Natasha Chokhani is an Assistant Professor of Law at the CUNY School of Law. She is interested in how the family regulation system is interwoven with colonialism, and how the juvenile justice and the family regulation systems mirror each other with respect to the pathologizing, policing, and surveillance of adolescents. In addition and arising out of that, her research will also examine how documentary evidence often privilege the states and reifies structural order.
Natasha joined CUNY Law from NYU School of Law where she was an Acting Assistant Professor of Lawyering. Before entering academia, Natasha was a staff attorney in the Family Defense Practice at The Bronx Defenders, where she represented parents ensnared by the dragnet of the family regulation system. While at The Bronx Defenders, Natasha created a project focused on foster youth who became parents while in the system and how state surveillance and policing of their lives was inevitably intensified after they had children.
Natasha also co-directed the Holistic Defense Clinical Externship at Columbia Law School for two years. She represented clients in post-conviction relief proceedings at the Center for Appellate Litigation (CAL) and supported human rights defenders at the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR).
Natasha holds a Bachelor’s in Political Science and International Relations from the University of California-Irvine.