Meet Dr. Morris

Susana M. Morris is a Black feminist Afrofuturist writer, scholar, and cultural critic who explores contemporary Black women's stories and experiences. As an Associate Professor of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech and co-founder of the Crunk Feminist Collective, she brings fresh perspectives to conversations about feminism, race, and culture.

Her most recent book, Positive Obsession: The Life and Times of Octavia E. Butler, is a cultural biography of the pioneering science fiction writer. Morris’s writing reaches readers everywhere—from academic journals to new outlets and popular magazines, always making complex ideas accessible and engaging.

Morris has appeared on NPR and the BBC, and her work has been featured in venues such as Book Page, Essence, the New York Times, the New Yorker, and The Root. With a PhD in English from Emory University and two decades of teaching experience, she is passionate about storytelling that critiques our world while imagining new possibilities.

Contact Me

Susana M. Morris is a Black feminist scholar and a cultural critic who has dedicated her career to studying the interior lives of Black women. She is an associate professor of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech and the co-founder of the Crunk Feminist Collective. A former Anschutz Distinguished Fellow at Princeton University and Norman Freeling Visiting Professor at the University of Michigan, she is the author of Positive Obsession: The Life and Times of Octavia E. Butler. Her other works include Close Kin and Distant Relatives: The Paradox of Respectability in Black Women's Literature, the co-edited collection The Crunk Feminist Collection, and the co-authored young adult handbook Feminist AF: The Guide to Crushing Girlhood. Her writing has appeared in Gawker, Long Reads, Cosmopolitan, and Ebony, and she has been featured on NPR, the BBC, and in Essence magazine.

Curriculum vitae

    • Ph.D. English; Certificate, Women’s Studies, Emory University, 2007

    • B.A. English, Mount Holyoke College, 2002

    • Associate Professor: School of Literature, Media, & Communication, 2017 -

    • Associate Professor: Department of English, Auburn University, 2013-2017

    • Assistant Professor: Department of English, Auburn University, 2007-2013

  • Books

    • Positive Obsession: The Life and Times of Octavia E. Butler (Amistad 2025). 

    • Feminist AF: A Guide to Crushing Girlhood. Co-authored with Brittney C. Cooper and Chanel Craft-Tanner. (New York: W.W. Norton, 2021).

    • The Crunk Feminist Collection. Co-edited with Brittney C. Cooper and Robin M. Boylorn. (The Feminist Press, 2017).

    • Sycorax’s Daughters. Co-edited with Kinitra D. Brooks and Linda Addison. (Cedar Grove Press, 2017).

    • Close Kin and Distant Relatives: The Paradox of Respectability in Black Women’s Literature (University of Virginia Press, 2014).

    Articles and Book Chapters

    • “The Black Speculative Tradition” in Studies in the Novel. Vol. 56 No. 4 (Winter), 2024. pp. 444–450. 

    • “Ethno-Gothic Cinema,” in The Oxford Handbook of New Science Fiction Cinema. Edited by Jay Telotte. Oxford University Press, 2023.

    • “Idlewild: Afrofuturism and the Hip Hop Musical in the Twenty-First Century,” An OutKast Reader: Essays on Race, Gender, and the Postmodern South, edited by Regina Bradley. University of Georgia Press, 2021.

    • “Dreaming of an Afrofuturist Utopia in N.K. Jemisin’s Dreamblood Duology” in Race and Utopian Desire in American Literature and Society, edited by Edward Chan and Patricia Ventura. Palgrave, 2019.

    • “‘Everything is real. It’s just not as you see it’: Imagination, Utopia, and Afrofuturist Feminism in Octavia E. Butler’s ‘The Book of Martha’” in The Black Speculative Arts Movement: Black Futurity, Art + Design, edited by Reynaldo Anderson and Clint Fluker. Lexington Books, 2019.

    • “The Stage Hip Hop Feminism Built: A New Directions Essay,” Co-authored with Brittney C. Cooper and Aisha Durham, in Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 38:3, Spring 2013, pp. 721-737.

    • Afrofuturism and the Black Speculative Arts Movement

    • Black Media Studies

    • Gender Studies and Black Feminist Theory

    • Race, Climate Change, and the Anthropocene

    • 20th and 21st Century African American and Caribbean Literature and Theory

    • Faculty Excellence in Research Award, Georgia Tech 2025

    • Principal Investigator, The Earthseed Project (Mellon Foundation Funded), 2024-2027

    • DILAC-A Grant Award for "Earthseed: Afrofuturism and Black Livability," 2021-2022

    • Norman Freeling Visiting Professor, Institute for the Humanities, University of Michigan, Spring 2023

    • Anschutz Distinguished Fellow in American Studies at Princeton University, Fall 2022

    • PULSE Community Building Award, Harvard Black Law Student Association, 2017