Daina Ramey Berry

Daina Ramey Berry is the Chair of the History Department at The University of Texas at Austin. She holds the Oliver H. Radkey Regents Professorship of History and is a Fellow of Walter Prescott Webb Chair in History and the George W. Littlefield Professorship in American History at the University of Texas at Austin. Formerly the Associate Dean of The Graduate School, Dr. Berry lead a campus-wide initiative to transform funding, student outcomes, and career pathways at the university. One of her greatest passions has been training doctoral students in African American History.

In addition to her work at the university as an administrator and internationally recognized scholar of slavery, Professor Berry is one of the most sought-after consultants for public-facing projects offered by museums, historical sites, K-12 educational initiatives, syndicated radio programs, online podcasts, and public television. Professor Berry completed her BA, MA, and PhD in African American Studies and U.S. History at the University of California Los Angeles. She is “a scholar of the enslaved” and a specialist on gender and slavery as well as Black women’s history in the United States.

Professor Berry completed her BA, MA, and PhD in African American Studies and U.S. History at the University of California Los Angeles. She is “a scholar of the enslaved” and a specialist on gender and slavery as well as Black women’s history in the United States. Berry is the award-winning author and editor of six books and several scholarly articles. One of her recent books, The Price for their Pound of Flesh: The Value of the Enslaved, from Womb to the Grave, in the Building of a Nation received three book awards including the Phyllis Wheatley Award for Scholarly Research from the Sons and Daughters of the US Middle Passage.

Dr. Berry has received prestigious fellowships for her research from the National Endowment for the Humanities; the American Council of Learned Societies; the American Association of University Women and the Ford Foundation. She is a Distinguished Lecturer for the Organization of American Historians. Her work has been, featured in the New York Times, Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report, The Washington Post, and Huffington Post.

Professor Berry is the associate editor for The Journal of African American History and recently completed A Black Women’s History of the United States with Professor Kali Nicole Gross.