Dabney Evans

Dabney P. Evans, PhD, MPH is an exceptional public health leader, serving as an Associate Professor of Global Health in the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University. She is a mixed-methods researcher focused on the health and human rights of women and girls. Dr. Evans received her Master of Public Health degree in 1998 from Emory University and her doctoral degree in law from the University of Aberdeen (UK) in 2011. She is architect and Director of the Center for Humanitarian Emergencies in the Rollins School of Public Health and the Emory University Institute of Human Rights - both focus on capacity building. 

Dr. Evans’ current research projects focus on gender-based violence, and sexual and reproductive health and rights.  Her global research portfolio includes projects on: intimate partner violence during the COVID-19 pandemic (US); the commercial sexual exploitation of children (US); femicide prevention (Brazil);  and femicide perpetration (Argentina).

An editor of the text, Rights-Based Approaches to Health, Dr. Evans has advanced human rights discourse across a range of public health issues.  Dr. Evans has published over forty book chapters, scholarly articles and commissioned works; she has made over 200 peer-reviewed and invited presentations.  Her public scholarship has appeared in the Pacific Standard, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Ms. Magazine and The Hill, where she is a regular contributor; in 2015 she presented a TEDx talk.  She is on several editorial boards.  

Dr. Evans is a member of the Delta Omega Public Health Honor Society, Omicron Delta Kappa National Service Honor Society, past-president of the Georgia Federation of Professional Health Educators, and past chair of the Human Rights Forum of the American Public Health Association. She is the recipient of numerous awards including the Crystal Apple for excellence in professional school education (2015), the Unsung Heroine Award (2016), the American Public Health Association Mid-Career Award in International Health (2017), the Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health Early Career Teaching Award (2018) and the Hubert Department of Public Health Research Award (2021). She is a Board member of the Feminist Women’s Health Center and represents Emory University on the steering committee of the Interagency Working Group on Reproductive Health in Crisis.  She is fluent in Portuguese.