Nathan Jérémie-Brink

I strive to recover historical sites hidden or cloaked by dogmatic explanations, racist omissions, and nationalist myths, in order to foster Black empowerment and dismantle systems of oppression.

Bio:

Nathan Jérémie-Brink, PhD is the L. Russell Feakes Associate Professor of the History of Global Christianity at New Brunswick Theological Seminary. He is a historian of religion who specializes in Christianity and cultural and social movements of the Atlantic World and the early US republic. His research and teaching interests include the history of Christianity and slavery, revolution and resistance in Haiti and the Black Atlantic, and African American activism and print culture. Dr. Jérémie-Brink earned his PhD in History from Loyola University Chicago in 2018. He is currently preparing a book manuscript, “Spreading Fire: Black Print Activism in the Early US Republic,” that examines how early-nineteenth-century African American activists, clergy, and leaders of civic organizations used print to challenge slavery and advance Black empowerment. His work has been supported by the Henry Luce Foundation, the Louisville Institute, and a number of other leading foundations and research institutions.

Dr. Jérémie-Brink is passionate about public engagement and digital humanities. He co-founded the Slavery + Freedom Studies Working Group at Rutgers University-New Brunswick, supported by the Institute for the Study of Global Racial Justice. He also directs the Gospel Materialities Working Group and Digital Humanities Project in collaboration with the Rutgers Center for Cultural Analysis. This site is a digital gathering of scholars interested in the material culture and social history of Black gospel music and African American religion in the 20^th century, that also hosts events, curates innovative multi-media interpretive exhibits, and shares teaching strategies and resources on this subject.

His community-engaged scholarship includes The SHELTER Project. This project secured $200,000 in grant funds from the Henry Luce Foundation for direct service, public history and arts interventions, in collaboration with the Reformed Church of Highland Park-Affordable Housing Corporation, Rutgers University CCA and Public History Program, and coLAB Arts New Brunswick. He also was an executive editor for the project’s six episode SHELTER podcast that explores both the experiences of the unhoused in central New Jersey and the role that religious and educational institutions might play in addressing these vulnerabilities. He was awarded a NBTS Presidential Faculty Fellowship in 2022 to further support his work and advance the seminary’s platform for teaching and scholarship aligned with commitments to antiracism and social justice. He is also an ordained Presbyterian minister and works with faith communities around issues of antiracism, the history of slavery, and reparations.

EDUCATION

PhD in History, Loyola University Chicago, 2018

• Dissertation: “‘Gratuitous Distribution’: Distributing African American Antislavery Texts, 1773–1850,” Kyle B. Roberts (Advisor), John Donoghue, Timothy J. Gilfoyle, Jeffrey Glover
• Comprehensive Examination Fields: American History to 1865, History of the Early Modern Atlantic World; Completed with Distinction,2013

Master of Divinity, with Academic Distinction, McCormick Theological Seminary, 2009

• Master’s Thesis: “‘The Voice of Liberty is Sweet in Our Ears’: The Image of Haiti in African American Political and Religious Discourse, 1797–1829,” David D. Daniels, III (Advisor);

Bi-Registered Student, History of Christianity, University of Chicago Divinity School, 2007–2008

Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy, with Honors, Calvin College, 2005

 

PUBLICATIONS

Articles and Essays:

“In Word or Deed: Practices of Print and Citizenship in the Early U.S.” Extended Review Essay, American Studies Journal, 59, Number 2 (December 2020), 7-18.

Reviews:

Alexis Wells-Oghoghomeh, The Souls of Womenfolk: The Religious Cultures of Enslaved Women in the Lower South, Fides et Historia, Volume 54, No. 2 (forthcoming Summer/Fall 2022).

Cécile Vidal, editor, Louisiana: Crossroads of the Atlantic World, in The Historian 78, Number 2 (Summer 2016).

Erskine Clarke, By the Rivers of Water: A Nineteenth-Century Atlantic Odyssey, for Common-place 14, Number 3.5 (Summer 2014).

Manuscripts in Preparation:

“Prairie Routes to a Black Republic: An 1823 African American Odyssey from Illinois to Haiti,” under review with the Journal of the Early Republic.

“Spreading Fire: Black Print Activism in the Early United States,” book manuscript in preparation.

Digital Scholarship and Public Humanities:

Co-Director, with Maurice Wallace, GospelMaterialities.com, Working Group and Digital Humanities Project. Sponsored by the Rutgers University-New Brunswick Center for Cultural Analysis, Working Group founded in 2021, DH project site launched June 2022.

Co-Principal Investigator and Co-Director, SHELTER Project, A collaborative direct service, public history, and arts and humanities project of New Brunswick Theological Seminary, the History Department and Center for Cultural Analysis, Rutgers University, and coLAB Arts New Brunswick, funded by the Henry Luce Foundation, June 2020 – September 2022.

Producer, Videographer, and Editor, “The Ellacuría Tapes Project,” Short Documentary, Introduction to “The Ellacuría Tapes: A Martyr at Loyola,” Digital Archive and Exhibit, Dina Berger, Project Producer and Manager, Launched November 2014.

Contributor, “The Market Revolution,” in The American Yawp: A Free and Online, Collaboratively Built American History Textbook. Joseph Locke and Benjamin Wright, Editors. Launched August 2014.

Contributor, “The Abolition Seminar: Fighting Slavery and Racial Injustice from the Revolution to the Civil War” Interactive Teaching Resource. Richard S. Newman and Benjamin Wright, Editors. The National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library Company of Philadelphia. Launched January 1, 2014.

 

SELECT FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS

Presidential Award, Deconstructing Racism Faculty Scholar, New Brunswick Theological Seminary, 2022
Louisville Institute Dissertation Fellowship, 2017-2018
American Historical Association Council Annual Meeting Travel Grant, 2018
Graduate Scholar-in-Residence, Newberry Library Chicago, 2016-2017
Arthur J. Schmitt Dissertation Fellowship in Leadership and Service, Loyola University Chicago, 2016-2017
McNeil Center for Early American Studies Dissertation Fellowship, 2016–2017 (declined)
Lapidus Center Short-Term Fellowship, The Lapidus Center for the Historical Study of Transatlantic Slavery at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, 2016–2017 (declined)
Graduate School Research Mentoring Fellowship, Loyola University Chicago 2015
Historical Society of Pennsylvania/Library Company of Philadelphia McFarland Fellowship in African American History, 2014–2015
Massachusetts Historical Society Andrew W. Mellon Short-Term Fellowship, 2014–2015
Lapidus-Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture (OIEAHC) Slavery and Print Culture Fellowship, 2014–2015
Arthur A. Hays Fellowship, Christian History, McCormick Theological Seminary, 2011–2013
Higgins Fellowship, Presbytery of Chicago, Presbyterian Church (USA), 2011–2013
American Antiquarian Society History of the Book Summer Seminar: African American Cultures of Print, 2012
J Elliot P. Morrison Scholarship, McCormick Theological Seminary, 2006–2009
Nettie F. McCormick Award in Old Testament, McCormick Theological Seminary, 2009; 2008
Samuel Robinson Award, McCormick Theological Seminary, 2009
Isabella Blackstone Award in Church History, McCormick Theological Seminary, 2008
Taylor Award for Preaching, McCormick Theological Seminary, 2008

 

TEACHING

New Brunswick Theological Seminary

Power, Culture, and Mission in the History of World Christianity
History of American Christianity
Black Christianity in North America
Analyzing Systems of Privilege
Religious Traditions in Context
History of Global Christianity I: to 1450
History of Global Christianity II: 1450 to present

 

DIGITAL HUMANITIES EXPERIENCE

Creator and producer, Christian Responses to Disease and Pandemic Online Teaching Resource, using TimeMapper, developed with Science for Seminaries grant funding from the AAAS Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion (DoSER) program, in consultation with the Association of Theological Schools (ATS), developed with graduate student research assistant Susan McGeown, 2020.

Site Creator and Project Co-Director, with Maurice Wallace, Gospel Materialities Working Group and Public Humanities Project, Rutgers University Center for Cultural Analysis, 2021-present.

Curator and Producer of Digital Media Exhibit Companion Site, “Meeting Tonight: Two South Carolina African American Camp Meetings,” featuring photography of Holly Lynton, interpretive homilies by Maurice Wallace, Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University, and Mast Chapel of New Brunswick Theological Seminary, New Brunswick, New Jersey, Spring-Summer 2022.

Project Partner, The Good Life Project, The Center for the Study of Religion and the City, Morgan State University, 2021–present 

New Media Editor, Common-place, 2015–2018

Digital Media Assistantship, Loyola University Department of History, 2014–2015

New Media Assistant, Common-place, 2013–2015

Digital Media Support, Historians Against Slavery Annual Conference, Cincinnati, September 19-21, 2013

 

MEDIA AND OTHER DIGITAL PUBLICATIONS

“Foreign Governments and NGOs Will Try to Exploit Moïse’s Assassination,” Co-authored with Cécile Accilien, Nedghie Adrien, and Randal Maurice Jelks, Truthout / truthout.org, July 8 2021.

 Co-Executive Editor, Featured Project Co-Director, “SHELTER Podcast,” September 2021.

 “Keeping the Faith During the Coronavirus Pandemic,” Interviewed about the history of Christian responses to the 1918 influenza epidemic by Sheila Noonan, for NJ Spotlight News March 2020.

“Local exhibition and discussion highlights ‘The Spirit in the Struggle against Nazism,’” Interviewed about white nationalism by Alexander Lewis, Courier News and Home News Tribune / MyCentralJersey.com, October 2018,

 “On the Past’s Presence: Historians against Slavery,” The Junto: A Group Blog on Early Ameircan History, earlyamericanists.com, September 2013.