Clifton Boyd is Visiting Assistant Professor of Music at New York University, where he will transition into his role as Assistant Professor of Music beginning in 2024. His research explores themes of (racial) identity, politics, and social justice in 20th- and 21st-century American popular music. His articles and essays appear or are forthcoming in Music Theory and Analysis, Music Theory Spectrum, Theory and Practice, and Inside Higher Ed, as well as the edited collections The Oxford Handbook for Public Music Theory and Being #BlackintheIvory: Contending with Racism in the American University. In 2017, he founded Project Spectrum, a graduate student–led coalition committed to increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion in music academia. He has served on the Society for Music Theory’s Committee on Race and Ethnicity, and currently serves on the SMT-40 Dissertation Fellowship Committee.