Stephanie Buckhanon Crowder

Professor Crowder is a Bible in/and pop culture educator. Her focus on New Testament literature provides the lens for traversing the re-contextualization of such texts in present media. While engaging what she terms “womanist maternal thought,” she explores ways in which the Bible speaks to current-day motherhood through an African American lens. As a dually-aligned National Baptist and Disciples of Christ minister, Professor Crowder employs creative code-switching means to communicate in both the church and the academy. From 2018-2023 she was the first African American and first woman to serve as Vice President of Academic Affairs/Academic Dean at CTS. In 2021 she became the first African American woman to become Full Professor at CTS.

“Social identity is the core of interpretation. Whether people acknowledge any of variables that influence how they engage a text, the dynamics are still present. Teaching must provide a safe forum for coming to terms with the factors that shape who we are. The freedom to be and wrestle with this ‘being’ is paramount. Ultimately, named and unnamed social constructs bear on textual approach, engagement and subsequently praxis. Yet, the act of interpretation does not stop with the individual. There is a communal responsibility and sense of accountability that must spur both student and teacher to transform society and transgress acts of injustice and inequity. I want teaching to change me as I seek to create something new in my students so we all strive to become sensitized, global change-agents.”