Laura S. Grillo is an Affiliated Faculty in the Theology Department at Georgetown University. She earned her Ph.D. in History of Religions from The University of Chicago, specializing in African religions. She is the author of numerous journal and encyclopedia articles on African religions as well as a contributor to a number of anthologies including The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to African Religions and The Blackwell Companion to Religious Ethics. She has been the recipient of research grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Academy of Religions and the West Africa Research Association. Her forthcoming book, An Intimate Rebuke: Female Genital Power in Ritual and Politics in Côte d’Ivoire(Duke University Press), was generously supported by a Research Fellowship at Harvard Divinity School. For six years Laura served as co-chair of the African Religions Group in the American Academy of Religion. She is currently a member of the editorial board of the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, and Religion Compass Journal. She is currently working on a book, “Contested Powers and Power Contests: Female Genital Power in Ritual and Politics in Côte d’Ivoire.”