Emilie Maureen Townes (born August 1, 1955, Durham, North Carolina) is an American Christian social ethicist and theologian. She was Dean, E. Rhodes, and Leona B. Carpenter Professor of Womanist Ethics and Society at the Vanderbilt University Divinity School. Townes was the first African-American woman to be elected president of the American Academy of Religion in 2008. She also served as the president of the Society for the Study of Black Religion from 2012–2016. Source: Wikipedia (en)