Esparza Olivero, Daniel

Daniel R. Esparza is a philosopher and scholar of religion, and the author of Forgiving Philosophy (De Gruyter). He holds a PhD in Religion from Columbia University, along with graduate degrees in philosophy and religion from Columbia University and the New School for Social Research. His interdisciplinary research engages philosophy of religion, anthropology, psychoanalysis, aesthetics, and food studies.

Drawing on philosophical, anthropological, and psychoanalytic sources, his current work explores why the desire for mystical union often takes the form of eating. It argues that religious experience is fundamentally shaped by acts of consumption, and challenges traditional aesthetic hierarchies that have privileged vision and hearing over taste. His interests include philosophy of religion (Augustine, Kierkegaard, Bataille, Arendt), anthropology (Lévi-Strauss, Geertz, Douglas), psychoanalysis (Freud, Klein, Kristeva) and Iberian mysticism (Juan de la Cruz, Teresa of Avila, Quevedo, Spinoza).