Research Interests
African American Religious and Intellectual History; Slavery and Abolition; Religious Liberalism; American Secularism
Education
Ph.D. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2010
M.A. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2008
B.A. Keene State College, 2006
Current Projects
My current book project is entitled Liberal Religion and Race in America. This book explores the history of African Americans’ engagement with religious liberalism from the First Great Awakening of the 1740s to the founding of Black Lives of Unitarian Universalism in 2015. African Americans were among the founders of the first Universalist churches in the eighteenth century, created their own liberal congregations beginning in the nineteenth century, and have continually pushed Unitarians and Universalists to be more attuned to social injustices. While their numbers have been few, African Americans have been profoundly affected by and made significant contributions to American religious liberalism.
In addition to my research, I was the founding president of the African American Intellectual History Society. I started this organization and its group blog Black Perspectives in order to provide a space for scholars in disparate fields to discuss the many aspects of teaching and researching black intellectual history. Check out new Black Perspectives posts at aaihs.org.
Publications
Books
- Race, Religion, and Black Lives Matter: Essays on a Moment and a Movement (co-edited with Phillip Luke Sinitiere), Vanderbilt University Press, 2021.
- Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism Northwestern University Press, 2019.
- New Perspectives on the Black Intellectual Tradition (co-edited with Keisha N. Blain and Ashley Farmer), Northwestern University Press, 2018.
- To Plead Our Own Cause: African Americans in Massachusetts and the Making of the Antislavery Movement Kent State University Press, 2014.
- Early American History: Society, Politics, and Culture Cognella Academic Publishing, 2014.
- The Abolitionist Movement: Documents Decoded ABC-CLIO, 2014.
Articles and Book Chapters
"Liberal Theology and American Abolitionism" Journal of Unitarian Universalist History, 2020.
“‘The Entire Thing Was a Fraud’: Christianity, Freethought, and African American Culture.” Raymond Haberski, Jr. and Andrew Hartman, eds. American Labyrinth: Intellectual History for Complicated Times Cornell University Press, 2018.
“The New Negro Renaissance and African American Secularism.” Keisha N. Blain, Christopher Cameron, and Ashley Farmer, eds. New Perspectives on the Black Intellectual Tradition Northwestern University Press, 2018.
“Slavery and African American Irreligion.” Journal of Southern Religion Vol. 18 (2016): http://jsreligion.org/vol18/cameron/
“Zora Neale Hurston, Freethought, and African American Religion.” Journal of Africana Religions Vol. 4 No. 4 (2016): 236-244.
“The Puritan Origins of Black Abolitionism in Massachusetts.” Historical Journal of Massachusetts 39 (Summer 2011): 79-107.
Courses Taught
HIST 1160 U.S. History to 1865
HIST 1161 U.S. History from 1865-Present
HIST 2000 Religion in America
LBST 2101 Unbelief in America
HIST 2105 American Slavery and Emancipation
HIST 2160 African American History, 1400-1860
HIST 2600 History Skills Seminar: Religion and the American Revolution
HIST 3000 American Thought and Culture to 1865
HIST 3003 Slavery and Abolition in the Atlantic World
HIST 3201 Colonial America
HIST 3202 The American Revolution, 1750-1815
HIST 3203 The Antebellum U.S., 1800-1860
HIST 4000 Historiography of the American Revolution
HIST 4600 Religion in American History
HIST 4600 The American Revolution
HIST 4797 Honors Methods and Practice: The American Revolution
HIST 6000 Graduate Colloquium in U.S. History to 1865
Fellowships
American Council of Learned Societies Fellowship (2020-2021)
Franklin Grant, American Philosophical Society (2019)
Short Term Fellowship, Manuscripts and Rare Book Library, Emory University (2015)
Faculty Research Grant, UNC Charlotte (2011, 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2021)
Massachusetts Historical Society/National Endowment for the Humanities Long Term Fellowship (2013-2014)
Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History Fellowship (2009)
Philips Library Fellowship, Peabody Essex Museum (2009)