Rachel Elizabeth Harding
March 31st - April 28th, 2025Rachel Elizabeth Harding is a poet, historian and scholar of religions of the Afro-Atlantic diaspora. A native of Atlanta, Georgia, Dr. Harding writes about religion, creativity and social justice in the experience of communities of African descent in the US and Brazil. She is associate professor emeritus and former chair of the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado Denver.
Dr. Harding is author of numerous essays, poems and scholarly articles, as well as two books: A Refuge in Thunder, a history of the Afro-Brazilian religion, Candomblé; and more recently, Remnants: A Memoir of Spirit, Activism and Mothering, co-written with her mother, Rosemarie Freeney Harding, on the role of compassion and mysticism in African American social justice organizing. Remnants was chosen by the editors of Duke University Press and one of the most influential books of the decade (2010-2020).
Dr. Harding is an ebômi (ritual elder) in the Terreiro do Cobre Candomblé community in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. She also co-directs the Veterans of Hope Project – an interdisciplinary initiative on religion, grassroots democracy and healing, that was founded by her parents, Vincent and Rosemarie Freeney Harding. (www.veteransofhope.org)
Harding’s honors include a Colorado Black Roundtable Civil Rights Award, a Cave Canem Poetry Fellowship, the Sterling Brown Distinguished Visiting Professorship at Williams College, the Rosa Parks Award from the University of Colorado Denver, and an honorary doctorate from the Starr-King School for the Ministry.
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