She received her doctorate from the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England, and served as a fellow at the Carter G. Woodson Institute for African American and African Studies at the University of Virginia. Silkey is the author of several scholarly essays and a new book, “Black Woman Reformer: Ida B. Wells, Lynching, and Transatlantic Activism.” Her research examines nineteenth-century transatlantic debates about American lynching and race relations.