Rothin Datta

Rothin Datta grew up in Gurgaon, India. He received his BA in Political Science and Critical Theory from Macalester College and his PhD in Political Science with an emphasis on Political Theory from Johns Hopkins University. His work investigates the relationship between theoretical scholarship, power, and the naturalization of social relations and subjectivities under racial capitalism.

Rothin is currently working on a book manuscript based on his doctoral research titled, Foucault’s Marx: Power and Subjectivation in the Critique of Political Economy. This project investigates the possibility of producing a Foucauldian reading of Karl Marx’s critique of political economy –  a reading that Foucault himself alludes to but never pursues. Such a reading allows us to recognize the productive (rather than merely repressive) account of power in Marx’s analysis and encourages us to think of the production and naturalization of subjectivities – especially racialized, gendered, and colonized subjectivities – as essential element of capitalism’s reproduction of its own social relations. Rothin is also working on a co-written article for an edited volume on Marx and antiquity; an article about the recent neo-republican uptake of Capital; and an article on the historiographical questions surrounding the origins of capitalism debates.

Rothin’s interests also include the history of economic thought, labor politics, and social reproduction theory. He teaches courses on decolonizing political theory, racial capitalism, and the work of Karl Marx and Michel Foucault. In the Spring of 2025, he will lead the Chuck Green Civic Engagement Fellowship. Rothin also serves on the steering committee for the Critical Theory concentration and the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies department.

• BA: Macalester College
• MA: Johns Hopkins University
• PhD: Johns Hopkins University