George Washington University professor Jessica Krug admits she pretended to be black

A university professor whose work focuses on African American history has admitted she pretended that she was black.

Jessica Krug, an associate professor at George Washington University, said she was in fact a white Jewish woman from Kansas City.

Writing in a Medium blog post published on Thursday, Ms Krug said: "I have built my life on a violent anti-Black lie, and I have lied in every breath I have taken."

The academic said: "To an escalating degree over my adult life, I have eschewed my lived experience as a white Jewish child in suburban Kansas City under various assumed identities within a Blackness that I had no right to claim."

She described her behaviour as "the very epitome of violence, of thievery and appropriation, of the myriad ways in which non-Black people continue to use and abuse Black identities and cultures".

The case bears a strong resemblance to Rachel Dolezal, who was forced to resign as leader of Washington's National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People branch in 2015 after she her parents revealed she was white.

Ms Dolezal kept up the pretence of being African American for years, but said she "identified as black".

In her blog post, titled The Truth, and the Anti-Black Violence of My Lies, Ms Krug labelled herself as a "coward" in her post, adding: "I am not a culture vulture. I am a culture leech."

"No white person, no non-Black person, has the right to claim proximity to or belonging in a Black community by virtue of abuse, trauma, non-acceptance, and non-belonging in a white community," she wrote.

She expressed "remorse" and blamed her lies on trauma experienced in her early years, but acknowledged it was not an excuse for her actions.

"There are no words in any language to express the depth of my remorse, but then again: there shouldn’t be. Words are never the point," she wrote.

"The wrath of all whom I’ve harmed, individually and collectively, will never erase the harm I’ve done."

But screenwriter Hari Ziyad said the academic's admission came "because she had been found out".

"Jess Krug... is someone I called a friend up until this morning when she gave me a call admitting to everything written here," he wrote on Twitter. "She didn't do it out of benevolence."

George Washington University said it is "aware" of Ms Krug's post but cannot comment further on the case.