Sierra J. Austin-King is an Assistant Professor of Teaching in the Department Women’s, Gender and  Sexuality Studies (WGSS) and an Ohio Prison Educational Exchange Program faculty member. She specializes in Black feminist thought, with an emphasis on how social systems, curricula, pedagogy, and educational practices & policy shape the academic experiences of Black girls. She is also interested in the ways in which Black girls and women engage in genealogies of resistance against state-sanctioned and institutional violence, using Black afterlives as an operative analytic. 

Sierra’s work appears  in Films for the Feminist Classroom,  Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture, and Society and Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies. She is the recipient of several grants, and has presented original research both domestically and abroad.

Sierra has been recognized as a Women of Economic Leadership & Development (WELD) Calendar Honoree (2023), a  Leadership Ohio Ambassador (2021), a YWCA Columbus Sue Doody Alumni of the Year (2020), and a JPMorgan Chase & Deloitte Wise Women Rising Star (2019). She currently serves as both Board Chair and Grants Committee Chair of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio, as well as a member of the Franklin University School of Education Advisory Board. She is also a proud member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated.

Teaching Interests:

• Abolitionism
• Afrofuturism
• Black Women’s Literature
• Black Food Pathways
• Intersectionality