Faculty Profiles

Amber M. Neal-Stanley, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor of Curriculum Studies in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at Purdue University. Her research agenda converges at the intersection of Black education studies, critical qualitative inquiry, and faith as a vehicle for educational transformation. Her research, teaching, and service are informed by her lived experiences as a Detroit Public School (DPS) student as well as professional experiences as a social worker and public elementary school teacher. Dr. Neal-Stanley is committed to preparing diverse students to address structural inequity, (re)member Black radical traditions, and employ humanizing pedagogical and research approaches. Her recent research has been published in Curriculum Inquiry, Religion & Education, Equity and Excellence in Education, and Qualitative Inquiry. An award-winning educator and scholar, Dr. Neal-Stanley was awarded the 2023-2024 Purdue University College of Education Outstanding Faculty Teaching Award. She was also selected as a 2024-2025 Research Fellow through The Crossroads Project at the Center for Culture, Society, and Religion at Princeton University.

Selected Publications

• Neal-Stanley, A.M. (forthcoming). (Re)membering the ecology of the self. Journal of Teaching.
• Neal-Stanley, A.M., Morgan, J.A., & Allen, D.J. (forthcoming). The religio-spiritual capital of the Black Church: A conceptual model for combatting antiblackness in the early years. Early Childhood Research Quarterly.
• Neal-Stanley, A.M. (forthcoming). (Black) digital humanities for educational history: A technology of recovery in the age of artificial intelligence and antiblackness. American Educational History Journal.
• Lyiscott, J., Smith, P., Neal-Stanley, A.M., Harris Garad, B., Caraballo, L., Hoskins, J., Green, K., & Wallace, D. (2024). In Spirit and in Truth: (Re)searching Christianity and Racial Liberation in Education. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 1-17. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2024.2348801
• Neal-Stanley, A.M., Duncan, K., & Love, B. (2024). “A brief moment in the sun”: Mapping white backlash in the history of K-12 Black education in the United States. International Journal of Multicultural Education, 26(1), 31–56. https://doi.org/10.18251/ijme.v26i1.3901
• Neal-Stanley, A.M. (2024). “God meant I should be free”: Historical Black women teachers and the womanist theo-ethical imperative of abolition. Educational Studies, 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131946.2024.2307898
• Neal-Stanley, A.M. (2023). The fugitive spirit of historical Black women teachers: Theorizing hush harbors as praxis. Curriculum Inquiry, 1-25. https://doi.org/10.1080/03626784.2023.2285758
• Neal-Stanley, A.M. (2023). Out of the mouths of babes: Testimonies of Black student experiences in a modern-day segregation academy. Religion & Education, 50(4), 320-347. https://doi.org/10.1080/15507394.2023.2247306
• Neal-Stanley, A.M. (2023). Black feminist (Re)constructions of education in the afterlife of abolition: An invitation. Equity and Excellence in Education, 1-15. https://doi.org/10.1080/10665684.2023.2262489
• Dillard, C.B. & Neal, A.M. (2021). Still following our North Star: The necessity of Black women’s spiritual (re)membering in qualitative (re)search. Qualitative Inquiry.
• Neal, A.M. & Dunn, D.C. (2020). Our ancestors’ wildest dreams: (Re)membering the freedom dreams of Black women abolitionist teachers. Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 35(4), 59-73.
• Dillard, C.B. & Neal, A.M. (2020). I am because we are: (Re)membering Ubuntu in the pedagogy of Black woman teachers from Africa to America and back again. Theory into Practice, 59(4), 370-378.

• EDCI 59100 — Critical Theory in Education
• EDCI 61500 — Qualitative Research Methods in Education
• EDCI 61600 — Qualitative Data Collection and Analysis in Educational Research
• EDCI 68400 — Seminar in Curriculum Studies (History of Black Education in the U.S.)