IAFOR > The Asian Conference on Ethics, Religion & Philosophy (ACERP) > ACERP2019 > Speakers

Speakers

The Asian Conference on Ethics, Religion & Philosophy (ACERP) is a multidisciplinary conference held concurrently with The Asian Conference on Psychology & the Behavioral Sciences (ACP). Keynote, Featured and Spotlight Speakers will provide a variety of perspectives from different academic and professional backgrounds. Registration for either conference will allow participants to attend sessions in both.

This page provides information about presenters. For details of presentations and other programming, please visit the Programme page.

  • Nicholas Benes
    Nicholas Benes
    The Board Director Training Institute of Japan, Japan
  • Mimi Bong
    Mimi Bong
    Korea University, South Korea
  • George D. Chryssides
    George D. Chryssides
    The University of Birmingham, UK
  • Satoru Nishizawa
    Satoru Nishizawa
    Yamanashi Prefectural University, Japan
  • David Putwain
    David Putwain
    Liverpool John Moores University, UK
  • Frank S. Ravitch
    Frank S. Ravitch
    Michigan State University College of Law, USA
  • Brian Victoria
    Brian Victoria
    Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, UK

Previous Speakers

View details of speakers at past ACERP conferences via the links below.

ACERP2018 ACERP2017 ACERP2016
ACERP2015 ACERP2014 ACERP2013
ACERP2012 ACERP2011
Nicholas Benes
The Board Director Training Institute of Japan, Japan

Biography

Nicholas Benes is head of the government-approved nonprofit public-interest organization the Board Director Training Institute of Japan (BDTI). He has served as an investment banker at JP Morgan, founded an M&A advisory firm and has nine years of experience as an independent director on a number of Japanese corporate boards. He holds a JD-MBA degree and is an inactive member of the bar in California and New York. In 2010, he led a task force that laid the groundwork for Abenomics’ Third Arrow. In 2013, he proposed that the creation of a corporate-governance code be included in the LDP’s growth strategy. More recently, he persuaded the government to focus on the vital theme of stewardship by corporate pension funds.

Featured Presentation (2019) | The Next 50 Years
Mimi Bong
Korea University, South Korea

Biography

Mimi Bong is Professor of Educational Psychology and the Associate Director of the Brain and Motivation Research Institute (bMRI) of Korea University. Bong has been studying motivation of adolescents in school settings and published over 60 articles and book chapters on related topics over the past 18 years. Her work appears in journals such as Journal of Educational Psychology, Educational Psychologist, Educational Psychology Review, and Contemporary Educational Psychology, among others.

Bong was recognized as the 8th most productive educational psychologist for the period of 1997-2001 and received the ‘Richard E. Snow Award for Early Contributions in Educational Psychology’ from the American Psychological Association/Division 15. She is the Associate Editor of American Educational Research Journal for the Teaching, Learning, and Human Development section and has served or currently serves on the editorial boards of Child Development, Contemporary Educational Psychology, Educational Psychologist, Educational Psychology Review, Educational Researcher, Journal of Educational Psychology, Journal of Experimental Education, and Theory into Practice.

Keynote Presentation (2019) | Presentation information will be added here shortly
George D. Chryssides
The University of Birmingham, UK

Biography

Dr George D. Chryssides is Honorary Research Fellow in Contemporary Religion at the University of Birmingham, after being Head of Religious Studies at the University of Wolverhampton, UK, from 2001 to 2008. George Chryssides obtained a First Class Honours MA degree in philosophy at the University of Glasgow, and a First Class Honours Bachelor of Divinity in systematic theology. He subsequently undertook postgraduate research at the University of Oxford, obtaining his doctorate in 1974.

From the 1980, George Chryssides’ main interest has been new religious movements, on which he has authored numerous books and scholarly articles. Recent publications include Historical Dictionary of Jehovah’s Witnesses (2008), Heaven’s Gate: Postmodernity and Popular Culture in a Suicide Group (2011), Historical Dictionary of New Religious Movements (2012), The Bloomsbury Companion to New Religious Movements (co-edited with Benjamin E. Zeller,2014), and Jehovah’s Witnesses: Continuity and Change (2015). He is a regular presenter at national and international conferences.

Keynote Presentation (2019) | Presentation information will be added here shortly
Satoru Nishizawa
Yamanashi Prefectural University, Japan

Biography

Professor Nishizawa is a Clinical Psychologist and Professor of Social Work at Yamanashi Prefectural University. He is Chief Editor of the Japanese Journal of Child and Neglect, and a Board Member of several groups, including the Japanese Society for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect, the Center for Child Abuse Prevention, Tokyo, and the Association for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect, Osaka. He is also Professional Advisor for the Department of Family and Child Services, Tokyo Prefectural Government. He has published several books on Child Abuse, the most recent of which is Challenge for Child Abuse: Toward an Integrative Approach, published (in Japanese) in 2013. He was educated at Osaka University in Japan and San Francisco State University in the United States.

Keynote Presentation (2019) | Presentation information will be added here shortly
David Putwain
Liverpool John Moores University, UK

Biography

Professor David Putwain is the Director for the Centre of Educational Research in the School of Education at Liverpool John Moores University and Chair of the Psychology of Education Section of the British Psychology Society. He taught in schools and 6th Form colleges from 1994 to 2003. After completing a PhD in 2006, Dave joined Edge Hill University working initially in the Department of Social and Psychological Sciences, where he established an undergraduate programme in Educational Psychology, and subsequently in the Faculty of Education. David joined Liverpool John Moores University in May 2016. His research interests focus on how psychological factors influence learning and achievement with a particular focus on student motivation, emotion, engagement, and the classroom environment.

Keynote Presentation (2019) | Presentation information will be added here shortly
Frank S. Ravitch
Michigan State University College of Law, USA

Biography

Frank S. Ravitch is Professor of Law and Walter H. Stowers Chair in Law in Religion at the Michigan State University College of Law. He also directs the MSU College of Law, Kyoto Japan Program. He is the author of Freedom’s Edge: Religious Freedom, Sexual Freedom, and the Future of America (Cambridge University Press, 2016) (Nominated for a Prose Award); Marketing Creation: The Law and Intelligent Design (Cambridge University Press 2012), Masters of Illusion: The Supreme Court and the Religion Clauses (NYU Press 2007); Law and Religion: Cases, Materials, and Readings (West 2004)(2nd Ed. 2008) (3rd Ed. 2015 with Larry Cata Backer), School Prayer and Discrimination: The Civil Rights of Religious Minorities and Dissenters (Northeastern University Press, 1999 & paperback edition 2001). He is co-author, with the late Boris Bittker and with Scott Idleman, of the first comprehensive treatise on Law and Religion in more than one hundred years, Religion and the State in American Law (Cambridge University Press 2015) (this project was supported by a generous grant from the Lilly Endowment). He is also co-author of, Employment Discrimination Law (Prentice Hall, 2005) (with Pamela Sumners and Janis McDonald).

Professor Ravitch's articles, which have appeared in a number of highly regarded journals, have primarily focused on law and religion in the US and Japan, but he has also written about civil rights law and disability discrimination. He has authored a number of amicus briefs to the US Supreme Court and has given numerous academic presentations nationally and internationally. In 2001, he was named a Fulbright scholar and served on the law faculty at Doshisha University (Japan). He has also made dozens of public presentations explaining the law before school groups, community groups, and service clubs and has served as an expert commentator for print and broadcast media.

Professor Ravitch’s current projects include a book on the Japanese Legal System (co-authored with Colin Jones), a chapter on law and religious tradition, and a project focusing on Law, Religion, and Authoritarianism. He speaks English and basic conversational Japanese and Hebrew.

Keynote Presentation (2019) | Presentation information will be added here shortly

Previous Presentations

Keynote Presentation (2018) | Law, Religion and Authoritarianism: From State Shinto to Religio-Trumpism
Featured Presentation (2017) | Freedom’s Edge: Balancing Religious Freedom and Equal Access to Facilities and Services for Transexuals
Featured Panel Presentation (2017) | Free Speech and Hate Speech – History, Story, Narrative
Brian Victoria
Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, UK

Biography

Brian Victoria is a native of Omaha, Nebraska and a 1961 graduate of Nebraska Wesleyan University in Lincoln, Nebraska. He holds a MA in Buddhist Studies from Sōtō Zen sect-affiliated Komazawa University in Tokyo, and a PhD from the Department of Religious Studies at Temple University.

In addition to a second, enlarged edition of Zen At War (Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), Brian's major writings include Zen War Stories (RoutledgeCurzon, 2003); an autobiographical work in Japanese entitled Gaijin de ari, Zen bozu de ari (As a Foreigner, As a Zen Priest), published by San-ichi Shobo in 1971; Zen Master Dōgen, coauthored with Prof. Yokoi Yūhō of Aichi-gakuin University (Weatherhill, 1976); and a translation of The Zen Life by Sato Koji (Weatherhill, 1972). In addition, Brian has published numerous journal articles, focusing on the relationship of not only Buddhism but religion in general, to violence and warfare.

From 2005 to 2013 Brian was a Professor of Japanese Studies and director of the AEA “Japan and Its Buddhist Traditions Program” at Antioch University in Yellow Springs, OH, USA. From 2013-2015 he was a Visiting Research Fellow at the International Research Center for Japanese Studies in Kyoto, Japan where he is writing a book tentatively entitled: Zen Terror in 1930s Japan. Brian currently continues his research as a Senior Research Fellow at the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, and is a fully ordained Buddhist priest in the Sōtō Zen sect.

Featured Presentation (2019) | Is Religious Tolerance Always Desirable: The Case of Shinto and Buddhism

Previous Presentations

Featured Presentation (2018) | Shinto: Window on Universal Religion
Featured Presentation (2017) | Military Conscription, Slavery and the Modern State
Featured Panel Presentation (2017) | Battles of Ideas: Identity and Alienation