Jewell Ruth-Ella Humphrey

Jewell Ruth-Ella Humphrey (She/Her) is a PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and a proud alumna of Africana studies at Howard University. Her research interests include Black digital humanities, twentieth-century Black community organizing, African diaspora maritime heritage, and digital archival practices. Her dissertation titled “Black Star Archive: Digital Heritage Preservation & the Materiality of the UNIA” addresses the need for a centralized digital archive of the twentieth-century organization Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)- contending that virtual practices can be utilized to expand the definitions of archival research in archaeology. Inspired by her namesakes and grandmothers, Jewel & Ruth Ella, her love for heritage preservation is the driving passion behind this work.