Oluwatomisin Olayinka Oredein
Assistant Dean for Strategic Initiatives and Theological Imagination and Associate Professor in Black Religious Traditions, Constructive Theology and Ethics
Email: o.oredein@tcu.edu
Phone: 817-257-5809
Biography
Dr. Oluwatomisin Olayinka Oredein joined Brite Divinity School in 2019. Her creative and scholastic work engages liminal identity and faith, American African explorations of womanism, theopoetics, constructive theology, social ethics, and liberative pedagogy.
Dr. Oredein is a graduate of The University of Virginia (BA, 2007) and Duke Divinity School (MDiv, 2010; ThD, 2017). She is the author of _The Theology of Mercy Amba Oduyoye: Ecumenism, Feminism, and Communal Practice_, a Notre Dame Press award-winning monograph that links how the events and pursuits of Mercy Amba Oduyoye's life inform her ecumenical path and the formation of African women's theology.
Oredein is also the co-editor of the anthology _Theopoetics in Color: Embodied Approaches to Theological Discourse_, the first theopoetic work featuring all racially and ethnically minoritized scholars. She is currently working on a monograph examining an ethic of care from a theo-ethical perspective and is co-editing an anthology emphasizing creative, theopoetic, and decolonial explorations of theological anthropology from minoritized perspectives.
Dr. Oredein is the proud daughter of the late Olugbenga and Iyabo Oredein, a tremendously blessed sister, aunty, and friend. Her scholarship exists in her prose, poetry, creative writing, music, and other mediums.
In 2021, she received the Louise Clark Brittan Endowed Faculty Excellence in Teaching Award, an award given by the student body to recognize superlative teaching performance. In 2025, Dr. Oredein was recognized by her colleagues and awarded the Catherine Saylor Hill Endowed Faculty Excellence Award.
Degrees:
Th.D., Duke Divinity School
M.Div., Duke Divinity School
B.A., University of Virginia
Courses Taught:
Introduction to Christian Ethics
Womanist Theology and Ethics
Black Church Traditions and Cultures
The Salvation of Words: Christian Theology and Black Women’s Poetry
African (Im)Migrant Identity and Christian Identity in the U.S.
Decolonizing Christian Discourse: Approaches to Liberating Theology and Church Practice
Professional Affiliations:
American Academy of Religion
Society of Christian Ethics
Fellowship of Protestant Ethics
Society for the Study of Black Religion
Arts, Religion, & Culture
National Women's Studies Association
Association of Writers and Writing Programs
Publications:
The Theology of Mercy Amba Oduyoye: Ecumenism, Feminism, and Communal Practice
Theopoetics In Color: Embodied Approaches in Theological Discourse
Can African Women be Womanists?
Hagar’s Textual Agency: Diversifying Christian Womanist Sources of Interpretation
Sharing Our Knowledge: Feminist Collaborations across Generations
Katie Geneva Cannon and Christian Womanist Religious Scholarship
Distinction and Desire: Racial Reconciliation as a White Ecclesial Project
Interview with Mercy Amba Oduyoye: Mercy Oduyoye in Her Own Words
A Theology of Domesticity: Where Can Black Women Live?
Bondage, Labor, and the Ethics of Care: Eucharistic Misogynoir in Words and Institutions
Reminders of What Once Was: The Ethics of Mercy Amba Oduyoye
What They Don’t Tell You About…
Listening as Weaponized Incompetence
Common Questions
Mercy Amba Oduyoye and Her Circle
The Beauty of Liberation: Decolonization as Talking in Poetry
Winning Students’ Trust by Decolonizing the Classroom
Diversity is Survived
We Have to Tell the Truth: A Liberative Approach to Trauma-Informed Pedagogy
Creativity Needs Anti-Institution Institutions
We Need to Talk about White Belief
An Invitation to Breathe
Pandemic Predispositions: Minority Trauma Responses in Higher Education
Mercy Amba Oduyoye Centers African Women within Christian Theology
First Draft with Oluwatomisin Olayinka Oredein