CEAS Faculty Michael Bourdaghs and Affiliated Faculty Yoonsun Choi Receive Named and Distinguished Service Professorships

Published on January 4, 2024

Eighteen University of Chicago faculty members recently received named and distinguished service professorships in 2024 including the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations' Michael Bourdaghs, and the Crown Family School's Yoonsun Choi.

Named the Robert S. Ingersoll Distinguished Service Professor, Michael Bourdaghs is a scholar of modern Japanese literature, literary and critical theory and music, while focusing on moving beyond the boundaries of Japan across multiple global networks for his research.  In his book “A Fictional Commons: Natsume Sōseki and the Properties of Modern Literature” (2021), recipient of an honorable mention for the 2023 John Whitney Hall Prize from the Association of Asian Studies, Bourdaghs re-examines the fiction and critical essays of Sōseki as they relate to ideologies of modern property ownership.

As the Director of the Doctoral Program at the Crown Famil School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice, Professor Choi has been named the Mose J. and Sylvia Firestone Professor in the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice and the College.  She is also a fellow of the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.  Professor Choi served as the Vice President of the Society for Social Work and Research and as the Chair of the Asian Caucus of the Society for Research on Child Development. Her scholarship is particularly interested in the role of culture in family (such as culturally unique family processes and intergenerational cultural conflict), racial prejudice and discrimination, ethnic/racial identity, culture change and formation (acculturation), and the intersection of culture and socioeconomic class that may be unique issues for ethnic/racial and cultural minority and immigrant/migrant youth.