I am associate professor of philosophy and history of education and teach courses on how education has, does, and can help us imagine, struggle for, and enact liberatory ways of being together in the world. My courses depend on and inform my research interests, which are quite varied but generally focus on the relationships between education and political movements. If you like podcasts, I think the hosts of Nothing Never Happens helped me articulate the larger picture of my work in this interview.
I've written a few books, the latest of which is Teaching the Actuality of Revolution: Aesthetics, Pedagogy, and the Sensations of Struggle and has been reviewed in Monthly Review, Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, Studies in Philosophy and Education, and Rethinking Marxism. (You can hear about it on Revolutionary Left Radio and watch the book launch). I’ve published about 30 book chapters and over 50 peer-reviewed articles in journals ranging from Contemporary Music Review and Educational Philosophy and Theory to Rethinking Marxism and International Critical Thought. My public scholarship appears in outlets like Black Agenda Report, Monthly Review, Peace, Land, and Bread, and has been translated into Türkçe, Spanish, Portuguese, Korean, Chinese, and Japanese. What moves my research and teaching also moves my organizing. I am on the Steering Committee of the Free Shaka Shakur Campaign, volunteer as the Organizational Relations Director at the Indianapolis Liberation Center, and as an organizer with the ANSWER Coalition, among other groups. I was recently a Visiting Scholar at Korea University (Tokyo).
In 2021, I started engaging other media with a podcast series I wrote and hosted, Reading Capital with Comrades, which takes listeners through volume 1 of Marx's magnum opus. Since June 2025, I’ve co-hosted the weekly podcast, Naptown People’s Radio, with my comrade and co-host Dani Abdullah. Both are available on all streaming platforms. In 2025, I ended up producing a documentary— “Across Enemy Lines: Shaka A. Shakur”— about New Afrikan Political Prisoner, theorist, and organizer, Shaka A. Shakur,” which debuted worldwide in early December 2025. A DePauw student and I helped Shaka edit his first book, Manifestations of Thought: When the Dragon Comes, which 1804 Books published. Before then, I helped write, produce, and play myself in a short minidocumentary series about Vernon T. Bateman, a brother of mine who the state has terrorized since he was 17. Although DePauw no longer supports my editorial work, I remain a deputy editor of the Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies and associate editor of Postdigital Science and Education.
I serve as deputy editor of the Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, associate editor of Postdigital Science and Education, and contributing editor at the Hampton Institute.