Professor Gwen Griffith-Dickson, Director and Founder
Professor Griffith-Dickson specialises in the philosophy and theology of different faiths. She has done groundbreaking work in bringing an interfaith approach to theology and the philosophy of religion. Her research work focuses on the beliefs of different religions, their mutual relations, and their impact on contemporary issues.
Born and raised in Hawaii, Professor Gwen Griffith-Dickson’s academic career has been spent entirely in London. At the University of London, Birkbeck College, she developed and managed the country’s largest continuing education programme in Religious Studies, along with Islamic Studies, Theology and Philosophy. She was the first woman to hold the Gresham Chair in Divinity in 2001 at Gresham College. She left Birkbeck in 2004 to found The Lokahi Foundation.
With a background in theology and philosophy, teaching and research interests span the two disciplines, with a major focus on the philosophy of religion.
Gwen's principal research interests comprise the philosophical issues of religions, and the relation of different faiths and their shared histories and beliefs. She has a background in Continental European Philosophy, especially German thought, as well as a keen interest in Hawaiian Studies. Theological interests are at the philosophical end of theology: language, religious knowledge and metaphysics, interpretation and methodology.
On 16 September 2011 it was announced that Gwen was appointed Vice-Principal - Academic of Heythrop College, the specialist philosophy and theology college of the University of London. She will take up her new role in January 2012 and will remain Director of The Lokahi Foundation. This key academic appointment will strengthen the link between academia and Lokahi's social impact mission within communities. To see the full press release issued by Heythrop College, please click here.
Publications include:
> The Philosophy of Religion, SCM Press, 2005
> Human and Divine, Duckworth, 2000
> A Passion for Critique, with Herman Browne, Sit Press
> Johann Georg Hamann's Relational Metacriticism, De Gruyter, 1995
> The Gresham Lectures, 2001-2009 (transcripts & video)