El/yse Ambrose, PhD (they/them)* is a blackqueer ethicist, creative, and educator whose research, art, and teaching lie at the intersections of blackness, sexuality, gender, and spirituality/religion.

Ambrose’s book, A Blackqueer Sexual Ethics: Embodiment, Possibility, and Living Archive (2024) forwards a transreligious sexual ethics grounded in blackqueer living archive. They are the creator of the Black Trans Ethical World(un)making Lab, co-sponsored by the Department of Black Study at the University of California, Riverside and the University of California Humanities Research Institute. Their artistic work-in-progress, stilled waters|“water overflows with memory” (inspired by M. Jacqui Alexander’s words), is a photographic and sound experiment in river water and memory, black geography, and the sacred.

Ambrose’s most recent completed photo-sonic exhibition, “Spirit in the Dark Body: Black Queer Expressions of the Im/material,” premiered in November 2019 during the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion at the L Street Fine Arts Gallery (San Diego, CA) and has shown with the House of Mark West (Bronx, NY)— one of the few black queer-owned galleries in the country.

Ambrose currently serves as Assistant Professor in the Department of Black Study and the Department for the Study of Religion at University of California, Riverside. Their research has been supported by the Mellon Foundation and the Center for Ideas and Society at UC Riverside, the Louisville Institute for the Study of American Religion, the Forum for Theological Exploration, Columbia University's Center on African American Religion, Sexual Politics, and Social Justice, the Henry Luce Foundation, the Yale University LGBT Studies Fellowship, and the Center for Black, Brown, and Queer Studies (BBQ+).

Ambrose’s work and commentary have been featured in the Huffington Post, the Christian Century’s podcast Contemplating Now, ForHarriet.com, Vice, and CBC Radio One’s Tapestry, as well as artistic venues as BMoreArt and Religious Studies Review.

Ambrose's research interests include black religious studies, queer and trans studies in religion, social ethics, religion and social change, spiritual traditions of the U.S. South, and black queer and black trans cultural history and productions.

El/yse Ambrose resides in Los Angeles. They are a proud partner, plant sibling, and parakeet parent. 

*I am both Elyse and El. As a blackqueer agender person, my names are my primary referents. However, in line with English language conventions, “they/them” (or more so, dey/themme) are appropriate pronouns to employ.