About

about justin

I am a lifelong Tennessean, and my small town in West Tennessee provided the backdrop to my first learned lessons about race and racism. Like most people, I have a complicated relationship with the people and places that have shaped me, but I will always claim them as “my people,” and I hope they would do the same.

I earned a Ph.D. in Christian Ethics from Fuller Theological Seminary (Pasadena, CA), where I studied how white evangelicals in the south responded to the Civil Rights Movement. My dissertation was more or less a form of therapy in dealing with whiteness and biases. Prior to Fuller I earned my Master of Divinity (MDiv) from Duke Divinity School, focusing on ethics and practical theology.

After nine years of graduate education and nearly 15 years of teaching I’ve learned how to ask better questions, rather than provide all the answers, and hopefully, how to foster good conversations. Nearly every step of the way, I have worked on matters of race and diversity at the interpersonal and institutional level, which you can read more about in my CV.

Knoxville, Tennessee, is my home where I teach and write. It is also where I routinely lose debates, board games and Words with Friends to my wife, Erin. When I’m not reading and writing, I’m exercising and letting my mind wander on how to fix the New York Mets or comparing legendary emcees with today’s hip-hop. I’m bearded in the winters, so photos may vary.