Dr. Evelyn L. Parker is 15th President of the Society for the Study of Black Religion. President Parker is Professor Emerita of Practical Theology at Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University. She joined the faculty in July 1998.
Parker is the author of Between Sisters: Emancipatory Hope Out of Tragic Relationships, (Cascade Books, 2017) and Trouble Don’t Last Always: Emancipatory Hope Among African American Adolescents (Pilgrim Press, 2003) and editor of The Sacred Selves of Adolescent Girls: Hard Stories of Race, Class, and Gender (Pilgrim Press, 2006). She has also published several chapters and journal articles on adolescent spirituality, including “Divine Fortitude: A Reflection on God’s goodness in black female child soldiers,” in Susan Willhauck, ed., Female Child Soldiering: Gender Violence and Feminist Theologies. Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2019. Evelyn earned her Ph.D. from the Joint Program of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary/Northwestern University in Religious and Theological Studies, with an interdisciplinary emphasis in Christian Education, Womanist approaches to religion and society, and education and public policy. While at Garrett Seminary/Northwestern University, she was a Fund for Theological Education Black Doctoral Scholar from 1993-1995. Parker is a J. William Fulbright Scholar, 2019-2020, Cape Town, South Africa, focusing on the role of religious leaders in preventing and intervening in teen dating violence. She is the Past President of the Association of Practical Theology.
