Salim Faraji

Department Chair

Contact Information

Dr. Salim Faraji is Professor and Chair of Africana Studies at California State University, Dominguez Hills. He is also the founding Executive Director of the Master of Arts in International Studies (MAIS) Africa Program at Concordia University Irvine in Ghana, West Africa. He completed his Master of Divinity at the Claremont School of Theology and M.A. and Ph.D. at Claremont Graduate University. He is a member of the International Society for Nubian Studies and specializes in early Christian history, Africana and Africanist historiography, Coptic Studies and the Kerma, Napatan, Meroitic and Medieval periods of Nubian history. He has presented papers on Nubian Christianity at the 11th International Conference for Meroitic Studies in Vienna, Austria and the 12th and 13th International Conferences for Nubian Studies at the British Museum and the Université de Neuchâtel, Switzerland, respectively. In 2018 Dr. Faraji presented “The Ascendancy of the Kushite Kingdom of Kerma in the Post Middle Kingdom Era: Revisiting the Second Intermediate Period of Ancient Egypt” at the 14th International Conference for Nubian Studies at the University of Paris-Sorbonne/Louvre Museum.

Dr. Faraji is a member of the National Council for Black Studies and a founding member of the William Leo Hansberry Society. He is also a member of the American Sudanese Archaeological Research Center (AmSARC). He is one of a handful of Nubiologists in the United States and the only Africana Studies scholar in the country who is also a Coptic Studies specialist. Professor Faraji is a contributor to New Perspectives on Ancient Nubia, Life Under the Baobab Tree: Africana Studies and Religion in a Transitional Age, the Encyclopedia of African Religion, the Oxford Dictionary of African Biography and the author of The Roots of Nubian Christianity Uncovered: The Triumph of the Last Pharaoh.

Dr. Faraji has traveled and worked extensively on the African continent in such nations as Ghana, Burkina Faso, Egypt, Ethiopia and Namibia as both a scholar and activist-humanitarian. His work in international programs at CSU Dominguez Hills has included organizing Pan African Global Trade & Investment Conferences and co-organizing the Mandela Washington Alumni Enrichment Institute of Los Angeles for emerging African leaders from Sub-Saharan Africa. Dr. Faraji also presents a ministerial background and has served in the United Methodist and Unitarian Universalist Churches. As a theological pluralist and interfaith practitioner, he is currently an ordained minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and a practicing African Traditional Priest who has been initiated in both the Akan traditions (Okomfo) of Ghana, West Africa and ancient Egyptian religious practice (Kheri Heb).

PUBLICATIONS (2010-PRESENT)

Books

The Roots of Nubian Christianity Uncovered: The Triumph of the Last Pharaoh; Religious Encounters in Late Antique Africa (Trenton: Africa World Press, 2012).

The Plan: A Guide for Women Raising African American Boys from Conception to College (Chicago: Third World Press, 2013)

The Plan Workbook: A Guide for Women Raising African American Boys from Conception to College (Chicago: Third World Press, 2013).

Encyclopedia & Reference Works

Salim Faraji. “Silko,” “Julian,” “Longinus,” “Ameniras,” “Arkamaniqo,” “Arkamani,” In Oxford Dictionary of African Biography. Edited by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Emmanuel Akyeampong. (New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).

Salim Faraji. “Atum.” & “Kingship” In Encyclopedia of African Religion. Edited by Molefi K. Asante & Ama Mazama (Sage, 2009).

Articles and Chapters

“Rites, Remedies and Oracles: Relocating Ancient Egyptian Religion in the Enduring Spiritual Heritage of Africa and the African Diaspora” in: Bloomsbury’s Handbook to Ancient Egyptian Religion: Agencies and Practices. R. Lucarelli and L. Weiss (eds.), (Bloomsbury, New York forthcoming, 2025).

“The First Empire of Kush: Delegitimizing the Colonial Trope of the Black Pharaohs.” New Perspectives on Ancient Nubia, Solange Ashby and Aaron Brody, eds., (Gorgias Press, 2024).

“Nubian Ascendancy in the Middle Kingdom: Exploring the Foundations of Kushite Rule During the 2nd Intermediate Period” In Kush: Proceedings of the 14th International Conference for Nubian Studies XX Paris, 2018. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta. Leuven: Peeters, 2023.

“Envisioning Africana Religions: Seeking a Distinctive Voice for the Study of Religions in Africa and the African Diaspora” Life Under the Baobab Tree: Africana Studies and Religion in a Transitional Age, Aliou C. Niang, Kenneth Ngwa, Arthur Pressley, eds., (Fordham University Press, 2023).

“Amon is the God of all Africa: Meroitic Kush and the Akan,” Revue Sénégalaise d’Histoire No. 22 (December 2022), p. 17-36.

“Rediscovering the Links between the Earthen Pyramids of West Africa and Ancient Nubia: Restoring William Leo Hansberry’s Vision of Ancient Kush & Sudanic Africa,” Origins and Afterlives of Kush: Proceedings of the University of California at Santa Barbara Conference in Nubian Studies, July 25-27, 2019, eds. Pearce Paul Creasman and Stuart Tyson Smith Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections Vol. 35 (September 2022), p. 49-67.

Déjà vu: The Crisis of the Black Intellectual Again: Ta-Nehisi Coates, Cornel West and the Omission of the Pan-Africanist Tradition” Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization (January 2018).

“Savior King: Re-reading the Gospels as Greco-Africana Literature & Re-Imaging Christ as Messianic Pharaoh” in Albert Cleage Jr. and the Black Madonna Child, Jawanza Clark, ed., (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016)

“King Silko and the Roots of Nubian Christianity,” The Kushite World: Proceedings from the 11th International Conference for Meroitic Studies Vienna, 1-4 September 2008, ed. Michael H. Zach Beitrage zur Sudanforschung – Beiheft 9 (2015)

“Reversing Injustice: Combating the Criminality of an Apartheid State” Insights: The Faculty Journal of Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary Fall 2014

“Exploding the Myth of the Black Christian Past: What Can the New Black Church Learn From the

Funeral Ceremony of Nelson Mandela” The Journal of Pan African Studies Vol.6, no.7, February (2014)

“Kush and Rome on the Egyptian Southern Frontier: Where Barbarians Worshipped as Romans and Romans Worshipped as Barbarians” in Romans, Barbarians, and the Transformation of the Roman World: Cultural Interaction and the Creation of Identity in Late Antiquity, Ralph W. Mathisen and Danuta Shanzer, eds., (Ashgate: 2011)

Academic Presentations (2014 - Present)
Pomona College History Department – Ancient History of Africa Conference
Lecture Presentation: Seeking Eternal Amun and Praising the Knowledge of Djehuty: Ancient Egypt and the Making of Philosophy and Theology in the Late Antique World ( February 28-March 2, 2025)
William Leo Hansberry Africa Roundtable
Lecture Presentation: Engaging Ethiopia – The African Kingdom of Aksum & Early Christianity ( February 22, 2025)
Akrofi-Christaller Institute of Theology, Mission & Culture - Andrew F. Walls Conference on Early African and World Christianity
Lecture Presentation: Exploring the Links between Ancient Egyptian Philosophy and Alexandrian Theology: A Brief Excursus on Chaeremon Egyptian Priest-Philosopher ( October 2024), Akropong, Ghana & New Haven, CT
University of Delaware, Department of Africana Studies
Lecture Presentation: African American Folk Religion (Hoodoo): The Retention and Adaptation of Ancient Egyptian & Nubian Religion in the African Diaspora and panelist, The John and Patricia Cochran Symposium on Africana Religions – A Conversation on Black Religious Pluralism ( October 2023)
American Sudanese Archaeological Research Center
Lecture Presentation: Early and Medieval Nubian Christianity: Ancient Rites and Cultural Convergence in the Middle Nile Valley ( March 29, 2023)
California State University, Long Beach – Africa Subcommittee, International Education Committee
Lecture Presentation: Engaging Original African Religions, Spiritualities and Ethics: Enduring Insights and Options for our Times ( March 14, 2023), Long Beach, CA
A2MEND African American Male Education Network - 16th Annual African American Male Success Summit
Keynote Speaker & Panelist: The Ausar Project: Resurrecting Black Male ( March 6, 2023), Los Angeles, CA
William Leo Hansberry Research Symposium
Lecture Presentation: Ritual Power in Early and Medieval Nubian Christianity: Ancestral Rites and Healing Baths ( February 25, 2023)
University of Juba South Sudan Philosophical Society & U.S.-Africa Institute
Lecture Presentation: The Seeds of Revolutionary Democracy: African Indigenous Heritage, Philosophy and Governance ( May 21, 2022), University of Juba, South Sudan
Akrofi-Christaller Institute of Theology, Mission and Culture – Centre for Early African Christianity & The Center for Early African Christianity, Akropong, Ghana and New Haven, CT
Walls-Oden-Bediako Lecture on Early African Christianity - Lecture Presentation: African Spiritual Dimensions of Medieval Nubian Christianity (April 21, 2022), Akropong, Ghana & New Haven, CT
Stanford University Archaeology Collections
Visiting Lecturer Presentation: Dr. Christina Hodge/Dr. Denise Lim, Museum Cultures: Exhibiting the African Imaginary, “Formulating An Africana Transdisciplinary of History: Nubian, the Nile Valley and Sudanic Africa as Case Study,” (April 12, 2022), Stanford, California
Candler School of Theology, Emory University
Visiting Lecturer Presentation: Dr. Emmanuel Lartey, Spiritual Care in African Religious Traditions, “Harnessing the Force: Nurturing Wellbeing through Trans-Religious African Spiritual Power,” (November 9, 2021), Atlanta, Georgia
22nd St. Shenouda-UCLA Conference of Coptic Studies
Lecture Presentation: “Reflecting Ancient Egyptian Magic & Coptic Ritual Power: A Consideration of Funerary Prayer Inscriptions in Medieval Christian Nubia” (July 2021), UCLA, Los Angeles, CA
International University of Africa, Dept of Archaeology, Sudan
Lecture-Interview Presentation: “Multiculturalism and Multilingualism in Late Antique Nubia” ( March 2021), Khartoum, Sudan
Pacific School of Religion and UC Berkeley Archaeological Research Facility
Lecture Presentation: “Nubian Ascendancy in the Middle Kingdom: Exploring the Foundations of Kushite Rule During the 2nd Intermediate Period” ( October 2020), Berkeley, CA
21st St. Shenouda-UCLA Conference of Coptic Studies
Lecture Presentation: “Athanasius and Ancient Egyptian Metaphysics: Forging Christology, Creed and Canon” (August 2020), UCLA, Los Angeles, CA
San Diego State University – Department of Africana Studies
Lecture Presentation: “The African Kingdom of Aksum: The Crossroads of the Ancient World” (February 2020), SDSU – San Diego, California
UC Santa Barbara – Department of Anthropology, Origins and Afterlives of Kush Conference
Lecture Presentation: “William Leo Hansberry Pioneer of Africana Nubiology: Toward a Transdisciplinary Nexus of Nubian Archaeology, Africana Studies & Africanist Scholarship” (July 2019), UC Santa Barbara – Santa Barbara, California
UCLA Cotsen Institute of Archaeology
Lecture Presentation: “Meroitic Kush and Rome: The Politics of Temple Piety and Religious Identities” (October 2018), UCLA – Los Angeles, California
8th Annual Pan African Global Trade and Investment Conference
Lecture Presentation: “Building an Africana International Studies Program: Pathways to Forging Global Trade & Foreign Investment in Africa & The Pan African Diaspora.” (September 2018), California State University, Dominguez Hills – Carson, CA
14th International Conference for Nubian Studies
Lecture Presentation: “The Ascendancy of the Kushite Kingdom of Kerma in the Post Middle Kingdom Era: Revisiting the Second Intermediate Period of Ancient Egypt” (September 2018), The Musée du Louvre and Sorbonne University, Paris, France
42nd Annual Kawaida Institute for Pan African Studies Conference
Lecture Presentation: “Kawaida Theory and the Conceptualizing of Africana Religions” (July 2018), The African American Culture Center, Los Angeles, California
19th St. Shenouda-UCLA Conference of Coptic Studies
Lecture Presentation: “Osirian Motifs in the Martyrdom of St. Peter of Alexandria” (July 2018), UCLA, Los Angeles
Drew University Theological School - The Africana Studies Transdisciplinary Theological Colloquium
Lecture Presentation: “Toward an Africana Theory of Religion: Seeking out a Distinctive Disciplinary Schema for the Study of Religions in Africa and the African Diaspora.” (March 24-26, 2017), Madison, New Jersey
Penn State University College of Communications Office of Multicultural Affairs
Lecture Presentation: “From Ferguson to Africa: Dispensing with Race; Reclaiming Black Power.” (February 26, 2015), University Park, PA
Candler School of Theology, Emory University
Visiting Lecture Presentation for doctoral study course: African Moral Philosophy Directed Reading Course (February 18, 2015), Atlanta, Georgia
Twenty-Sixth Annual Cheikh Anta Diop Conference
Lecture Presentation: “Cheikh Anta Diop, Physics and the Consciousness of Sovereign Experience: Toward a New Africana Philosophy and the Re-Emergence of Sovereign Theology” (October 2014) Philadelphia, Penna.