Visiting Fellows - 2007

Name                           : Veronica Rovoletto

Institution                   : Bard College

Date of Visit(s)           : 1 October 2006 – 1 September 2007

E-mail                         : veronica.rovoletto@gmail.com

Brief Biodata

Veronica rovoletto was born in Venice, Italy, in 1973. She studied Philosophy at the University of Padua and pursued a PhD in philosophy at the University of Barcelona, Spain, where she became researcher in 2006. After studying with Francisco Lopez Frias and Norbert Bilbeny, Specializing in practical philosophy, she moved to New York, teaching at Bard college, where she published the Challenge of Globalization, BSS, Journal of Social Science, New York 2006. Influenced by the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche and his concept of freedom, she analyzes the development and structure of the modern society focusing on its mass culture aspects. She asserts that, since the human beings cannot be detached from their circumstances, which form the world where they live, there must be constant attention to not be absorbed from those circumstances and, at the same time, there must be an attempt to absorb them. They cannot be avoided since they constitute our unique being, which must be preserved against the dryness of thinking created by a mass oriented culture.

Name                          : Assoc Prof Dr Stefan Bucher

Institution                   : Sultan Idris Education University (UPSI), Malaysia

Date of Visit(s)           : 2 October – 31 December 2006

                                      10 April – 11 July 2007

                                       29 March 2012 – 30 September 2013

E-mail                         : st_bu@yahoo.com

Brief Biodata

Dr. Stefan Bucher received his PhD (magna cum laude) in philosophy in 1989 at the University of Münster (Germany). He has been an Asst./Assoc. Professor at Kyungbuk National University (Korea), the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Tamkang University (Taiwan) and Sultan Idris Education University. He has served on committees and boards in universities, academic associations and an NGO. In Malaysia, he has been collaborating with SUHAKAM in organising Human Rights Days and researching Human Rights education. He has been lecturing and giving talks in numerous countries across Europe, Asia and America covering moral, social and intercultural issues and conducted research on peace, human rights and education while being affiliated with academic research centres in Europe and Asia. One of them is the UM Centre for Civilisational Dialogue, where he had two short-term attachments in 2006 and 2007 and where he serves currently as a Senior Research Fellow, since March 2012.

Name                           : Dr Eric Winkel
Institution                   : Bridge Academy Charter School, Las Vegas, New Mexico
Date of Visit(s)           : 14 – 30 July 2005
                                       2 August 2007
E-mail                         : ericwinkel@ymail.com

Brief Biodata
Ph.D. in Government and International Studies from the University of South Carolina, he worked with IIIT in Herndon, Virginia and then at the International Islamic University Malaysia on ideas of Islamisation. He has taught at the University of New Mexico, Universidad del Valle de Mexico, at the Quaid-i-Azam University in Pakistan as a Senior Fulbright Scholar, and again recently at the National College of Arts in Lahore. His primary study for over twenty years is the Futuḥāt of Ibn ʿArabī. He has addressed the Muhyiddin Ibn ʿArabī Society in Berkeley, in Santa Barbara, as well as Oxford in 2008. Dr. Winkel has made great efforts to understand quantum mechanics and absorbed the fascination with chaos, fractals, and complexity emanating from Los Alamos and the Santa Fe Institute. He believes the greatly expanded interest in and study of Ibn ʿArabī corresponds to the last four decades of interest in complexity. From 2000–2008 Dr. Winkel co-founded a small public high school in rural New Mexico (USA) with grants from the U.S. Department of Education. His school introduced students to languages and cultures, culminating in a ‘global experience’ for a total of thirty-five students travelling to nine countries.

Name                         : Melanie Jones-Leaning
Institution                   : 
Date of Visit(s)          : 
E-mail                         : 

Brief Biodata

Name                           : Dr. Vivienne Angeles

Institution                   : La Salle University

Date of Visit(s)           : 27 June – 30 November 2007

E-mail                         : angeles@lasalle.edu

Brief Biodata

Ph.D., Temple University, 1987

M.A., Temple University, 1979, Kansas State University, 1971

B.A., University of the Philippines, 1964

Areas of Interest

Islam in America, Muslim movements in the Philippines and Southeast Asia, Visual expressions of Islam in Southeast Asia, Issues in religion, gender, and migration, Religion, identity, and globalization

Name                           : Assoc Prof Dr Alastair Stephen Gunn

Institution                   : Waikato University, New Zealand

Date of Visit(s)           : 4 September – 15 December 2006

                                       1 March – 1 June 2007

E-mail                         : alastair@waikato.ac.nz

Brief Biodata

Associate Professor Alastair S. Gunn (PhD Waikato) is a member of the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at the University of Waikato, Hamilton, NZ. He has been visiting scholar or professor at several universities in the US, Australia and Malaysia. His teaching and research interests are in applied ethics, including bioethics and engineering, environmental and media ethics. He has published three books on engineering ethics, all of which have been translated into Japanese and one into Chinese, and many monographs and articles. He has a particular interest in internet based teaching as well as philosophy in schools, and is involved in setting up a programme in Malaysia. He has been a member or convenor of several health and research ethics committees in NZ and regularly undertakes ethics consultancy work in New Zealand and internationally.