Farah Jasmine Griffin is the William B. Ransford Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University and the inaugural Chair of the African American and African Diaspora Studies Department. She received her B.A. from Harvard and Ph.D. in American Studies from Yale. Professor Griffin is the author or editor of eight books, including “Who Set You Flowin?,” “If You Can’t Be Free, Be a Mystery,” “Clawing at the Limits of Cool,” “Harlem Nocturne,” and the prize-winning “Read Until You Understand.” Her collected essays, “In Search of a Beautiful Freedom,” was published in 2024.
She has been a Guggenheim Fellow and a Mellon Foundation Fellow in Residence.