Dr. Joanne M. Braxton is Founder and CEO of the Braxton Institute for Sustainability, Resiliency and Joy, a nonprofit organization that co-creates collective strategies to repair and heal harms and traumas of historically oppressed communities and lift up legacies of resistance and joy. She is the author or editor of several volumes, including Black Female Sexualities (2015), Monuments of the Black Atlantic: Slavery and Memory (2003), Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings: A Casebook (1993), The Collected Poetry of Paul Laurence Dunbar (1993), Wild Women in the Whirlwind: The Renaissance in Contemporary Afra-American Writing (1990), Black Women Writing Autobiography: A Tradition Within a Tradition (1989) and Sometimes I Think of Maryland (1977), a collection of poetry. Dr. Braxton leads the Institute’s Reparations for Lakeland Now! campaign and is organizer and co-facilitator of Maryland’s state-wide Black-Eyed Susans for Reparations convenings. Her African Odyssey photo exhibition is on display at Montpelier House Museum in Laurel, MD, through November 1, 2026.