Candler will welcome Walter Earl Fluker and Kwok Pui Lan to the faculty beginning in the spring 2020 semester.
Walter Earl Fluker, who served as the Alonzo L. McDonald Family Chair on the Life and Teachings of Jesus and Their Impact on Culture at Candler in spring 2019, joins the Candler faculty as Dean’s Professor of Spirituality, Ethics, and Leadership. He previously served as Martin Luther King, Jr. Professor of Ethical Leadership, the editor of the Howard Thurman Papers Project and the Director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Initiative for the Development of Ethical Leadership at Boston University School of Theology. Fluker earned his MDiv from Garrett-Evangelical Seminary and his PhD in social ethics from Boston University. He was founding executive director of the Andrew Young Center for Global Leadership Center and the Coca-Cola Professor of Leadership Studies at Morehouse College. Known as an expert in the theory and practice of ethical leadership, Fluker is an internationally-known consultant, speaker, lecturer and workshop leader. He is the author of The Ground Has Shifted: The Future of the Black Church in Post-Racial America (New York University Press, 2016) and Ethical Leadership: The Quest for Character, Civility and Community (Fortress, 2009), and the editor of the multi-volume series The Papers of Howard Washington Thurman (University of South Carolina Press) and Educating Ethical Leaders for the Twenty-First Century (Cascade Books, 2013).
Kwok Pui Lan rejoins the Candler faculty as Dean’s Professor of Systematic Theology. She previously served as Distinguished Visiting Professor of Theology for the 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 academic years, and was named Faculty Person of the Year by the student body both years. Kwok earned her ThM from Southeast Asia Graduate School of Theology and her ThD from Harvard University. She is the former William F. Cole Professor of Christian Theology and Spirituality at Episcopal Divinity School, and has also taught at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Auburn Theological Seminary, Union Theological Seminary, and Yale Divinity School. Kwok’s research focuses on Asian feminist theology and postcolonial theology. She has written or edited 20 books in English and Chinese, including Occupy Religion: Theology of the Multitude (Rowman and Littlefield, 2012, with Joerg Rieger); Postcolonial Imagination and Feminist Theology (Westminster John Knox, 2005); Introducing Asian Feminist Theology (Sheffield Academic Press, 2000); Discovering the Bible in the Non-Biblical World (Orbis Books, 1995); and Chinese Women and Christianity, 1860–1927 (Scholars Press, 1992). An internationally known scholar, Kwok served as president of the American Academy of Religion in 2011, cofounded the network Pacific, Asian, North American Asian Women in Theology and Ministry, and has held leadership roles in the Association of Theological Schools and the Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning.