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Dr. Kelly is a historian of South Africa. She writes about gender and violence under colonialism and apartheid. Dr. Kelly is the faculty mentor of a team of undergraduate and graduate researchers who conduct oral history interviews with underrepresented alumni for the Voices of SMU Oral History Project to document the experiences of Black, Latinx, and Asian students at SMU. She is a recipient of the M Award, SMU’s highest honor bestowed upon students, faculty and staff who give unselfishly of their talents to better the University.

Educational Background

Ph.D., Michigan State University, 2012 B.A., Saint Vincent College, 2004

Kelly CV 2025

Awards, Fellowships, and Grants

2023 The New York Public Library Short-Term Fellowship, Schomburg Center
2023-24 Tom Tunks Distinguished University Citizen Award
2023 Dedman College Dean’s Research Council Grant
2023 Center for Presidential History’s History Department Writing Fellowship
2023 Sam Taylor Research Fellowship
2023 91��Ƭ�S�ϼ� Research Council Travel Grant
2022 Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study Writing Fellowship
2020 Altshuler Distinguished Teacher Professor Award
2020 M Award
2018-2019 Fulbright U.S. Scholar Grant
2018 Dedman College Dean’s Research Council Grant
2017-2018 91��Ƭ�S�ϼ� Research Council Research Grant
2016-2017 Sam Taylor Research Fellowship
2016 Engaged Learning Excellence in Mentoring Award
2015 91��Ƭ�S�ϼ� Research Council Travel Grant
2015 91��Ƭ�S�ϼ� Golden Mustang Teaching Award
2015 American Council of Learned Societies Fellowship

Publications 

Books

• To Swim with Crocodiles: Land, Violence, and Belonging in South Africa, 1800-1996 (, 2018 and , 2019).

Articles and Chapters

• “Nokukhanya Luthuli as First Lady of the African National Congress.” 57, no. 3 (2024): 287-306.
• “Nokukhanya Luthuli: South African Women’s Leader,” In . Oxford University Press (2024).
• “Mdluli Backstories and Biographies: Shaka Zulu and the Persistence of Amalala Identities.” 69, no. 1 (2024): 77-100.
• “Land Reform for a Landless Chief in South Africa: History and Land Restitution in KwaZulu-Natal,” 64, no. 4 (2021): 884-908.
• “King Zwelithini and the Historians,” with Jabulani Sithole and Liz Timbs, in  73, no. 2 (2021).
• “In Peace and Rebellion: Inkosi Mhlabunzima Maphumulo” in , Natal Society Foundation (2021): 211-228.
• “Teaching South African History in the Digital Age: Collaboration, Pedagogy, and Popularizing History,” with Omar Badsha, Special Issue, 47 (2020): 297-325.
• “Gender, Shame, and the ‘Efficacy of Congress Methods of Struggle’ in 1959 Natal Women’s Revolts,” 71, no. 2 (2019).
• “Bantu Authorities and Betterment: The Ambiguous Responses of Natal’s Chiefs and Regents, 1955-1970,”  41, no. 2 (2015).
• “Women Were Not Supposed to Fight”: The Gendered Uses of Martial and Moral Zuluness during uDlame (1990-1994) in Jan Bender Shetler (ed.), . University of Wisconsin Press (May 2015).
• “‘It is because of our Islam that we are there’: The Call of Islam in the United Democratic Front,”  41, no. 1 (Jul 2009): 118-139.

Current Research

“‘The Burden is Heavy, We Need the Men’: Gendered Knowledge in the 1959 Rebellions in South Africa” examines the gendered nature of ethnicity and anti-apartheid resistance in 1950s South Africa. The project considers how women used knowledge about Zulu masculinity and the “patchwork of patriarchies” under which they lived as discourses to inform tactical interventions in rural struggles. Examining women’s motivations and strategies is significant because it reveals how gender and ethnicity shape the availability of violence as a political tactic and situates women at the forefront of violent actions that prompted liberation organizations to rethink tactics in the 1950s and early 1960s.