Dr. Becky Vartabedian teaches courses in the history of philosophy, metaphysics, philosophy and art, and philosophy's intersections with race, gender and sexuality. She also contributes courses to the Peace and Justice Studies, Women's and Gender Studies and Integrative Core programs. Before returning to Regis in 2012 – Dr. Vartabedian is a 2001 graduate of Regis College – she taught philosophy at the Community College of Aurora, Metropolitan State University of Denver and Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, where she earned her Ph.D.
Dr. Vartabedian’s primary areas of research are contemporary Continental philosophy and critical phenomenology; her work discusses philosophers Gilles Deleuze, Alain Badiou, Jacques Derrida, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Jane Bennett, George Yancy and many others. She is also engaged in interdisciplinary research, with interests in philosophy's various relationships to mathematics, aesthetic practices (especially photography), urban development, history and social and political concerns.
Dr. Vartabedian is committed to mentoring undergraduate students in the work of philosophical research and writing toward publication and presentation. With a group of recent Regis graduates, she co-authored "Erlebnis, Tarrying, and Thinking Again in the Work of George Yancy," a chapter appearing in George Yancy: a Critical Introduction (Rowman and Littlefield in 2021). She is presently working with a cohort of students from her fall 2021 seminar in Medieval philosophy on an article concerning the value of Medieval thought in responding to the question at the heart of Jesuit education, "How ought we to live?"
