Jennie K. Williams, Ph.D., is a historian specializing in American slavery, digital humanities, and data ethics. Her forthcoming book, Oceans of Kinfolk: African American Ancestral History and America’s Middle Passage, will be published by the University of North Carolina Press.

Dr. Williams is the creator of five historical databases that collectively document the names of more than 85,000 enslaved African Americans. She is the Founding Executive Director of Kinfolkology™, an open archive, database collective, and collaborative community dedicated to remembering enslaved people as kin and kindred in full partnership with Descendant communities. She is also the Founder and CEO of Find My People™, a genealogical research and digital archiving company that helps individuals and families discover, document, and preserve their ancestral histories through personalized research and curated digital family archives. Find My People™ dedicates 100% of its profits to advancing Kinfolkology's mission and sustaining its freely accessible historical resources.

Dr. Williams is also the Co-Founder of the Descendants Forum™, a growing international congress of organizations led by Descendants of free and enslaved African and African American ancestors.

Beyond her scholarship and organizational leadership, Dr. Williams regularly collaborates with scholars, museums, cultural institutions, and design teams to develop historically rigorous, ethically grounded, and Descendant-centered interpretations of slavery and African American history. Her consulting expertise encompasses historical and genealogical research, interpretive planning, and advising on the ethical representation of slavery and its legacies in public history, museum exhibitions, and digital spaces.