Frances Smith Foster (born 1944) is an American researcher and emeritus Professor of African-American studies and women's history.

[2] After graduating Foster moved to the University of California, San Diego, where she investigated slave narratives as part of a doctoral programme in British and American literature.

[2] In the early days of her academic career, Foster was appointed as the Chair of Black Students at San Diego State University.

[6] The Modern Language Association has said: "Frances proved that the slave narrative was a dynamic and ever-evolving genre of black self-expression."

[11][12] The following year, the Society for the Study of American Women Writers announced that Foster was the inaugural winner of the Karen Dandurand Lifetime Achievement Medal.