Black Historian Cries Racism After Scholars Call Out Fabricated Citations

A black historian is no longer employed at Tufts University after it was revealed that her prize-winning book cited sources that didn’t exist.

Initial reviews praised Kerri K. Greenidge’s book, titled “The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery In An American Family”, for her focus on the slaveholding Grimke brother fathering children with an enslaved woman. Previous histories had focused more on the Grimke sisters, Sarah and Angelina, who had rejected their heritage and become prominent abolitionists, also championing women’s rights.

The book retold the story through the sisters’ biracial nephews, citing letters from the University of Michigan’s archive that apparently are not there. But when Greenidge was confronted with that information, she suggested that her work was only under scrutiny because she was black.

“I am heartbroken that a field I have given my life to can treat me this way,” Greenidge said in an interview on Friday. “The attack on black women academics is real.”

She claimed she has never fabricated anything, but admitted some citations could be misattributed. “Are there citations that were misattributed? Probably.”

Myra C. Glenn, a retired professor of American history at Elmira College, first raised concerns about the book’s credibility in a March 2024 review. “All too often Greenidge lacks the evidence to substantiate many of her major claims. Her work is also riddled with factual errors and repeatedly omits needed endnotes.”

Glenn alleges that Greenidge negatively portrayed the two abolitionist sisters as being “alternately cruel and relentlessly judgmental” toward their bi-racial nephews without evidence. Glenn argues the negative portrayal of the sisters ultimately “serves a larger purpose” by laying the foundation for the book’s central narrative.

Another allegation claims Greenidge fabricated a dramatic scene by writing that the Grimké sisters “led thousands of antislavery women through prayer” and helped them escape the burning Pennsylvania Hall during an anti-abolitionist mob attack in 1838. Glenn said that numerous sources had previously documented that no one was in the building as it burned.

After Glenn expressed her doubts, other scholars followed. The book, labeled one of the 10 best books of 2022 from Publishers Weekly, is no longer listed on Greenidge’s author page. Patrick Collins, a spokesman for Tufts University, told the New York Times that Greenidge was no longer employed by the university on Thursday. While the email did not specify whether Greenidge left the university or was terminated, Collins said the university had recently become aware that the book “contained multiple errors of fact and failed to give appropriate credit to the work of another.”

Like Collins, Greenidge declined to detail the nature of her departure but did criticize Tufts’ peer review panel. Greenidge claimed two of the panelists were hostile toward black women in academics and that the university’s review was prompted by a white female scholar. Greenidge said that she plans to get a restraining order against that woman.

Collins responded saying, “The independent review by outside experts in the field was fair, fact-based, thorough, and objective. We stand by the review and strongly deny any allegations of bias.”

Problems with Greenidge’s “The Grimkes” ultimately led to questions about her book “Black Radical.” Stephen Fox, a historian who wrote a book on the same story, said, “It seems well done, except when you look at the footnotes. I started to think maybe it wasn’t just sloppy,” before adding “I think it’s something deeper.”