Existentia Africana: Understanding Africana Existential Thought PDF
Preview Existentia Africana: Understanding Africana Existential Thought
Existentia Africana r Books in the Africana Thought series: Caliban’s Reason:Introducing Afro-Caribbean Philosophy Paget Henry Series Editors:Lewis R.Gordon and Paget Henry i I Existentia Africana Understanding Africana Existential Thought r Lewis R. Gordon Routledge New York and London i I Published in 2000 by Routledge 29 West 35th Street New York,NY 10001 Published in Great Britain by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane London EC4P 4EE Copyright © 2000 by Routledge This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library,2002. All rights reserved.No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter in- vented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,without permission in writing from the publisher. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Gordon,Lewis R.(Lewis Ricardo),1962– Existentia Africana :understanding Africana existential thought / Lewis R.Gordon. p. cm.— (Africana thought) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-415-92643-2 (hardcover :alk.paper) ISBN 0-415-92644-0 (pbk.:alk.paper) 1.Afro-American philosophy. 2.Existentialism. I.Title. II.Series. B944.A37 G67 2000 142'.78'08996—DC21 99-047909 ISBN 0-203-90075-8 Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0-203-90079-0 (Glassbook Format) To William R. Jones i Contents I Preface, with Acknowledgments ix 1 Africana Philosophy of Existence 1 2 A Problem of Biography in Africana Thought 22 3 Frederick Douglass as an Existentialist 41 4 What Does It Mean to Be a Problem? 62 W.E.B.Du Bois on the Study of Black Folk 5 Mixed Race in Light of Whiteness 96 and Shadows of Blackness Naomi Zack on Mixed Race 6 Can Men Worship? 118 An Existential Portrait in Black and White 7 Recent Africana Religious Thought 135 Existential Anxieties of Pan-Africanism and Postmodernism at the End of the Twentieth Century 8 Existential Borders of Anonymity 153 and Superfluous Invisibility 9 Words and Incantations 164 Invocations and Evocations of a Wayward Traveler Notes 181 Works Consulted 187 Index 217 i I What indeed could be more grotesque than an educated man,a man with a diploma,having in consequence un- derstood a good many things,among others that “it was unfortunate to be a Negro,” proclaiming that his skin was beautiful and that the “big black hole”was a source of truth. Neither the mulattoes nor the Negroes under- stood this delirium.The mulattoes because they had es- caped from the night,the Negroes because they aspired to get away from it.Two centuries of white truth proved this man to be wrong.He must be mad,for it was un- thinkable that he could be right. —Frantz Fanon,“West Indians and Africans” r Because it is a systematic negation of the other person and a furious determination to deny the other person at- tributes of humanity, colonialism forces the people it dominates to ask themselves the question constantly:“In reality,who am I?” —Frantz Fanon,The Wretched of the Earth r Your own Truth Commission.Lights.Cameras.Notoriety. Days upon days of probing our insides.We show our in- sides gladly.All we ask is that you not eat them. —Monifa Love,Freedom in the Dismal i I i I Preface, with Acknowledgments T his book is dedicated to William R. Jones,professor emeri- tus of African American Studies and Religious Studies at Florida State University at Tallahassee. Prior to his work at Florida State,Jones taught philosophy of religion at the Yale Divin- ity School. It was during that period that the first edition of his classic work in Africana religious thought,Is God a White Racist? A Pre- amble to Black Theology, appeared. The work challenged black libera- tion thinkers to take seriously the possibility that the signs and symbols of the Western religions upon which they depended may harbor the seeds of their destruction. Instead, Jones counseled, a liberation project stands a good chance of meeting its goals through an appreciation of human agency in the formation of rad- ical, historical change. Old-time religion may have helped black people survive;liberation,however,requires a more radical path. Jones took his own counsel seriously. For him, there was, and continues to be, no point in intellectual work if there is no com- mitment to the values it represents. It is the intellectual’s task to take on the struggle over ideas. The importance of that task is evi- ix
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