Dianne M. Stewart

For other uses, see Dianne Stewart.

Dianne Marie Stewart is Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Religion and African American Studies at Emory University. Dr. Stewart's work focuses on religion, culture and African heritage in the Caribbean and the Americas as well as womanist religious thought and praxis. Dianne M. Stewart is the author of Three Eyes for the Journey: African Dimensions of the Jamaican Religious Experience (Oxford University Press, 2005), Black Women, Black Love: America’s War on African American Marriage (Seal Press, 2020) and  Obeah, Orisa and Religious Identity in Trinidad, Volume II, Orisa: Africana Nations and the Power of Black Sacred Imagination (Duke University Press, 2022).

Personal life

Dianne M. Stewart was born in Kingston, Jamaica, and grew up in Hartford, CT, USA. In 1990, Stewart obtained her B.A. degree from Colgate University in English and African American Studies. In 1993, she obtained her Masters of Divinity in theology and culture, specializing in African American Religious Thought from the Harvard Divinity School. In 1997, she received a Ph.D. in systematic theology, specializing in African Diaspora Religious Thought & Cultures from Union Theological Seminary in New York City.

Stewart studied with scholars including Delores Williams, James Washington and her adviser James Cone.

Career

From 1998 to 2001, Stewart was an assistant professor of religious studies at College of the Holy Cross. From 1997 to 1998, Stewart was a visiting professor at Macalester College. In 2001, she joined Emory's faculty, and is currently Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Religion and African American studies. where she teaches undergraduate and graduate courses focused on African American/diaspora, religion, and culture.

Publications

Stewart's first monograph was titled, "Three Eyes for the Journey: African Dimensions of the Jamaican Religious Experience" and analyzed the motif of liberation in African heritage from the 18th to 21st century. Subsequently, Stewart has published a number of books and articles:

Year	Publication	Title
2023	Routledge Taylor & Francis Group	"African archives in the Caribbean: the Yoruba tradition, cultural experts, and the unmaking of religious knowledge in twentieth-century Trinidad"
2022	Duke University Press	Obeah, Orisa and Religious Identity in Trinidad, Volume 2, Orisa: Africana Nations and the Power of Black Sacred Imagination
2020	Seal Press	Black Women, Black Love: America’s War on African American Marriage
2019	Afro-Catholic Festivals in the Americas: Performance, Representation, and the Making of Black Atlantic Tradition	"The Orisa House That Afro-Catholics Built: Africana Antecedents to Yoruba Religious Formation in Trinidad"
2018	Victorian Jamaica	"Kumina: A Spiritual Vocabulary of Nationhood in Victorian Jamaica"
2016	Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Religion Vol. 7, Issue 1.4 (July 2016), 1-29	"Rethinking Indigenous Africana Sources of Womanist-Feminist Activisms in the 21 st Century"
2014	The Oxford Handbook of African American Theology, edited by Katie Cannon and Anthony Pinn, 331-350. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2014	"Religious Pluralism and African American Theology"
2013	Caribbean Cultural Thought: From Plantation to Diaspora (Reprinted from Chapter 4 of Dianne M. Stewart, Three Eyes for the Journey: African Dimensions of the Jamaican Religious Experience)	"Visitation: The Legacy of African-Derived Religions in Jamaica"
2013	Journal of Africana Religions Vol. 1, no. 1 (January 2013): 28-77	"Africana Religious Studies: Toward a Transdisciplinary Agenda in an Emerging Field"
2013	Bulletin of Ecumenical Theology	"Matricentric Foundations of Africana Women's Religious Practices of Peacebuliding, Sustainability & Social Change"
2013	Del Caribe	"Las Religiones Heredadas del África Central en el Contexto Jamaicano"
2008	The Hope of Liberation in World Religions	"Orisha Traditions in the West"
2007	International Journal of African Renaissance Studies 2:1 (July 2007): 35-57	"Collecting on Their Investments One Woman at a Time: Economic Partnerships Among Caribbean Immigrant Women in the United States"
2006	Indigenous Peoples’ Wisdom and Power: Affirming Our Knowledge Through Narratives, edited by Ivy Goduka and Julian Kunnie, 127-142.	“Indigenous Wisdom at Work in Jamaica: The Power of Kumina"
2006	Deeper Shades of Purple: Womanism in Religion and Society edited by Stacey Floyd-Thomas	"Dancing Limbo: Black Passages through the Boundaries of Place, Race, Class, and Religion in Deeper Shades of Purple"
2006	Encyclopedia of Women and Religion in North America, edited by Rosemary Skinner Kellar and Rosemary Radford Ruether, 116-126.	“Women in African Caribbean Religious Traditions”
2005	Oxford University Press	Three Eyes for the Journey: African Dimensions of the Jamaican Religious Experience
2005	Encyclopedia of Religion, Volume 1, 2nd edition, edited by Lindsay Jones, 73-83.	“African American Religion: History of Study” co-authored with Tracey E. Hucks
2005	Contours: A Journal of the African Diaspora 3:2	"African-Derived Religions in Jamaica: Polyvalent Repertoires of Culture and Identity in the Black Atlantic"
2004	Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion	"Womanist Theology in the Caribbean Context: Critiquing Culture, Rethinking Doctrine, Expanding Boundaries"
2004	Union Seminary Quarterly Review	"Womanist God-Talk on the Cutting Edge of Theology and Religious Studies: Assessing the Contribution of Delores Williams"
2003	Western Journal of Black Studies, Vol. 27, no. 3	“Authenticity and Authority in the shaping of Trinidad Orisha Identity: Toward an African-Derived Religious Theory,” co-authored with Tracey Hucks

Awards and Fellowships

Stewart received the Emory College of Arts and Sciences' Distinguished Advising Award, the Emory University Laney Graduate School's Eleanor Main Graduate Faculty Mentor Award, and a Senior Fellowship at the Bill and Carol Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry. Over the course of her career, her honors include:

Awards and Honors (Professional)

Year	Award
2023	Faculty Award for Inclusive Excellence in the Humanities, Laney Graduate School, Emory University
2022	Black Interfaith Fellowship Program, Interfaith Youth Core/Funded by the Henry Luce Foundation
2021	Chronos Faculty Fellowship
2021	Kirkus, Best Books of 2020: Black Life in America
2021	Morehouse College’s Collegium of Scholars
2021	Longlisted, History Category, Georgia Writers Association Author of the Year Award, Black Women, Black Love: America’s War on African American
2020	Kirkus Star, Black Women, Black Love: America’s War on African American Marriage
2020	Library Journal Star, Black Women, Black Love: America’s War on African American Marriage
2020	KQED Forum – Favorite Books of 2020 (Black Women, Black Love)
2019	Emory CFDE, The OpEd Project Workshop – Write to Change the World
2019	Emory Williams Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching Award
2017	The Bill and Carol Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry Senior Fellowship, Emory University
2016	PERS Grant, Emory College of Arts and Sciences
2016	Eleanor Main Graduate Faculty Mentor Award, Emory University Laney Graduate School
2016	CFDE Engaged Learning Program Grant
2016	Center for Creative Arts Grant
2013	Distinguished Advising Award, Emory College of Arts and Sciences
2012	American Academy of Religion, Collaborative Research Assistance Grant (Trinidad & England)
2011	Woodruff Presidential Faculty Research & Travel Grant (DR Congo & England), Emory College
2009	Woodruff Faculty Resource Grant, Emory College
2008	ICIS Faculty International Travel Grant (England), Emory College
2006	Fulbright Scholar, Democratic Republic of Congo
2006	ICIS Faculty International Research Grant, Emory College
2005	Massee-Martin Teaching Consultation Grant (with Dr. Regine Jackson), Emory College
2005	ICIS Faculty International Travel Grant, Emory University (Jamaica & Trinidad)
2003	ICIS Faculty International Travel Grant, Emory University (Trinidad)
2002	Massee-Martin Teaching Consultation Grant (with Dr. Frances Foster), Emory College
2001	University Teaching Fund, Emory University (Collaborative Gullah Project with Dr. Tracy Rone)
1999	American Academy of Religion, Collaborative Research Assistance Grant (Jamaica)
1999	Hewlett Mellon Grant, Holy Cross College (Trinidad & Tobago)
1999	Hewlett Mellon Grant, Holy Cross College, Educational Technology Web Site SETA Program
1998	Research and Publication Faculty Fellowship, College of the Holy Cross (Trinidad & Tobago)
1998	Wallace Faculty Research Grant, Macalester College (Nigeria)

Committees

Stewart is a member of the executive board, ASWAD [1]

Fieldwork

Stewart uses transdisciplinary methods in her research, including the collection of qualitative data which includes ethnographic field work. The focus of her research is African religions and the practices and religious thought of African-descended people in the regions of Anglophone Caribbean and the United States. Another aspect of her research is women's studies, particularly womanist approaches to religion and society. Stewart has lectured and conducted research in African, Latin American, and Caribbean countries including, Trinidad, Jamaica, Nigeria, The Benin Republic, South Africa, Brazil, Mexico, Guatemala, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Congo, and Bermuda.