RICHARD A. COHEN
Professor of Jewish Thought
Professor of Philosophy
Affiliated Professor, Department of Comparative Literature
Director, Levinas Philosophy Summer Seminar
712 Clemens Hall (o) 716 645-3473
University at Buffalo (SUNY) racohen@buffalo.edu
Buffalo, New York 14260 (c) 716 880-0083
Education
Ph.D., philosophy State University of New York at Stony Brook, 1980.
M.A., philosophy State University of New York at Stony Brook, 1976.
philosophie Université de Paris, Paris-Sorbonne, 1974-1975.
B.A., philosophy Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 1972.
B.A., political science Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 1972.
Specialization Competence
Modern and Contemporary Continental History of Philosophy
Philosophy and Jewish Thought, Spinoza,
Levinas
Teaching
2019 spring & 2017 spring: Visiting Research Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Rome, La Sapienza, Rome, Italy.
2012 spring: Visiting Scholar, Kadish Center for Morality, Law, and Public Affairs, Berkeley School of Law, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, California, USA.
2008 fall to present: Professor, University at Buffalo (SUNY), Buffalo, New York, USA. Fall 2015 to present, Department of Jewish Thought; Chair, fall 2015 to summer 2016; fall 2008 to present, Department of Philosophy; fall 2008 to summer 2015, Director, Institute of Jewish Thought and Heritage.
2008 fall: Visiting Professor, Department of Philosophy, Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, New York, USA.
1994 to 2008 spring: Isaac Swift Distinguished Professor of Judaic Studies and Professor of Religious Studies; Coordinator (and creator) of Judaic Studies Minor (1999); University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, North Carolina, USA.
2002, 2004, 2005, 2006, summer, Adjunct Visiting Professor, John Cabot University, Rome, Italy.
2003 spring; Visiting Professor, John Cabot University, Rome, Italy; and adjunct Professor, Loyola University of Chicago in Rome, Italy.
2001 summer: Scholar-in-Residence, John Cabot University, Rome, Italy.
1999 spring: Visiting Professor, Department of Jewish Philosophy, Tel Aviv University,
Ramat Aviv, Israel.
1994 spring: Visiting Professor, Department of Jewish Thought, Hebrew University of
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel.
1989 fall to 1994 spring: Aaron Aronov Chair of Judaic Studies; “Eminent Scholar” and Associate Professor of Religious Studies; Director (and creator) of Judaic Studies Minor (1991); University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, USA.
1988 fall to 1989 spring: Associate Professor of Humanities, Shawnee State University,
Portsmouth, Ohio, USA.
1985 fall to 1988 spring: Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Loyola College, Baltimore,
Maryland, USA.
1980 to 1985 spring: Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Pennsylvania State University, Scranton, Pennsylvania, USA.
Director of Summer Seminars
National Endowment for the Humanities - Summer Seminar for College and University Teachers
2020 “Emmanuel Levinas: Ethics of Democracy,” August, at University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY (forthcoming)
2017 “Emmanuel Levinas on Morality, Justice and the Political,” July 17-21 at University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY
Levinas Philosophy Summer Seminar
2019 “Irresponsibility and Justice,” July 15-19, Center for Jewish History, New York, NY
2018 “Justice and Ideology,” July 2-6, University of Chicago Center in Paris, Paris, France
2016 “Free Speech and Difficult Freedom,” July 18-22, Richard Diner Center for Jewish Studies, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, CA
2015 “Eros and Ethics,” July 6-10, John Cabot University, Rome, Italy
2014 “Levinas and Kant: The Primacy of Ethics,” July 7-11, University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY
2013 “The Origin of Responsibility,” July 8-12 at Jewish Culture and Information
Center, Vilnius, Lithuania
Colloquia Organized at University at Buffalo
“Cosmopolitanism versus Globalization,” October 23-24, 2017, 508 O’Brian Hall, North Campus. Participants: Richard A. Cohen (UB), Joseph Conte (UB), Sergey Dolgopolski (UB), Tito Marci (University of Rome, La Sapienza), Deborah Reed-Danahay (UB), Luca Scuccimarra (University of Rome, La Sapienza)
“Spinoza, Judaism, Politics,” November 6, 2013, 508 O’Brian Hall, North Campus. Participants: Richard A. Cohen (UB), Steven Nadler (University of Wisconsin), Zev Harvey (Hebrew University of Jerusalem), and Alex Green (UB)
“Translating Judaism for the Wor(l)d: Cohen’s ‘Levinasian Meditations’ (2010) and Hughes’ ‘The Invention of Jewish Culture’ (2010),” May 2, 2011, 708 Clemens Hall, North Campus. Participants: Richard A. Cohen (UB), Ken Dauber (UB), Aaron Hughes (UB), Martin Kavka (Florida State University), Sean Hand (University of Warwick)
Books
Politics of Humanity. Co-authors, Tito Marci and Luca Scuccimarra (forthcoming).
Religion, Heidegger and Levinas. Co-author, Algis MicKunis (forthcoming).
Saving Democracy: Ethical Politics (forthcoming).
Out of Control: Confrontations between Spinoza and Levinas. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2016. 369pp.
Levinasian Meditations: Ethics, Philosophy and Religion. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 2010. 377pp.
Ethics, Exegesis and Philosophy: Interpretation after Levinas. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001, 2007. 361pp.
Elevations: The Height of the Good in Rosenzweig and Levinas. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. 342pp.
Books Translated, Edited and/or Introduced
On Obliteration: An Interview with Françoise Armengaud Concerning the Work of Sacha Sosno by Emmanuel Levinas; French, German and English (revised English translation by Richard A. Cohen), ed. Johannes Bennke. Berlin: Diaphanes Verlag, 2019.
Ricoeur As Another: The Ethics of Subjectivity. Co-Edited by Richard A. Cohen and James L. Marsh. Albany: SUNY Press, 2002. 239pp.
In Proximity: Emmanuel Levinas and the Eighteenth Century. Co-Edited by Melvyn New, Robert Bernasconi and Richard A. Cohen. Lubbock: Texas Tech University Press, 2001. 419pp.
Ninety-five Poems and Hymns by Judah Halevi by Franz Rosenzweig. Edited and introduced by Richard A. Cohen. Translated by Eva Jospe, Thomas Kovach and Gerda Schmidt. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000. 283pp.
New Talmudic Readings by Emmanuel Levinas. Translated and introduced by Richard A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1999. 133pp.
Discovering Existence with Husserl by Emmanuel Levinas. Edited and introduced by Richard A. Cohen; co-translated with Michael B. Smith. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1998. 198pp.
Time and the Other and Additional Essays by Emmanuel Levinas. Translated, edited, and introduced by Richard A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1987. 149pp.
Face to Face with Levinas. Edited and introduced by Richard A. Cohen. Albany: State
University of New York Press, 1986. 264pp.
Ethics and Infinity by Emmanuel Levinas. Translated and introduced by Richard A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1985. 126pp.
Books Introduced
Preface (vii-ix) to Psychotherapy for the Other, ed. George Kunz, Kevin Krycka, George Sayre. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 2015.
Foreword (English, 1-9; Chinese translation by Celine Pan and Meng-Rut Ke, 11-17) to Chung-Hsiung Lai, Responding to the Other: Revisiting Levinas [in Chinese]. Taipai: Bookman Press, 2014.
Unforeseen History by Emmanuel Levinas. Translated by Nidra Poller. Introduction (pp. xi-xxv) by Richard A. Cohen. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2004.
Humanism of the Other by Emmanuel Levinas. Translated by Nidra Poller. Introduction (pp. viii-xliv) by Richard A. Cohen. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2003
Bioethical and Ethical Issues Surrounding the Trials and Code of Nuremberg, edited by Jacques Rozenberg. Preface (pp. xii-xx) by Richard A. Cohen. Lewiston: The Edwin Mellon Press, 2003.
Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence by Emmanuel Levinas. Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Foreword (pp. xi-xvi) by Richard A. Cohen (1998). Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1981.
The Theory of Intuition in Husserl’s Phenomenology, Second Edition, by Emmanuel Levinas. Translated by Andre Orianne. Preface (pp. ix-xxxi) by Richard A. Cohen
(1998). Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1995.
Journals Edited
Religions, online journal (reviewed), special issue, “Levinas and the Political,” eds. Richard A. Cohen and Jolanta Saldukaityte, Volume 9-10, number 3 (Basel, Switzerland, 2019).
Subsection on "Give Ethics a Chance: Rethinking Politics and Ethics in Contemporary American Society," in Sociologia: Revista Quadrimestrale di Scienze Storiche e Socioli, Year 51, No. 3, 2017; 7-30 (editor’s introduction, 7).
Levinas Studies, Vol. 11. Co-Edited by Richard A. Cohen and Jolanta Saldukaityte. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, Volume 11, fall 2017; 257pp (co-editor’s introduction, vii-xiv). [This volume appeared in mid-2018.]
The Eighteenth Century: Theory and Interpretation, Vol. 40, No. 3 (pp. 187-278), fall 1999, special issue: “Emmanuel Levinas and the Eighteenth Century,” edited by Melvyn New with Robert Bernasconi and Richard A. Cohen.
Interviews
Interview by Donald Wallenfang, July 26, 2017, at Loyola University, Chicago (Lakeside Campus), during 12th annual meeting of North American Levinas Society
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I50Bsu6M2sw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_v6gQeUflU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jz12OiKmouM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQnwp-LI-tU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2l6K-wVQCc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6V8kFRwBbI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhrO6kSVHFg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2CTc2RGLkY
“Interview with Richard A. Cohen on Levinas and Spinoza,” by Alan Brill. Posted December 14, 2016. See, https://kavvanah.wordpress.com/2016/12/14/interview-with-richard-a-cohen-on-levinas-and-spinoza/
“Defending Levinas: An Interview with Richard Cohen,” interviewer, Chung-Hsiung Lai, [Chinese] translation by Yu-Wen Liu, in Chung-Wai Literary Quarterly, Vol. 36, No. 4, 2007, ed. Chung-Hsiung Lai, 267-306.