Joseph Richard Winters

My name is Joseph Winters and I am an associate professor at Duke University in Religious Studies and African and African American Studies. I hold secondary appointments in English and Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies. My interests lie at the intersection of black religious thought, black studies, and critical theory. My research examines the ways black literature and aesthetics develop alternative configurations of the sacred/profane, spirituality in the flesh, and secularity in response to the religious underpinnings of anti-black violence and coloniality. My first book, Hope Draped in Black: Race, Melancholy, and the Agony of Progress was published by Duke University Press in 2016. My second book, The Disturbing Profane: Hip Hop, Blackness and the Sacred (also with Duke Press) was published in August, 2025.

Bio updated Sept 2025