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Naomi Choi

Naomi Choi

Assistant Professor
PGH 414
713-743-0413
nchoi2@uh.edu

Research Interests

Contemporary Political Theory
History of Political Thought
Philosophy of Social Sciences

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Biographical Summary

Naomi Choi joined the faculty in 2015.  Her research and teaching interests are in contemporary political theory, with particular emphasis on liberal-democratic theories and their critics.  She also works on the philosophy of social sciences, and the history of political thought, primarily in the Anglo-American tradition.  Her current book project, Political Theory After the Interpretive Turn, explores the relationship between scientific inquiry, ideas about selfhood, and approaches to political theorizing in the 20th C through a sustained examination of the intellectual contributions of the philosopher, Charles Taylor.  By tracing the development of Taylor’s views on knowledge, values, and politics, she shows how he was a pivotal figure in bringing about an “interpretive turn” in the social sciences; and she explores the strengths and limits of the turn to interpretation, as well as Taylor’s approach, for contemporary political theory. 

Before joining UH, she was an Assistant Professor at the University of Alabama, and the 2012-3 Democracy and Diversity postdoctoral fellow under the supervision of Will Kymlicka at Queen’s University in Canada.  She currently serves as Vice President of the Society for the Philosophy of History of the American Philosophical Association’s Eastern Division.  She teaches courses in contemporary political theory and meta-methodology in the social sciences.

Education

Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, CA
M.A., University of California, Berkeley, CA
B.A., Barnard College, Columbia University, NY

Selected Publications

Naomi Choi, “Berlin, Analytical Philosophy, and the Revival of Political Philosophy” in The Cambridge Companion to Isaiah Berlin, eds. Steven Smith and Joshua Cherniss. Cambridge, forthcoming.

Naomi Choi, “Idealist Legacies” in The Handbook of Interpretive Political Studies, eds. Mark Bevir and R.A.W. Rhodes.  Routledge, forthcoming.

Naomi Choi, “Liberalism and the Interpretive Turn: Rival Approaches or Cross Purposes?” The Review of Politics, 77:2 (2015): 243-270.

Naomi Choi, “The Post-Analytic Roots of Humanist Liberalism,” History of European Ideas 37:3 (2011): 280-292.

Naomi Choi, “Defending Anti-Naturalism after the Interpretive Turn: Charles Taylor and the Human Sciences,” History of Political Thought, 20:4 (2009): 693-718.

Naomi Choi, “Interpretivism in Jurisprudence: What Difference Does the Philosophy of History Make to the Philosophy of Law?” Journal of the Philosophy of History 1:3 (2007): 365-393.

Naomi Choi, “Crafting Explanatory Concepts,” Qualitative Methods, 3:2 (2005): 24-29.