Premeditated Indifference: Colored Orneriness as Critical Companion to U.S. Democracy: A Lecture by Dr. Emilie M. Townes
An American Lecture in the History of Religion (ALHR), Dr. Townes' presentation will discuss how democracy has become a contested ideal in recent years and how the combination of work and willpower, or "colored orneriness", is necessary to creating a more just society. This program is sponsored by Temple Libraries, Temple's Department of Religion and the American Academy of Religion.
Townes is the Martin Luther King, Jr. Professor of Religion and Black Studies at Boston University School of Theology.
Registration for this hybrid event is encouraged. Registration for Zoom is required.
- Date:
- Thursday, February 20, 2025
- Time:
- 11:00am - 12:30pm
- Location:
- Charles Library Event Space
- Location:
- Online
- Campus:
- Main Campus
Dr. Emilie M. Townes, an American Baptist clergywoman, is a native of Durham, North Carolina. She holds a Doctor of Ministry degree from the University of Chicago Divinity School and a Ph.D. in Religion in Society and Personality from Northwestern University. Dr. Townes was the Dean and University Distinguished Professor of Womanist Ethics and Society (Divinity) and University Distinguished Professor of Gender and Sexuality Studies (College of Arts and Science) at Vanderbilt University, becoming the first African American to serve as Dean of the Divinity School from 2013-2023. She is the former Andrew W. Mellon Professor of African American Religion and Theology at Yale University Divinity School and in the fall of 2005, she was the first African American woman elected to the presidential line of the American Academy of Religion (AAR) and served as president in 2008. She was the first African American and first woman to serve as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs in the Yale Divinity School.
Townes is the author and editor or co-editor of many books on women, spirituality and ethics. She is currently the president of the Society of Christian Ethics and is the first Black woman to hold this office. She joined the Boston University School of Theology faculty in 2024. (she, her, hers)
