Endia Hayes, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Race, Ethnicity, Gender and Sexuality Studies
Bio
Endia Hayes is a Black Southern feminist theorist studying how Black Texan women and femmes use their bodies and, thus, the senses to create cultural production. Spanning the 19th-21st centuries, Dr. Hayes’ research is dedicated to the often forgotten Black women and femmes of Texas, shaping the state’s history and contribution to the Black South writ large.
She is currently working on two book projects, one that examines the visual role of Black Southern femme bodies in maintaining Black Southern hip-hop, and the second exploring folklore as a racial project defining Texas statehood and its racialization of Black bodies.
Her writing has appeared in journals such as The Black Scholar, Literature and Medicine, Southern Cultures, and Gastronomica alongside pivotal anthologies like Black Feminist Sociology and Black Women and Da 'Rona. She has held fellowships with The Center for Black, Brown, and Queer Studies (BBQ+), the Global Black Feminisms Summer Lab at UC Berkeley, and was a former Thurgood Marshall fellow at Dartmouth College.
Dr. Hayes earned her Ph.D. in Sociology from Rutgers University, and B.A. in Sociology and Anthropology from Spelman College.
Teaching
- Introduction to African American Studies
- Intersectionality
- Sensing Race, Gender, and Sexuality: Exploring Megan Thee Stallion
- Black Feminisms & Black Queer Theory
Research Interests
- Black Texas
- Senses
- Embodiment
- Black Feminist Theory
Degrees
- Ph.D., Sociology, Rutgers University, 2024
- M.A., Sociology, Rutgers University, 2020
- B.A., Sociology and Anthropology, Spelman College, 2017
Honors and Awards
- Teaching Award: Anna J. Cooper Award
- Year Awarded: June 2025
- Organization: Lorna C. Hill Black Celebration, Dartmouth College
Presentations
- “Liquidity: Sticking to Haunting in Texas Afterlives”
- Venue: The African American Intellectual History Society
- Presentation Date: 2025
- “Trap Feminist Sisterhoods and the Iconic Ghetto: Glorilla, Gangsta Boo, and Megan Thee Stallion– The Southern Connect”
- Venue: Association of Black Sociologists
- Presentation Date: October 2025
Publications
- Hayes, Endia. “Sensing the Black Femme: Spit’s Obsessions and Pleasures in Aunt Dicy Tales.” Moon Charania (eds.) Society + Space. (forthcoming fall 2025)
- Hayes, Endia L. 2024. “The Peculiar Sensation.” Front Matter on Afterlives. Kimberly Bain (ed.). Literature and Medicine. 42(1): p. 10-12.
- Hayes, Endia L. and Norah MacKendrick. 2022. “‘Leave No Stone Unturned’: Sustainable Belonging and Desirable Futures of African-American Food Imaginaries.” Gastronomica. 22(2): p. 64-74.
- Hayes, Endia L. 2022. “Between Flesh and Dirt: At the Distortive Interstices of Afro-Texan Archiving.” The Black Scholar. 52(4): p. 53-63.
- Hayes, Endia L. 2021. “Eating Dirt, Searching Archives: Excavations from a Texas Woman.” Southern Cultures. 27 (2): p. 126-133.
