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Shubha Pathak Associate Professor Philosophy and Religion

Contact
Shubha Pathak
(202) 885-2957 (Office)
CAS | Philosophy/Religion
Battelle-Tompkins 113
Office Hours (Fall 2024): via Zoom audioconferencing by e-mail appointment
Degrees
AB (religion), Princeton University
PhD (social and behavioral sciences), The Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health
AM (divinity), PhD (history of religions), The University of Chicago Divinity School

Bio
Shubha Pathak is a historian of religions who interprets epic myths from Greece, India, and Rome. In addition to teaching courses on intersections of religion, philosophy, and politics in classical and postclassical contexts, she researches epics in their original and later literary forms to illuminate their paradigmatic pantheons and their authors鈥 creative understandings of their places in their universes. Her monograph, (Center for Hellenic Studies, Trustees for Harvard University, 2014), shows how divinity-favored and -favoring bardic kings in the primary Greek and Sanskrit epics articulate and address their respective audiences' existential needs. Her edited volume, (State University of New York Press, 2013), demonstrates the methodological advances made by applying metaphor and metonymy theories in comparative religious studies. Her articles have appeared in such journals as , the , and .
See Also
For the Media
To request an interview for a news story, call 小蓝视频 Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.

Teaching

Fall 2024

  • CORE-105 Complex Problems Seminar: Epic Love, Lust and Loss

  • PHIL-496 Selected Topics:Non-Recurring: Myths/Philosophies of Love/Sex

  • RELG-396 Selected Topics:Non-Recurring: Mod Amer Myth: Edith Hamilton

Spring 2025

  • RELG-145 Religion without Borders

  • RELG-245 Stories of South Asia

  • RELG-396 Selected Topics:Non-Recurring: Mod Amer Myth: Metamorphica

Partnerships & Affiliations


  • Member, Steering Committee, 惭补丑腻产丑腻谤补迟补 and Classical Hinduism Seminar; Past Chair (with Professor Patton Burchett, College of William & Mary, as Past Chair), Hinduism Unit


  • Member


  • Member


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  • Past Chair, Committee on Public Information and Media Relations, Communications and Outreach Division; Past Member, Committee on the Classical Tradition and Reception, Outreach Division


  • Member

Scholarly, Creative & Professional Activities

Research Interests

The philosophical, psychological, and religious aspects of epic poetry and literary听creativity; political aesthetics; political theologies; comparative philosophy and comparative religion;听literary criticism; and contemporary psychological theories.

Grants and Sponsored Research

2016鈥17 College of Arts and Sciences Mellon Faculty Development Fund Grant, 小蓝视频.

2010鈥11 Faculty Research Award, Office of Academic Affairs, 小蓝视频.

2008鈥9 College of Arts and Sciences Mellon Faculty Development Fund Grant, 小蓝视频. 听

Selected Publications

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Books

  • Washington: Center for Hellenic Studies, Trustees for Harvard University; Cambridge: distributed by Harvard University Press, 2014.

  • (edited volume). Albany: State University of New York Press, 2013.

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Articles

  • 听 International Journal of Hindu Studies 27, no. 2 (2023): 173鈥212.
  • 听 In 鈥淭ransdisciplinary Approaches to the 搁补虅尘补虅测补苍蹋补 and 惭补丑补虅产丑补虅谤补迟补,鈥 edited by Laxshmi Rose Greaves and Simon Brodbeck, special issue, Religions of South Asia 16, nos. 2鈥3 (December 2022): 137鈥57.
  • Philosophy of Religion: big question philosophy for scholars and students (Web log). March 15, 2016.
  • Classics@ 12 (2015).
  • 听 International Journal of Hindu Studies 10, no. 2 (2006): 127鈥49.

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Chapter

  • 听 In Visions and Revisions in Sanskrit Narrative: Studies in the Sanskrit Epics and Pur膩峁嘺s, edited by Raj Balkaran and McComas Taylor, 291鈥313.听 Canberra: Australian National University Press, 2023.