Introducing: P. Kimberleigh Jordan
Wabash Center’s New Associate Director of Educational Design
The Wabash Center is pleased to announce the hire of P. Kimberleigh Jordan, Ph.D. as the Associate Director of Educational Design. Dr. Jordan will begin employment on November 9, 2020. As the Associate Director of Educational Design, Dr. Jordan’s experience in, and scholarly pursuits of, creativity, imagination, critical race theory and religion make her uniquely suited for this position.
“Having taught in undergraduate, graduate and seminary classrooms, Dr. Jordan is an ideal colleague to continue the legacy of the Wabash Center. Kimberleigh’s gracious practices of hospitality as well as her commitment to liberative pedagogies align with the ethos and future plans of the Wabash Center.” – Nancy Lynne Westfield, Director of the Wabash Center
Kimberleigh Jordan, Ph.D. is an interdisciplinary scholar working at the intersection of performance studies, religion, Black studies, and dance. She has taught at Drew University, Fordham University in the joint Ailey/Fordham Bachelor of Fine Arts program, and as a member of the faculty in Dance History at the Alvin Ailey School. Dr. Jordan was a Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow at Union Theological Seminary.
A native of North Carolina, she holds a PhD in Performance Studies from Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, as well as degrees from Union Theological Seminary (M.Div.) and UNC – Chapel Hill (A.B). Jordan is a clergywoman ordained to the Ministry of Word and Sacrament in the United Church of Christ. Prior to Seminary and ordination, Jordan was a professional dancer with various companies in North Carolina and New York, as well as performing at the Metropolitan Opera in Porgy and Bess. She studied dance on scholarship in the Dance Theatre of Harlem’s Professional Training Program.
Dr. Jordan’s most recent scholarly article, “Performing Black Subjectivity: Enfleshed Feminism in Homecoming and Amazing Grace” appears in the Summer 2020 issue of Feminist Media Histories. She is also author of “ ‘Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me ‘Round’: Performing the Spirituals as Embodied Acts of Resistance” in The Black Scholar Journal and “The Body as Reader: African Americans, Freedom, and the American Myth” in the anthology, The Bible and the American Myth. Jordan is a member of the American Academy of Religion, the Society for the Study of Black Religion, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, the Dance Studies Association, and the Collegium on African Diaspora Dance.
