B.A., Bombay University (1970)
B.A., Oxford University (1974)
Ph.D., University of Chicago (1983)

Areas of Specialization

Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Language, Political Philosophy and Moral Philosophy

Akeel Bilgrami got a first degree in English Literature from Bombay University but defected to philosophy becasue he found the former too hard. He went to Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar and there got another Bachelor's degree in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics. He has a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago, after writing a dissertation, "Meaning as Invariance," on the subject of the indeterminancy of translation and issues concerning realism and linguistic meaning. He joined the Department in 1985 after spending two years as an Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Professor Bilgrami has two relatively independent sets of intellectual interests--in the Philosophy of Mind and Language, and in issues of Political Philosophy and Moral Psychology especially as they surface in politics, history, and culture.

In the former, he has published a book in 1992 called 'Belief and Meaning' (Blackwell) and another book published in 2006 called "Self Knowledge and Resentment' (Harvard University Press). He is presently working on a book on some aspects of agency and practical reason.

In the latter, his collection of essays called "Politics and The Moral Psychology of Identity" is forthcoming in 2009 from Harvard University Press. He is also contracted to publish two small books in the very near future, one called "What is a Muslim?" (Princeton University Press) and another on Gandhi's philosophy, situating Gandhi's thought in seventeenth century dissent in England and Europe and more broadly within the later Romantic tradition.

He teaches courses and seminars regularly in the department on Philosophy of Mind and Language and also in the Committee on Global Thought and Political Science on issues in Politics and Rationality as well as Religion and Politics in Global Context.

Professor Bilgrami is the Director of the Heyman Center for the Humanities at Columbia University. His contact details there are: The Heyman Center for the Humanities, East Campus, 2nd floor, Director's office. Phone; 212-854-1277

In the coming year (2008-2009) he will be in the Writers and Scholars programme in the New York Public Library, where his telephone number is 212-930-0085.

Publications

Reference and Naturalism

Crispin Wright Volume

Secular Liberalism & Relativism

Gandhi

Links 

Professor Bilgrami's essay on "The Enlightenment and Enchantment", as well as some comments on it and replies by him can be read at the following link: http://3quarksdaily.blogs.com/3quarksdaily/2008/09/introduction-to.html