Undergraduate Course: Philosophies of Decolonization: Anti-Humanism and Further Explorations in the Construction of Racial Others (PHIL10188)
Course Outline
| School | School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 4 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course explores the writings and theories of revolutionary Black intellectuals in the United States, Africa, and the Caribbean, as well as critical analyses of existing Eurocentric paradigms (feminism, Marxism, liberalism, etc.), with particular attention to the Western construct of the Human. |
| Course description |
This course will introduce students to the radical Black traditions that challenge white supremacy, colonialism, and integrationism from the mid-1900s to present. This class is specifically geared towards the production of radical philosophies of liberation and anti-colonial thought that do not reside within the confines of Eurocentric thought or remain dependent on European anthropological theories of social consequence.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
Students MUST have passed:
Knowledge and Reality (PHIL08017) AND
Mind, Matter and Language (PHIL08014)
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | Students studying on MA Cognitive Science (Humanities) are permitted to take this course without having met the pre-requisites of Mind, Matter and Language (PHIL08014) and Knowledge and Reality (PHIL08014). However, it is advisable that students discuss the suitability of the course with their PT and the course organiser before enrolling. |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | Visiting students should have completed at least 3 Philosophy courses at grade B or above. We will only consider University/College level courses. Applicants should note that, as with other popular courses, meeting the minimum does NOT guarantee admission. These enrolments are managed strictly by the Visiting Student Office, in line with the quotas allocated by the department, and all enquiries to enrol in these courses must be made through the CAHSS Visiting Student Office. It is not appropriate for students to contact the department directly to request additional spaces. |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Explain the relationship colonialism has to theories of racial inferiority
- Critically assess current arguments concerning democracy, freedom, and empire made within the metropole and those originating from the Global South
- Explain the role that anti-colonial movements in Algeria and South Africa played in the development of Internal Colonization models in the United States
- Articulate their own views regarding the colonial history of the racial theories invented by Europe and America and its continuing consequences for the HUMAN
- Explain the link between decolonialism and contemporary theoretical interventions into Western political philosophy and dehumanization
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Reading List
Representative Readings
Huey P. Newton, "War on the Panthers," Newton, "Fear & Doubt," "In Defense of Self-Defense," "Women's Liberation and Gay Liberation," "Eve: The Mother of All Living," and "Dialectics of Nature," in Huey P. Newton Speaks (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2002), and Newton and Erickson, In Search of Common Ground (New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1973.¿
Sylvia Wynter, "Ethno-Socio Poetics," Alcheringa 2 (1976): 78-94; Beyond the Word of Man: Glissant & the New Discourse of the Antilles,"World Literature Today 63.4 (1989): 637-648; "Toward the Sociogenic Principle & What It is Like to be Black," in National Identities and Sociopolitical Change in Latin America, eds. Mercedes Duran-Cogan & Antonio Gomez-Moriana [New York: Routledge, 2001], 30-66).
A.J. Williams-Myers, Destructive Impulses: An Examination of an American Secret in Race Relations (Lanham: University Press of America, 1995).
Robert Allen, Black Awakening in Capitalist America: An Analytic History (Read: Introduction, Ch.3 "Black Nationalism," Ch.6-"Black Radicals," & Ch.7-"Transitional Program"), & Claudia Jones "An End to the Neglect of the Problems of Negro Women," in Beyond Containment, ed. Carole Boyce Davies (Banbury: Ayebia Clarke Publishing Ltd., 2011), 74-86.
Aime Cesaire, Discourse on Colonialism (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2000).
Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, white Mask (New York: Grove Press, 1952).
Octave Mannoni, Prospero & Caliban: The Psychology of Colonization (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1950).
Frantz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth (New York: Grove Press, 2005).
Frantz Fanon: "Racism and Culture," "Decolonization and Independence," and "First Truths of the Colonial Problem," in Toward the African Revolution.
Steve Biko: "white Racism and Black Consciousness," and "What is Black Consciousness," "The Definition of Black Consciousness," and "Black Consciousness and the Quest for a True Humanity," in I Write What I Like
Robert F. Williams - Negroes w/Guns (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1963).
Kathleen Cleaver, "Women, Power, Revolution," in Liberation, Imagination, and the Black Panther Party (New York: Routledge, 2001), 123-128, and Linda La Rue, "The Black Movement and Women's Liberation," The Black Scholar (1970): 36-42.
Assata Shakur, "Chapters 1-3," and "Chapters 8 & 9" in Assata: An Autobiography (UK: Zed Books Ltd, 1987).
Kristin Bumiller, In an Abusive State: How Neoliberalism Appropriated the Feminist Movement against Sexual Violence (Durham: Duke University Press, 2008).
Joseph A. Massad, Islam in Liberalism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015).
Calvin Warren, Ontological Terror (Durham: Duke University Press, 2018).
David Marriott, Whither Fanon?: Studies in the Blackness of Being (Red Wood City, CA: Stanford University Press, 2018).
Frank Wilderson, Afropessimism (London: Liveright, 2020). |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Mindsets: Enquiry and lifelong learning; Aspiration and personal development
Skill groups: Personal and intellectual autonomy; Personal effectiveness |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Prof Tommy Curry
Tel: (0131 6)51 3083
Email: T.J.Curry@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Ann-Marie Cowe
Tel: (0131 6)50 3961
Email: Annmarie.Cowe@ed.ac.uk |
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