Dr. Samantha Frost

Biography

Samantha Frost's research focuses on how understanding matter, materiality, and embodiment shapes concepts of politics. Her book, "Lessons of the Materialist Thinker: Hobbesian Reflections on Ethics and Politics" (Stanford 2008), examined how Thomas Hobbes's materialist metaphysics shaped his account of subjectivity and the processes of political order. Her work was recognized with a Book Award from the Foundations of Political Theory section of the American Political Science Association. Frost co-edited a collection of essays by contemporary theorists titled "New Materialisms: Ontology, Agency, Politics" (Duke 2010), which explores a variety of ways that a focus on materiality shifts the terrain and stakes of politics. As a recipient of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation New Directions Fellowship, she undertook training in biological sciences, leading to her recent book, "Biocultural Creatures: A New Theory of the Human" (Duke 2016). This book elucidates the conceptual significance of the plasticity of the biological body, and her latest project elaborates the political possibilities made visible by acknowledging this plasticity. Specifically, she examines how epigenetic processes articulate the ways that material, social, and symbolic environments shape the development of capacities to engage and shape the worlds in which we live.

Research Interests