Dr. Merold Westphal to visit Geneva College for annual Bitar Lecture Series

BEAVER FALLS, PA (03/24/2014)(readMedia)-- Dr. Merold Westphal will be speaking on April 8 and 9, 2014 for Geneva College's Dr. Byron I. Bitar Memorial Lecture in Philosophy, an annual event since 2004. Geneva College will host the renowned speaker for a public lecture series titled "Getting from There to Here: From Modernity to Postmodernity."

The first lecture will be at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 8 in John White Chapel of Old Main. The presentation is titled "Modernity and the Quest for Autonomy." His second lecture, "Postmodernity and its 'Other'," will take place at the same time and location on the following day, Wednesday, April 9.

Westphal has lectured widely in the United States and Europe, as well as in China and Brazil. He served as President of the Hegel Society of America and the Soren Kierkegaard Society, and as Executive Co-Director of the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy (SPEP). Westphal has written many books including, God, Guilt and Death, Transcendence and Self-Transcendence, and Whose Community? Which Interpretation?: Philosophical Hermeneutics for the Church.

Westphal holds a Ph.D. from Yale University and a B.A., Wheaton College. He is a Distinguished Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Fordham University, and he has also taught at Yale and Hope College, with visiting positions at Juniata, Loyola (Maryland), Villanova, Fuller Seminary, and Harvard Divinity School.

Dr. Keith Martel will serve as Respondent to Westphal's lectures. He holds a M.A and Ph.D. from Duquesne University and is an Associate Professor of Humanities and Higher Education at Geneva College. In his undergraduate major in philosophy at Geneva, Martel studied with the late Dr. Byron Bitar. His master's thesis engaged the work of Dr. Westphal.

The Dr. Byron I. Bitar Memorial Lecture in Philosophy is endowed by the William C. Kriner Family in memory of Geneva College's beloved professor of a quarter-century, in order to continue his legacy and vision for philosophy. The Lecture was inaugurated in 2004, a year after Dr. Bitar's untimely death. Geneva College's Philosophy Program can be contacted at 724-847-6700.

Westphal's lectures are free and open to the public.

Geneva College invites students to accept the challenge of an academically excellent, Christ-centered and affordable education. Offering nearly 40 undergraduate majors, Adult Degree Programs with fully online and campus-based options, and seven graduate degrees, programs are recognized for their high quality. U.S. News & World Report ranks Geneva as a Top 10 Best Value in the North Region with one of the Top 100 engineering programs in the nation. Adhering to the inerrancy of Scripture, a Geneva education is grounded in God's word as well as in a core curriculum designed to prepare students vocationally to think, write and communicate well in today's world.