His work focuses on the philosophy of the narrative imagination, hermeneutics and phenomenology. Among his best known written works are The Wake of the Imagination, On Stories, Poetics of Imagining, and Debates in Continental Philosophy.
Richard Kearney has recently established an ongoing artistic and multimedia project called "Hosting the Stranger". The project's core themes are host and guest; violence and reconciliation; embodied imagination and the sacred.
He is the author of over 20 books on European philosophy and literature (including two novels and a volume of poetry) and has edited or co-edited many others. He was formerly a member of the Arts Council of Ireland, the Higher Education Authority of Ireland and chairman of the Irish School of Film at University College Dublin. As a public figure in Ireland, he was involved in drafting a number of proposals for a Northern Irish peace agreement (1983, 1993, 1995). He has presented several series on culture and philosophy for Irish television and broadcast extensively on the European media. His most recent work is Anatheism, published by Columbia University Press in 2009.