Kiara Sample is a Senior Research Analyst at Impact Justice. She brings a wealth of research experience and a strong commitment to Black feminist, queer, and anti-racist perspectives in her work. She holds a Master’s in African Diaspora Studies from the University of California, Berkeley and a Bachelor’s in Psychology and African and African-American Studies from Washington University in St. Louis, where she was a Mellon Mays Research Fellow. There she worked extensively as a research assistant on projects examining the legacies of slavery, racial violence, and mass incarceration in the United States. Her peer-reviewed publication analyzes FBI files through a Black feminist lens, uncovering the impact of gender and sexuality on government surveillance of Black women activists.
While working on her PhD at UC Berkeley, Kiara’s research resides at the intersection of African diaspora studies, Black feminism, queer theory, and environmental humanities. At the heart of her work is elucidating African diasporic subjugated knowledge systems and the liberatory ways of knowing, being, and relating beyond Western colonial frameworks. Kiara is committed to scholarship recognizing the interconnectedness of struggles against antiblack racism, heteropatriarchy, imperialism, and environmental destruction.