Questions?
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Philosophy / Religion
202-885-2925
Fax: 202-885-1094
philrel@american.edu
Battelle Tompkins, Room 120
Harshe, Shelley G
Senior Administrative Assistant
Evan Berry
,Assistant Professor
Evan Berry is Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Religion at American University and Co-Director of the Ethics, Peace, and Global Affairs master's program. His research interests focus on ideas of nature in modern western culture, particularly the... [More]
Farhang Erfani
,Assistant Professor
I joined the AU community in 2005. My teaching and research are focused on democratic theory, globalization, exile, existentialism and aesthetics, particularly philosophy of film.
Ellen Feder
,Associate Professor
Ellen K. Feder works at the intersection of contemporary continental philosophy and feminist and critical race theory, particularly as these relate to matters of social policy. Family Bonds: Genealogies of Race and Gender applies Foucault's method to... [More]
Gershon Greenberg
,Professor
Gershon Greenberg is the author of three definitive bibliographies of religious thought and the Holocaust, and numerous articles on German-Jewish philosophy, history of Jewish thought in America and religious responses through the Holocaust. He has s... [More]
Kimberly Leighton
,Assistant Professor
Kim Leighton was raised in the Boston area, and has spent much of her life in New York and Western Mass. She spent her junior year abroad studying at Oxford University. After finishing her dissertation in philosophy on understandings of self-knowledg... [More]
Martyn Oliver
,Professorial Lecturer
Martyn was born and raised in southern Minnesota. In addition to Washington State and Boston, his studies also took him to Scotland, Lebanon, Austria, and Morocco. His work explores the construction of religious identity, particularly how Western lit... [More]
Amy Oliver
,Department Chair, Philosophy and Religion
Professor Oliver's teaching and research on Latin America explore philosophical topics such as marginality, feminism, nepantlismo, and transfronterismo. She works on the Hispanic essay of ideas and Latin American narrative. She has lived in Mexico, A... [More]
Jin Park
,Associate Professor
Jin Y. Park specializes in Buddhist philosophy, postmodernism, deconstruction, Buddhist ethics, Buddhist-postmodern comparative philosophy, and Buddhist encounter with modernity in Korea. Park’s research in Buddhism focuses on the Zen and Huayan scho... [More]
Shubha Pathak
,Assistant Professor
Shubha Pathak is a historian of religions who specializes in the mythological literatures of ancient India, Greece, and Rome. In addition to offering courses on philosophies of art, approaches to studying religion, and Hinduism, she is researching p... [More]
Jeffrey Reiman
,Professor
Jeffrey Reiman is the William Fraser McDowell Professor of Philosophy. He was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1942. After receiving his PhD, he joined the American University faculty in 1970, in the Center for the Administration of Justice (now called... [More]
Andrea Tschemplik
,Associate Professor
I came to American University in 2001 and have been teaching a variety of courses in the History of Philosophy, as well as thematic courses such as the Philosophy of Love and Friendship. My primary scholarly interest is in Ancient Philosophy, where I... [More]
Lauren Weis
,Assistant Professor
I joined the American University faculty in 2008, and have been teaching courses in the history of philosophy, metaphysics, ethics, and feminist theory. My philosophical research focuses on critiques of the Western metaphysical tradition articulated ... [More]
Debra Bergoffen
,Bishop Hamilton Lecturer in Philosophy
Dr. Debra Bergoffen is the Bishop Hamilton Lecturer in Philosophy at American University and Professor Emerita of Philosophy at George Mason University. During her tenure at Mason she chaired the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies and was... [More]
Leila Berner
,Scholar in Residence
A Fulbright scholar, Rabbi Leila Gal Berner, PhD, has spent extensive time in Spain researching Jews during the Spanish Reconquista. Ordained at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, Rabbi Berner currently serves Kol Ami: The Northern Virginia R... [More]
Rebecca Carr
,Scholar in Residence
Rebecca Carr is Scholar-in-Residence. She teaches courses in American philosophy, moral philosophy, and logic.
Erik Cooke
,Adjunct Instructor
I’m a political science doctoral student and instructor in the Philosophy Department. I specialize in Latin American politics and community power. I frequently diverge into neuroscience, the physiology of decision-making, food politics, the politics ... [More]
Jane Flax
,Scholar in Residence
Professor Flax's research interests include feminist theory, critical race theory, psychoanalysis, contemporary European and American political theory, and philosophy of mind and ethics. She also maintains a private psychotherapy practice in Washingt... [More]
Mark Schaefer
,Adjunct Instructor
Mark was born in Buffalo, New York and grew up in Center Brunswick, New York, near Albany. He earned degrees in Russian Language and Literature from the State University of New York at Albany before moving to Washington to attend the George Washingto... [More]
Erick Valdes
,Adjunct Professorial Lecturer
Dr. Valdes earned his PhD in Philosophy from University of Chile. His areas of specialization include political philosophy, bioethics, ethics, moral philosophy, philosophy of technology, and contemporary philosophy. He also teaches Health Care Ethics... [More]
Affiliate Faculty
Alan Levine
,Director, Political Theory Institute and Associate Professor
Alan M. Levine is an Associate Professor of political theory in the Department of Government and an Affiliate Associate Professor in AU’s Department of Philosophy. He has held fellowships at Princeton’s James Madison Program; the Hoover Institution a... [More]



