Emily Bernard

BIO

Emily Bernard is the Julian Lindsay Green & Gold Professor of English.  She holds a B. A. and a Ph. D. in American Studies from Yale University. Bernard has received fellowships from the Alphonse A. Fletcher Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the MacDowell Colony, the Vermont Arts Council, and the W. E. B. DuBois Institute at Harvard University. She was the inaugural James Weldon Johnson Senior Research Fellow in African American Studies at Yale University. Her published works include: Remember Me to Harlem: The Letters of Langston Hughes and Carl Van Vechten, which was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year; Some of My Best Friends: Writers on Interracial Friendship, which was chosen by the New York Public Library as a Book for the Teen Age; and Michelle Obama: The First Lady in Photographs, which received a 2010 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work.  Carl Van Vechten and the Harlem Renaissance: A Portrait in Black and White, was published by Yale University Press in 2012. Bernard’s essays have been reprinted in Best American Essays, Best African American Essays and Best of Creative Nonfiction. Her most recent book, Black is the Body: Stories from My Grandmother’s Time, My Mother’s Time, and Mine, was published by Alfred A. Knopf in the spring of 2019. Black is the Body  won the Christopher Isherwood Prize for autobiographical prose in the Los Angeles Times 2020 Book Prizes competition.  A native of Nashville, Tennessee, Emily Bernard has been a faculty member at UVM since 2001.

Courses

• African-American Literature
• Race & Ethnicity in Literary Studies
• African-American Autobiography
• Race and Representation in American Culture
• African-American Women's Writing
• Harlem Renaissance
• Toni Morrison: Her Work and Vision

Publications

Emily Bernard Publications (DOCX)

Awards and Achievements

• Recipient, Julian Lindsay Green and Gold Professorship in English, January 2018.
• Nominee, National Magazine Award for “Interstates,” November 2017.
• Fellow, MacDowell Colony, June 2015.
• Notable Essay, Best American Essays 2015, for “Black is the Body.”
• Notable Essay, Best American Essays 2014, for “Mother on Earth.”
• 2014-2015 Creation Grant, Vermont Arts Council.
• Outstanding Service and Leadership Award, ALANA (Asian Latino African Native American) Community of the University of Vermont, May 2014.
• First Runner-Up, 2014 Neil Shepard Prize in Creative Nonfiction for “Mother on Earth,” Green Mountains Review.
• First Runner-Up for “Black is the Body,” Spring 2015 contest, Creative Nonfiction.
• UVM Dean’s Lecture Award, 2013.
• Notable Essay, Best American Essays 2012, for “The Refuge of the Classroom.”
• Winner, 2010 NAACP Image Award for Michelle Obama: The First Lady in Photographs (with Deborah Willis), New York: Norton, 2009.
• Alphonse Fletcher Sr. Fellow, 2009-2010.
• James Weldon Johnson Senior Research Fellow in African American Studies, Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University, 2008-09.
• Best African American Essays (2009) for “Fired.”
• Best of Creative Non-Fiction (2008) for “Figurines.”
• Kroepsch-Maurice Excellence in Teaching Award, 2007.
• Outstanding Faculty Woman Award, 2007.
• Best American Essays 2006, for “Teaching the N Word.”
• Nominee, Pushcart Prize XXXI: Best of the Small Presses, for “Teaching the N Word.”
• Nominee, National Magazine Award for “Teaching the N Word.”
• Some of My Best Friends selected for Books for the Teen Age, The New York Public Library, 2006.
• Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow, 2005-2006.
• Award for Outstanding ALANA Faculty Member, 2005.
• Recognition as Outstanding Professor by the Interfraternity Council and the Panhellenic Council, 2005.
• Recognition by the Class of 2003 for Valuable Contributions to the Students of the University of Vermont.
• W. E. B. Du Bois Non-Resident Fellow, Harvard University, 2000-present.
• W. E. B. Du Bois Resident Fellow, Harvard University, 1999-2000.
• National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship, 1999-2000.
• Grants from Committee on Faculty Compensation and Development, Smith College, Fall 1997; Spring 1998; Fall 1998; Spring 1999.
• Nominee, Prize Teaching Fellowship, 1995.
• Beinecke Summer Research Fellowship, 1994.
• Dorothy Danforth Compton Fellowship, 1990-1996.
• Ford Foundation Pre-Doctoral Fellowship, 1990-1993.
• Norman Holmes Pearson Prize for Best American Studies Senior Essay, 1989.

Area(s) of expertise

African-American and 20th-Century American literature, critical theory, race and ethnicity in literature, Women's studies