Charles I. Nero is an American interdisciplinary scholar, cultural critic, and professor of rhetoric, film and screen studies at Bates College. His work sits at the intersection of communication studies, film and literary criticism, African American studies, and cultural studies. Notably, Nero’s work deeply engages the place of sexuality in African American studies and African American culture. Nero received his undergraduate degree in Theater Education from Xavier University of Louisiana (1978), his MA in Speech Communication from Wake Forest University (1980) and his PhD in Speech Communication with concentrations in African American Studies and African Studies from Indiana University (1990).
Nero is a pioneer in the area of black queer studies. While working toward his PhD he became acutely aware of the need for this area of study. The late poet Essex Hemphill contacted him personally to include the essay “Toward a Black Gay Aesthetic: Signifying in Contemporary Black Gay Literature” in the landmark 1991 anthology Brother to Brother: New Writings by Black Gay Men. That essay is considered to be the first scholarly treatment of black gay literature. Nero was honored to write the introduction for the Cleis Press edition of Hemphill’s anthology Ceremonies. His essays have been important interventions into what typically had been unquestioned straightness in African American studies and an assumed whiteness in gay scholarship.
His scholarly work has appeared in major academic journals including Callaloo, College Language Association Journal, Palimpsest: A Journal on Women, Gender and the Black Diaspora, The Journal of Black Studies, Public Culture, Camera Obscura: Feminism, Culture, and Media Studies, and The Howard Journal of Communications. He also published in the groundbreaking collections Black Queer Studies: A Critical Anthology, More Than the Blues: Black Women and Music, Our Voices: Essays in Culture, Ethnicity, and Communication, Migrating the Black Body: The African Diaspora and Visual Culture, Blacktino: Queer Performance, and Queer Representations: Reading Lives, Reading Cultures; a Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader.
He offers courses on American cinema, lesbian and gay cinema, and African American literature and culture. In his lower division (100 level) courses he seeks to provide students with the critical skills and vocabulary to analyze how systems of power–for example, white supremacy–have played a role in structuring American culture representations in film, literature, and other public discourses. In his upper division courses (200 and above) he provides students with the knowledge and skill that enable them to explore how citizens have resisted oppression and created new forms of culture. He encourages students to explore the formation of identities by being attentive to race, class, sexuality, and gender.
Nero is currently the Benjamin E. Mays Distinguished Professor of Africana and Rhetoric, Film, and Screen Studies at Bates College. Endowed by James F. Orr, II and Ann L. Orr P ’94 in honor of the late civil rights advocate, theologian, and educator Benjamin E. Mays ’20, this professorship recognizes a faculty member who has advanced our understanding in matters of diversity and who affirms the ideals of the Bates alumnus Benjamin E. Mays ’20.
