Ersula J. Ore's research agenda focuses on the suasive strategies of Black Americans and investigates the relationship between physical and discursive violence, citizenship, and race. Professor Ore is the Lincoln Professor of Ethics in the School of Social Transformation and Associate Professor of African & African American studies. 

Ore’s book, Lynching: Violence, Rhetoric, & American Identity (2019), which explores American lynching as an ongoing practice of racialized citizenship connected to anti-Black policing, received the 2020 RSA Book Award from the Rhetoric Society of America.