Courtney Thorsson is an Associate Professor in the English Department and a Faculty Fellow n the Clark Honors College at the University of Oregon, where she teaches, studies, and writes about African American literature from its beginnings to the present using Black feminist methods.

Her most recent book, The Sisterhood: How A Network of Black Women Writers Changed American Culture, tells the story of how a community of Black women writers and intellectuals transformed political, literary, and academic cultures. The Sisterhood has been positively reviewed in Publisher's Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, Library Journal, and the Times Literary Supplement and been on lists fromTown and Country’s "Must-Read Books of Fall 2023" to the Los Angeles Times’s "18 Best Nonfiction Books" of 2023. The Sisterhood has been selected for the The Grio’s "Ultimate Holiday Gift Guide," Seminary Co-Op’s 2023 Notable Books; African American Intellectual History Society's "Best Black History Books of 2023"; and a 2024 Black History Month selection for the Black Women’s Studies Association, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and Powell's Bookstore.