Biography

Wang received his PhD from the Religion Department, Temple University, USA. His specialized areas include philosophical interpretations of Chan Buddhist thought, Chinese Buddhist thought and early Daoist thought, especially the Zhuangzi, and cross-cultural dialogue and comparison between Chinese philosophy/religious thought and Western philosophy/theology.

He has published four books, including Linguistic Strategies in Daoist Zhuangzi and Chan Buddhism: The Other Way of Speaking (Routledge, 2003), Deconstruction and the Ethical in Asian Thought (ed.) (Routledge, 2007), Historical Dictionary of Chan Buddhism (Rowman and Littlefield, 2017), and Dao Companion to Chinese Buddhist Philosophy (ed.) (Springer 2019). His articles have appeared in journals such as International Philosophical Quarterly, Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy, Asian Philosophy, Philosophy East and West, and Journal of Chinese Philosophy. He is also a member of the editorial board for the Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy (the only non-Western philosophy journal among the top 100 philosophical journals in the Western language). His fifth book, a monograph, The Ethical Dimension of Forgetfulness: Engaging the Zhuangzi in Studies of Cultivated Forgetting, is forthcoming in 2024 with Routledge.

He is invited as a guest editor for a special issue of Religions (ranked 44 in the top 100 journals in religion studies) on the topic of forgetfulness, soteriology and ethics in Asian religious-philosophical traditions. He is also writing a new monograph on the interplay of remembrance and forgetting and its ethical dimension in Chan Buddhism. He was a recipient of the Senior Research Excellence Award of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences in 2023-2024.

Wang teaches Religions of the World, Religions of Asia, Asian Thought, Buddhism, Daoism, Spirituality and Healing and Select Topics in Philosophy and Religion Studies at Rowan, many of which have become required or selective courses for the programs of Philosophy, World Religions, Asian Studies, Ethics and the bank of Rowan Core Courses.