focused on Afro-Caribbean identity and experiences with the Black Lives Matter movement in Georgia. They also completed a graduate certificate in women’s and gender studies. They graduated from Emory University with a major in creative writing and a minor in sociology. While at Emory, they were a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellow.

Dr. Crooks-Allen is from Irvington, NJ and is of Afro-Costa Rican descent. Their interest in Black migratory identity formation developed while living the effects of their parents migrating to the US and settling into Black prescribed spaces. In conjunction with academia, they also devote time to spoken word poetry and activism.

Housed in the National Center for Institutional Diversity, the Anti-Racism Collaborative is one of the three components of Provost Susan M. Collins’ anti-racism initiative. Its function is to strengthen research and scholarly engagement around anti-racism at U-M, through mechanisms such as support for postdoctoral fellowships focusing on anti-racism, faculty and student research grants, seminars and symposia, and interdisciplinary scholarly collaboratives.