Kenton Rambsy

Dr. Kenton Rambsy is currently associate professor in the English Department at Howard University, with an appointment in the Center for Applied Data Science and Analytics (CADSA) as the data storytelling and visualization specialist. Previously, Dr. Rambsy served as professor of African American literature and Digital Humanities at the University of Texas at Arlington where his cutting-edge teaching includes a course titled the “The Life and Times of S. Carter” also known as #theJayZclass. This is a digital humanities course which positions the prolific rapper in a broader literary continuum of autobiographical and semi-autobiographical works. He attended Morehouse College and received his Bachelor’s degree in 2010, graduating Magna Cum-Laude and Phi Beta Kappa. He later received his Masters (2012) and PhD (2015) in English for the University of Kansas. Dr. Rambsy has developed unique expertise in a rapidly expanding social and academic landscape which is characterized by heavy reliance on a digital interaction. His ongoing work ensures that data analytics, text-mining, and mapping software are not just short-term trends, but instead, long-term components in the academic arena. In the summer of 2016, he served as the Co-Director of a digital humanities initiative at Howard University. This position, funded by a grant for the National Endowment for the Humanities, exposed professors at Howard University to tools related to digital humanities. He is currently working on the Black Book Interactive Project, an NEH-funded collaborative research project housed at HBW that seeks to increase the number of black-authored texts in the study of digital humanities. This groundbreaking project also provides him an opportunity to continue his mission of utilizing modern technology to reach new levels of understanding in textual analysis.