The Divinity School is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Emily D. Crews (PhD'21) as the Assistant Director of the Martin Marty Center for the Public Understanding of Religion. In this position Dr. Crews will contribute to advancing the research agenda of the Center, assisting faculty and graduate students with translating their work to public audiences as well as managing the Center’s community and academic partnerships and its engagement with the media.

Dr. Crews, who is currently a Divinity School Teaching Fellow, will bring a wealth of teaching, research, and publishing experience to the position. Brie Loskota, the Executive Director of the Martin Marty Center, commented, "Dr. Crews brings a depth of knowledge about religion in Chicago, history of religions, and the Divinity School itself. She is a highly regarded member of the Div School community and could have chosen any career path within or outside the academy. That she has chosen to bring her strengths and expertise to the Marty Center is a testament to what we are building and the ways the Divinity School is broadening its reach."

"I think the work we do at the Divinity School matters," said Dr. Crews. "It has the potential to shape the ways that a diverse public understands issues that are profoundly important to our present moment, from the significance of the Supreme Court’s recent Dobbs draft to ethical responses to climate change. I’m honored to be part of the Divinity School’s engagement with that public."

Dr. Crews’ research and teaching investigate the ways that women’s religious lives are bound up with issues of race, gender, and reproduction. Her current research project focuses on the significance of alternative reproductive health practices to the construction of certain forms of white femininity in evangelical Christian communities in the American South. She is currently at work on a digital humanities site, supported by a grant from the Center for Lived Religion in the Digital Age, that explores the landscape of African immigrant religions in Chicago. Dr. Crews is the co-editor of Remembering Jonathan Z. Smith: A Career and Its Consequence (with Russell McCutcheon, 2020) and African Diaspora Religions in 5 Minutes (with Curtis J. Evans, forthcoming 2023).

Dr. Crews’ appointment is effective August 1st, 2022.