Vincent Brown, PhD is the David Brion Davis Professor of History at Yale University. A historian of the African diaspora in the Atlantic world, Brown is a native of Southern California. He earned his bachelor's degree from the University of California, San Diego, and received his PhD in History and Graduate Certificate in African & African American Studies from Duke University, where he also trained in the theory and craft of film and video production. Before joining Yale, Brown was the Charles Warren Professor of American History, Professor of African and African American Studies, and an affiliate of Art, Film, and Visual Studies at Harvard University. He is also the co-founder of Timestamp Media, which explores the histories that connect people and places across the globe.
Professor Brown is the author of two award-winning books on the history of slavery: The Reaper's Garden: Death and Power in the World of Atlantic Slavery (2008) and Tacky's Revolt: The Story of an Atlantic Slave War (2020). In addition to numerous scholarly articles and reviews, Brown has produced and directed several acclaimed documentary and multimedia projects, including Herskovits at the Heart of Blackness (2009), The Bigger Picture (2022), How Do You Remember the Days of Slavery? (2023), American Muslims (2025), and Profiles in the Memory of Slavery (2026). He is currently completing two books: Soul Survival: Slavery and Creation in the African Diaspora and Profiles in the Memory of Slavery.