The historical past of philosophy is generally the historical past of varied colleges arguing with one another about what’s good or true. The Epicureans, the Empiricists, the Stoics, the Skeptics, the Positivists, the Pragmatists — you get the purpose.
I’m not an official member of any of those golf equipment, however if you happen to requested me to select one, I’d go together with the Existentialists. For me, existentialism was the final nice philosophical motion. A part of the explanation for that’s purely historic. Existentialism emerged within the early- to mid-Twentieth century, towards the backdrop of two devastating world wars, and lots of the existentialists have been responding to that.
Another excuse for the motion’s attraction is that its main proponents didn’t simply write arcane educational treatises; they wrote novels and performs and fashionable essays, and their concepts crossed over into the tradition. In addition they engaged with concrete questions on freedom and duty and authenticity, and people concepts will at all times resonate as a result of the human situation hasn’t actually modified.
However each historic second is exclusive and so the query is at all times how does this custom deal with the world we inhabit immediately?
Nathalie Etoke is a professor on the CUNY Graduate Heart and the writer of the e book Black Existential Freedom. It’s an exploration of Black existence by means of the lens of existentialist thought, and it finally makes a case for one thing like tragic optimism. It’s each a critique of “Afro-pessimism” — extra on this concept under — and an affirmation of political realism, and that makes it a particular contribution to the discourse.
I invited Etoke on The Grey Space to speak concerning the e book and the distinctive perspective she brings to this dialog. As at all times, there’s rather more within the full podcast, so pay attention and comply with The Grey Space on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever you discover podcasts. New episodes drop each Monday.
This dialog has been edited for size and readability.
Earlier than we get to the story you need to inform on this e book, I would love to do just a bit philosophical table-setting for the viewers. What does existentialism imply to you? How do you strategy this custom of thought?
Nicely, I come from a Francophone education background, so I used to be uncovered to philosophy in highschool. Immediately, I discovered the questions that philosophers have been asking very fascinating.
I learn Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness. I learn some Kierkegaard; I learn Camus. Questions of existence have been at all times a part of my considering course of, however there’s one thing about current as a Black particular person within the context of white supremacist capitalist society and the entire concept of the dehumanization of Black folks, which thinkers like Du Bois, Fanon, Ralph Ellison additionally helped me take into consideration.
So you’ve got the standard existentialist faculty when you concentrate on the white thinkers, however actually when you concentrate on African writers and diasporic African writers who didn’t current themselves as philosophers, you constantly have them partaking the query of current as a Black particular person. These writers do not need to label themselves existentialists.
Is there one thing concerning the historic Black expertise that informs or expands existentialist philosophy?
Sure. The query that I ask is: What does it imply to be human if you’ve been traditionally dehumanized? And no matter the place you end up on this globe, you will notice that individuals with darker pores and skin are on the backside. So there’s one thing about this legacy of dehumanization that creates an existential pressure. In fact, it manifests in another way relying on the place you end up.
I used to be born in Paris, France, however I used to be raised in Cameroon, Central Africa, and I grew up there. I by no means considered myself as being non-human or as being Black.
However as soon as you progress to an area the place the bulk inhabitants is white and the interactions you’ve got with folks make you notice that you’re “the opposite,” though you by no means actually see your self as being “the opposite,” you notice that though race is a assemble, it is a lived expertise. For no matter purpose, even on this nation, citizenship is just not sufficient to be a part of the nation. As soon as you’ve got been outlined as non-human, what are you able to inform those that suppose that they are human what it means to be human?
As a result of what they do not notice is that they too have accomplished one thing to their humanity. [Frantz] Fanon wrote about it, the query of dehumanization/being human remains to be on the core of Black existential thought.
After I first began your e book, I used to be considering, as a result of existentialism is concerning the common human expertise, what does it even imply to say Black existentialism?
However then your e book in a short time drives house the reminder that we have now this custom of Western thought, and a part of the historical past of that custom is the devaluing of Black humanity, and that dehumanization is a part of the historic Black expertise, that sense of exile is a part of the expertise within the West, and so there’s simply no approach to interact with a convention like this one with out additionally coping with that historical past.
Precisely. Even within the African context, we’re conditioned to consider the query of the human and racism solely in racial phrases. Cameroon, the way in which we spell it immediately got here from “camaroes” as a result of the Portuguese have been the primary to indicate up there, and so they noticed quite a lot of massive shrimps.
To me, that is the start of dehumanization: Individuals declare a land and so they act as if the folks they discover on that land are of no worth. They rename the place, they balkanize it, and we’re nonetheless making an attempt to make sense of these areas.
There is a time period you utilize within the e book: “Afro-pessimism.” What does that consult with? And is the argument you make on this e book against this, or is the connection extra difficult?
Afro-pessimism says that there’s a steady and ongoing technique of dehumanization that individuals of African descent undergo. And in some ways, there is no approach we may be absolutely human as a result of we make everyone else human. In different phrases, it’s the dehumanization of individuals of African descent that makes different folks human.
I give attention to the continuing wrestle for freedom. I am not dismissing the truth of white supremacy. I am not dismissing the truth of the dehumanization of Black folks. I am not dismissing the fabric circumstances of our lives. However I am it from the angle of those that, for a really very long time, needed to combat with a view to exist.
On the very starting of the e book, you say explicitly that Blackness is just not synonymous with victimhood. Why was it vital to state that so clearly?
Nicely, as a result of I feel traditionally, folks of African descent have been victimized, so that they’re victims. However on the similar time, the opposite facet of the story is that they at all times attempt to discover a approach to free themselves. I can not separate the 2, in order that’s the place I draw the road between being traditionally victimized and being a sufferer and the state of victimhood. And it is not even simply within the US or in France.
In Sub-Saharan Africa, the dictatorships and the various methods during which neocolonialism and the establishing of an influence construction that also oppresses Africans is going on for the time being. Individuals are nonetheless making an attempt to be free. And to me, I am not being pessimistic. It is simply the info of Black life. It is the way you take care of it and the way constantly you’re nonetheless making an attempt to enhance the circumstances of your lives. Whereas the Afro-pessimists will say that there is no level speaking concerning the wrestle as a result of why must you even be struggling within the first place?
There’s a sure pessimism, to simply stick to that phrase, that I really feel in a lot of the race discourse in America, and I simply do not know what to do with it. So I am a white man who grew up within the deep South. That is only a truth about me. And I am not saying that in some performative approach. I am simply acknowledging that that is my expertise.
I additionally imagine within the universality of the human situation and the facility of language and concepts to bridge variations. And when the pessimism goes too far or once we change into trapped in our given identities, we sacrifice our company on some stage. We sacrifice our skill to outline ourselves within the right here and now and challenge ourselves into a greater future. However on the similar time, we’re merchandise of fabric and historic forces. How will we settle for the all too actual constraints imposed on us by historical past with out, on the similar time, lowering ourselves to historic props?
I at all times return to the lived expertise as a result of African folks or folks of African descent usually are not ideas. I actually imagine that day by day when somebody wakes up, they struggle to determine what they need to do, methods to go about it. It isn’t a tutorial matter. It’s totally concrete. It does not imply that you simply’re not going to be dealing with difficulties, challenges, issues, however you continue to go about your life as a result of that is the life you got to dwell.
However I additionally suppose, to paraphrase Gramsci, that you might want to strike a steadiness between the pessimism of the mind and the optimism of the desire. You want to have the ability to take care of actuality; in any other case it is a flight from duty. When you’re in a position to take a look at a state of affairs for what it’s and you do not mislead your self, you’ll be able to take care of it.
And this isn’t some grandiose philosophical assertion. I see that each time I’m going again to Cameroon. Coming from a perspective of any individual who has lived most of her life abroad, you’ll be able to come and be like, “Oh my God, these individuals are struggling. They do not have this. They do not have that.” You possibly can have a look at their each day lives from a perspective of lack and deficiency, however that’s not how they’re residing their lives. They’re nonetheless making an attempt to work no matter job they will do. They’re nonetheless having youngsters, they’re nonetheless having a sure type of pleasure. Horrible issues occur to them, however they do not sit in a state of pessimism and paralysis.
I can not afford to be pessimistic as a result of all of the individuals who got here earlier than me needed to endure and combat when it appeared like every thing was darkish and there was no hope. Had these folks not believed, and had they not fought, the place would I be immediately? In order that’s the place I additionally discover a sure hope.
A few of this will get on the ambivalence I felt studying somebody like Ta-Nehisi Coates, who writes superbly and in a approach that helped me perceive his expertise. What I wrestled with was the philosophy of hopelessness that appeared to undergird his work. I feel it yields an excessive amount of to the forces of oppression. Do you suppose I am misunderstanding the purpose there?
Nicely, sure and no. Keep in mind that folks of African descent in the USA, and — I am paraphrasing Baldwin right here — they’re the one individuals who by no means wished to come back right here. So that they did not come right here as a result of they’d a dream or they tried to enhance their residing circumstances. They have been by means of hell and so they’re nonetheless going by means of hell. We’re speaking about no less than 250 years of free labor. We’re speaking about Jim Crow legal guidelines. We’re speaking about lynching. So I can not say that Ta-Nehisi Coates is a preacher of hopelessness per se, as a result of in the USA, there’s additionally this obsession with hope and comfortable endings, which I shouldn’t have as a result of I come from a French background.
That is why I really like the blues, as a result of the blues is an African-American artwork kind that helps you take care of the dissonance of your existence. And also you can’t be in denial of your actuality, however you must be accountable about it. You may be humorous about it. You possibly can have a way of irony. And if you hearken to some blue songs, you’ll be able to see that the lyrics may be unhappy or tragic, however the melody is upbeat. What’s the blues singer expressing? Pleasure, happiness, hope? He is expressing an existential wrestle.
I’m wondering what you suppose is the principal wrestle immediately, and the place freedom is to be present in that, for Black folks on this nation?
When you concentrate on the ’60s and the ’70s, the Black wrestle was not only for Black folks. It was common. Most of these Black leaders have been Marxist or leftist. They have been additionally anti-capitalist. It wasn’t simply anti-racism.
I feel the problem immediately is just not essentially only a query of freedom, it is the truth that leftist politics is split. You have got the cultural left after which you’ve got the left that focuses on class, but additionally there’s this neoliberalization of identification discourse.
The query I’ve is, are we framing freedom by way of changing into a part of a system, which by definition will produce inequality? If that is what we’re claiming, you are going to create a minority elite class after which they are going to be a part of this world as it’s. Or do you need to create a world that’s tough to truly create as a result of all of us need to lose and threat every thing, and that features the Black bourgeois?
