Faculty

 

 

                     

Veena R. Howard, Ph.D.

Professor of Asian Religious Traditions in the Department of Philosophy at California State University, Fresno She also holds the Endowed Chair in Jain and Hindu Dharma. She was recently appointed as the director of the M.K. Gandhi Center: Inner Peace and Sarvodaya. She is the coordinator of Peace and Conflict Studies Program. She has authored and edited three books. She has published over two dozen articles in scholarly journals and anthologies. She has served on various communities boards including as the Board of Trustees of the Parliament of the World’s Religions.

 

Raja Rosenhagen
Assistant Professor

 

After earning my M.A. in Münster, which I began majoring in Indian Studies and ended majoring in Philosophy, I worked for some time at the University of Rostock, where I served as main coordinator of the Center for Logic, Philosophy of Science, and History of Science.

From Rostock, I moved on to Pittsburgh, where I completed my Ph.D. in the area of contemporary Philosophy of Perception, Epistemology, Metaphysics, and Philosophy of Science. My doctoral advisor was Anil Gupta.
After earning my Ph.D., I accepted a position at Ashoka University in Sonipat, Haryana, in India. At Ashoka, I served as Assistant Professor of Philosophy, completed a full tenure as Associate Dean of Academic Affairs, served for a year as Department Chair, eventually earned tenure, and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2023, while on extended sabbatical leave, which I spent serving as the University of Pittsburgh's inaugural Bhagawan Vasu Pujya Swami post-doctoral fellow in Jain Studies.

Since my graduate student days, my areas of research have expanded beyond from purely theoretical concerns so as to include work in Moral Perception [especially on Iris Murdoch and Simone Weil], Philosophy of Love, Jain Philosophy, Philosophical Counselling, Fusion Philosophy, and Non-Violent [Just] Communication. In fact, I have become increasingly interested in bringing my background in analytic philosophy and Indian Philosophy to bear on Peace and Conflict Studies [though, since I care most about Philosophy of Love and Nonviolence, I prefer the label 'Peace and Nonviolence Studies'].

Since it provides a unique opportunity to pursue all my various interests, I was thrilled to join Fresno State's Philosophy Department, where I serve the community primarily by helping teach for, further grow, and develop the PAX program, by assisting with the administration of the M. K. Gandhi Center for Inner Peace and Sarvodaya, and, of course, by offering philosophy courses in my areas.

In the medium term, I would love to help develop ties [and perhaps a student exchange] between Fresno State and Ashoka, as well as a collaboration with the University of Münster. [After all, Münster is one of Fresno's official sister cities!]