>> so, good evening. welcome, all to book culture for tonight's event. my name's roger berkovitz i'll be moderating. we're here tonight to talk about and to celebrate the publication of lewis gordon's book, "what fanon said: a philosophical instruction to his life and thought." it's an honor for me to have -- to be one of the series editors at university press that published this book and i'm excited to have the conversation tonight. i'm going to introduce the speakers as they go along and as they're going to speak. we have a large group of people who are going to comment on the book. i've asked them each to speak for about five minutes and then conclude their talk with a

question for professor gordon. and we will begin with professor drew scylla cornell who teaches at rutgers university. her latest book is "law and revolution in south africa." >> it was an honor when lewis gordon asked me to write the afterword to this book. and i want to focus my comments tonight on two very controversial cases the love affairs which have often been read in black skin/white mask to be a simple critique of interracial relationships. and in order to set the background for that, i want to talk fanon's most controversial remarks and put it in a new light based on lewis gordon's work which is fanon saying i know to nothing of -- i know nothing of a black woman.

he was making a much more profound point which gordon points out that what it meant to be black and a woman given the conditions of to blitz ration of sexual difference under conditions of slavery later indentured servitude and more generally the complete collapse of the idea that a black person could have an inner life was that what he saw what he heard what he studied in psychiatric hospitals had nothing to do with the black woman who could ab sently enunciate an i. what he knew as a black woman was her obliteration. it was not a trivial statement it was an important statement. this takes us to the two famous examples of one woman of color trying to find a way out of her lack of sexual difference because the way black women are stereotyped -- and we see anytime the movies all the time, right? they're either monsters,

seductresses or really super evil. it's to find your way into sexual difference by being mirrored as white. otherwise there is no femininity. and this is so crucial for feminists, because if we think that there's such a thing as a woman that is in any way separate from a racialization that has already taken place you miss the point. you mentioned lynching in this united states white femininity pitted against fantasies of a black lack of femininity. at one point one of the most idealistic movements led by the communist party in 1931, a group of black and white women fought against lynching by saying they were rejecting the way in which both white and black women had been buried under racialized pant -- fantasy. the attempt to escape individually by finding a way of being mirrored as whiteness

fails differently with the two, fails differently with -- [inaudible] because there's no way that a woman can ever mirror a black man as a nanomatter how white she is -- man no matter how white she is. both, in fact, fail at attempt at a love affair. but this wasn't just fanon telling us about these individual failures or even the failure of an individual way out. it was pointing to something that's not often noted in fanon. his writing on the arm struggle has seen it so much, but at the end of the day you can't read fanon, at least not when you read him with lewis as other than somebody who profoundly saw that the struggle against decolonization had to be a struggle for radical erotic transformation and, indeed for feminism. not just egalitarian feminism,

that women should participate in all walks of life, but the hallways that colonial, erotic relationships had been struggled through race that it completely destroyed sexuality had to be totally challenged. so he offers us a feminism that is intimately connected to erotic transformation, and this you get out of gordon's book. is my question to gordon tonight is having put fanon so strongly on the side of erotic transformation and a vision of a truly radical feminism that gets to the ground of how we have been racialized and feminized in the worst way that would allow us to open up a new ground for sexual difference, where would lewis take us now in a politics of decolonization through fanon that would emphasize this kind of challenge to all forms of -- [inaudible] centrism. >> thank you very much,

drucilla. we're going to have each panelist ask a question, and professor gordon's going to take them all at the end. so our next panelist and commentator is paget henry he's a professor of africana studies and sociology at brown university, the author of many books. his most recent is "the caribbean," if i have that correct. yes. por hen -- professor henry. >> good evening everyone. it's a will pleasure to be here and certainly a pleasure to be celebrating lewis gordon's new book. this book is a wonderful synthesis of all of the ideas that lewis has been working on and thinking about in relation to fanon for many many years. you can go back to fanon in the crisis of european man, you can look at his edited volume, fanon is the a critical reader, and

you can really see that this book is a wonderful synthesis a wonderful culmination of his thoughts on fanon so far. now, among the many ideas that get is nicely synthesized here i want to comment basically on two. the first is the idea that lewis throws out that in this text -- sorry, in black skin/white mask fanon speaks to us out of two voice voices. the first voice is that of what he calls the black or the voice of the text. the second voice in which fanon speaks to us he calls the voice of the theorist or the voice about the book. and it is very important that we distinguish these two voices. lewis suggests the comparison between the voice of the black

and dante's condemned sipper in "the inferno" and a comparison between dante's guide and a theorist. so these suggest other metaphorical appropriations to help us to grasp these two voices through which fanon speaks to us in this text. and so recognizing this distinction, i think is really important. it helps us to read the text differently, and lewis really does a good job in developing this point. and closely related to this point is the very, very interesting suggestion that in the wretched of the earth these two voices become one so that the writing subject shifts in the wretched of the earth. and, again it's just very, very

skillful scholarly insightful way in which he does this that i think is really, really wonderful, makes for excellent reading. the second idea that i wanted to comment on is lewis' brilliant treatment of the idea of failure in both its freudian and sartre phases. in describing the journey of black from the hell of racism fanon portrays it as taking the form of a series of projects, projectings of self-redefinition -- projects of self-redefinition. however, as lewis points out these projects seem to fail or they often fail. one reason why they fail is that they makes make use of many of the defense mechanisms that we see in psychoanalysis such as projection compensation, inflation, deflation, etc. however, we know that when used

extensively at very low levels of self-consciousness these coping strategies generally lead to failure. for sartre, the human ego or the foe itself realizes itself through projects also. and projects that also make some makes use of some of the strategies of defense and receive formation that -- self-formation that we see also in psychoanalysis. and be here, too, the projects of sartre, the projects of the foe itself often end in failure. and, again they end in failure depending on the level of self-consciousness at which they're undertaken. so it is not surprising then given the nature of these projects by which fanon defines the ascent from the hell of

racism that many of these projects fail. the mechanisms that they're using to really find the black identity are project even when not used to really find the black identity often fail. and i think lewis does again here a very wonderful job in developing both the psychoan littic and the existential roots of this concept and making clear why we get these repeated failures and what this means for the battle against racism. now, my question for lewis relates to negatively tuesday as -- negro tuesday as a project, the way in which the black turns to to it as a project and the response to sartre in his marxist critique. so the question is, who is responding here?

is it the black or is it fanon? and what are we to make of the fact that marxism becomes a vital part of fanon's revolutionary project? so that's my question. >> thank you professor henry. the next commentator is an associate professor of philosophy at john jay college at kuny, and she is the author of reading day cart otherwise. >> thank you roger. and thank you lewis for writing this beautiful book, and thank you all for being here. thank you to my fellow panelists here. i would like to take up this question of voice and vision that henry just mentioned. that happens to be one of quotes

that i wanted to discuss. the question of the dual not only existence but interweaving of the voice of the text. and the voice about the text. so text being black right? so the autobiographical kind of narrative, the experiencial voice narrating the story: but then there is the reflective gaze commenting on that experience. that's the voice about the text. so that's the kind of, the structure that comes into play that we see in black skin/white mask and also when lewis really stresses very beautifully and skillfully in his unfolding of this inner drama and experience

as a kind of antidote to that tyranny of the imposition of exteriority, right? that is what the book is highlighting. and so i want to take up the question and ask lewis and us to think about that structure if from a little difference point of view, and that will be the viewpoint of temporality. i was very struck by this what i see as a recurrent and simmering presence and recurrence of this figure of the child. right? this -- and the adult right? is so voice of the text is the voice of the child. in a sense, right? the voice about the text is the voice of the adult.

relating back to this experiences, right, that now become materialized and in the text. and i thought about say this moment of what you call what you define a situation in terms of realization of -- experience as realization of experience, right? that seems an interesting way to think about this connection between the child and adult through the lens of what it means to fill oztize. a modern thinker who also comes out of the french tradition right? of narrating one's own life, right? through various sort of critical apparatus. really seems to go back to this moment right? the moment when the child begins to think. the moment of trauma, the moment

where experience begins to appear. and so i could ask the question first, and see what sense you make of the question in relation to what i found in your text about the children right? the question that i have is this: this kind of -- we're looking at this very new generation of people. not only chirp, kind of incensetized by the digital -- incensetized by the digital media culture where the other is through the flat screen surface right? so the exteriority becomes -- [inaudible] so look, a negro, right? the phenomenon really brings in as a foundational moment as to cite your words here, your beautiful description of this world, you know, is hurled at

me right? a child is shouting, hurling this word at me look at the negro, right? now, that kind of encounter tends to happen now adays online right? and i think it's interesting to think about child as a thinker. this is kind of my starting point, right? child is the one who makes who begins to think and also about from the child hollywood experience we begin to theorize, right? our world. and now this access to the experience of the other seems heavily mediated in a different kinds of experience. and so how do we teach what fanon said in a very raw experience in a term, how do we transfer that not to the idioms of a material culture that we live in. and i think about it as sort of

a generational, you know, kind of challenge, but also a kind of task or philosophy, right? what does it mean for us philosophers to experience these things right? because one of beautiful and compelling and powerful moments in this text as you'll see yourself recount is that experience right? and how we make sense of that, right? but somehow our experience is dulled by various sort of, you know, the mechanisms that actually bar us from accessing that scene. so in other words, the question would be in addition to what fanon said, i would ask what would fanon say? what would fanon say right? about the task of philosophy grounded in what we still like to call experience. as realization of a situation where the situation itself seems to be somehow a function of

various fabrications of media. so also it's about how you educate, right? ourselves as well as the -- all of us who were once happy children. >> thank you very much, professor lee. the next commentator is doug advisic, he has taught at john jay college of criminal justice and he's now the visiting assistant professor at the university of new haven. >> good evening. thank you for coming out tonight, a somewhat rainy night to discuss and to celebrate the publication of what fanon said by lewis gordon, an important text whose importance is certainly not limited to the field of fanon's studies, a field that gordon helpfully outlines early in his introduction. drucilla padgett and queue have all addressed key aspects of this text from his analysis of

black woman to his method logical approach which is informed by the idea of failure. i would like to consider this question: given the secondary literature on franz fanon which is substantial what makes what fanon said unique and frankly, worth reading? several possibilities, possible answers to question come to mind. for example, i would argue that gordon's interpretation of black skin/white masks as a blues text is both unique and remarkably insightful. consider the following passages which are taken from chapter four. gordon writes: the blues is about dealing with life's suffering of any kind in an absurd and unfair world. because of this, it is the light mow tiff of modern -- motif of modern life. black people, we should remember were produced by the modern world. their aesthetic productions

speak to the aim as few others do. the irony here, he continues is that black skin/white masks is a blues text in that work fanon tells a story that is retold in mounting layers of revelation. at the moment of catharsis the weeping, the sobriety offers confrontation with a reality that was previously too much to bear a reality without hope of normative approval a reality in which the dialectics of recognition must be abandoned. i would also argue as does druscilla in her afterword that gordon's analysis of fanon on the issue of interracial sexuality is both nuanced and faithful to the relevant texts themselves which, according to for done, often go unread. fanon, as many of you know, has been accused of misogyny and homophobia by any number of credits, and in what fanon said, gordon addresses these

accusations explicitly, defending him against most of them, but also taking him to task for his sexism against simone de beauvoir to whom fanon gives no credit even though he was clearly and seemingly profound hi influenced by the second sex and the ethics of ambiguity. ultimately, this discussion ends with a call to decolonize sexuality, a project whose importance gordon powerfully demonstrates. more than anything perhaps what makes what fanon said unique as a text is the metatheoretical approach that gordon takes in it an approach that purposefully avoids what he refers to as disciplinary decadence. and what is disciplinary decadence? it is chen people privilege their discipline -- it is when people privilege their discipline to such extent that they deny other ways of knowing. thus literary theorists insist in knowing fanon, if not the

world, in terms of political theory, and political theorists insist of knowing fanon, if not the world, in terms of political theory. this is not just departmental -- [inaudible] rather it is as he explains in his book the re-- [inaudible] of such a discipline. in such an attitude he writes. we treat our discipline as though it was never born and will never change or, in some cases, die. it is something that came into being, it lives in such an attitude as a monstrosity as an instance of human creation that can never die. such a perspective brings with it a special fallacy. its assertion as absolute eventually leads to no room for other disciplinary perspectives. the result of which is the

rejection of them for not being one's own. thus if one's discipline has foreclosed the question of its scope, all that is left for it is a form of applied work. such work militates against thinking. fanon did not succumb to disciplinary decadence which is perhaps why his works are uniquely challenging and neither does gordon. there is a commitment to transthe disciplinarity, to, quote-unquote, outlaw thinking in what upon theon said, and as a text it represents another major contribution to fanon's studies from lewis gordon. finally, as i am supposed to ask a question, there is a debate raging even within the last 24 hours as many of you probably know about the role of intellectuals in society. my question is, what does the example of fanon tell us about that special role? thank you.

>> thanks very much, professor. our next and final commentator before we get to lewis gordon himself is nelson torres. he's an associate professor at the department of latino and hispanic-caribbean studies in the comparative literature program at rutgers university. his first book is "against war: views from the underside of modernity." >> thank you. well i have been the beneficiary of listening to what lewis gordon has been saying about fanon for almost 20 years. and so when we thought we had sort of 15 minutes to provide a comment, and i immediately took to task -- and i wanted to make sure that i not only provided a comment, but also that i responded to the occasion with a tribute to my teacher on the

publication of his book. and so is i was so focused on that, that seems that i lost the second memo saying it was only meant to be five minutes and a question. so you will tolerate me perhaps a little bit more while i share with you some of the ideas that i've prepared to you. in condensed form still. but hopefully we'll add a new layer to the publication. and i have entitled this what lewis gordon is saying. comment on his work. of course, this is only the first 10-15 minutes. i run through it. lewis gordon's what fanon said, a philosophical introduction to his life and thought what it meant to be part of a series of volumes on what certain thinkers

really said. and there are few more thinkers about whom it is so important to know what they really said given the enormous quantity of quick and facile judgments about fanon and his ideas than fanon. fanon remains one of the most misinterpreted thinkers which i think is in part a result of his intellectual and political -- [inaudible] as well as his writing. fanon, the doctor, writes with a clinical goal in mind. in his writing he produces multiple mirrors that reflect back on the reader and on the society and context to which the reader belongs. the mirrors are designed to reveal things that one would rather leave behind hidden and the response to the self is often to evade -- [inaudible] as a result, many interpreters focus on what fanon seems to be saying or suggesting or simply on what they deem him to be doing rather than taking the time in ferreting out what he is actually saying. there is all that we are often navigating around fanon's ideas,

taking time, incorporating them in our discussions and debates about art psychology, literature and other areas and hardly responding to the fundamental imperative in his work, that of bringing about what he calls the end of the world. so there are many reasons why we should try to have a good sense of what fanon really says, and gore con's -- gore gordon's text makes it easier for us to focus on the questions that he raised to his generation and that he still raises to us. now, what fanon said also raises another important topic and a crucial one for philosophy, i think. remember that this is a philosophical introduction to his life and work. the title of the text highlights the importance of saying and this is a topic of high political importance in fan op. this is where i would offer an initial approach to what fanon said through the phenomenon of the saying as it appears in

fanon's work. now this is only the first short part of a longer essay when the plan is to focus on three things that gordon says about fanon but also gordon says as gordon. and one has to do with the meaning of significance of blackness in relation -- and i want to develop in relation to the higher concept of being with relate to being and third, the significance of liberation and emancipation -- [inaudible] and i think what gordon says is that blackness and anti-blackness form a key axis of the modern world, but we also need to understand this in decision to colonialism. purely how it presents himself as an essence. also fanon and gordon say no matter how difficult it is, it is not only possible, but

necessary to strive to emancipate ourself from them. so it is far from a form of pessimism. now, in my -- [inaudible] of the saying of fanon in relation to what fanon said, i take my clue from the following in the introduction of fanon's black skin/white mask, fanon writes and this is how it begins. don't expect to see an explosion today. it is too early or too late. i am not the bearer of absolute truths. ..

and shouting them indicated the work. it's the philosophy that existed through many of his writings in the public existence that leads to the struggle to emerge and that is referred to. both were philosophers in relation to that same

significance. the second chapter appears multiple times and indicates [inaudible] is the ordinary act that becomes an extraordinary event and what it meant as extraordinary that is exception that becomes normal it is referred to here in the creation of the difference to the dividing question. this is what could be referred to.

philosophically one issue is to do being. for instance something enough basic language ceases to be a communication understood. it seems to be that a part of the drama would be needed to return to itself because they cannot establish the contact with another. the break is found on the political assistance in favor living in the world on the political density and a fictive deviation to the issue. that is the move to the point of

the other through the language to return and focus on trying of giving hand or herself to others the drama of the subject to give density to itself as. there are problems in his past coming back. the first problem is the subject of the stage which they are upset at being in the narcissistic fashion. the second one is that they want to be for the most part conceived of what they are. and therefore it acquires a component even in one's self. it does remarkably those and you

can find many reflections of this. this is part of what he has been saying for years. it is only the subject opposed to the idea that if if they use this passion for the most part it is to be both in itself or for itself. rather than human beings in the abstract is people in the modern age they are informed. if we want to learn more about our ideas about the behavior of people with, we should entertain the extent to which the world is informed by the production such as white and black and therefore speaking of the general.

putting it in perspective it is in relation that starts the characterization of being in a fashion that primarily applies. it would seem to reflect most simply they would seem to reflect most in the passion of trying to be. of course also because another way of trying to become god however this is not the simplest that are which makes a fundamental difference. at the same time it is at the emphasis of blackness which means they wouldn't only endure wanting to be at the same time just with a highlight but also prior to being against itself.

a similar fashion they also do not want to be black and do not want a world where the passion is also very intentionally genocidal. having an identity that is based on others comes back to itself in various ways including the use of technology in the expansion but is different. in relation to world war i and world war ii. after the continuation is so significant is that shouting them to the desperation isolation and the skepticism and cynicism are the subject of these. they say things not kept in the

shadows but someone in the colony, plantation and yet coming through. modern philosophy may have been born there. there was no evil genius needed. one can understand what is going on and he wonders not to understand the importance that that they are saying it. it is an expression of the act of the communication that they are supposed to avoid the substance so they are both trying to achieve but in chapter when they do not achieve. it indicates the move away from the tendencies that are found

into place the kind of thing that is also made by the desire to inspire the process into the philosophy that is rooted and it could also be the philosophy of wisdom into turns out that along with language and communication for a second become so for others. this is another way to read the relevance of the chapter on the second or third. but it continues to show the order both entering the substance over the course of another. the philosophy than to conclude

it is a point of saying for love she writes of that in the text. the world wouldn't be the same without him or her. [inaudible] some 17 years ago. this doesn't mean we also find that he listens. this doesn't mean that he idealizes but acknowledges all and he will go farther than most in establishing the dimension that it doesn't seem to be a word that a work of love and also of understanding and

communication saying it's not only the philosophical introduction but also to philosophy itself to consider a self of understanding and openness to others. the >> it's appropriate. a microphone is not on the. they've done an admiral job of expressing the breath and depth of the book. from its very title it attracted

us when we first read it. i think one of the real interventions is to take it away from arguments about biography and other things. someone who deserves to be taken with his own right in his book has made the case crystal-clear and it's a case that will appeal to experts who know an enormous amount and so i think we should say that and the leadership of the book could be pretty wide. and we will have time for some discussion from the audience. many of you know that he's the

professor of philosophy. and he is from a distinguished professor at rhodes university. they've entered the africana philosophy but james gordon and defined warnings are. [applause] >> you all know this is because

my shoes on. [inaudible] i could keep going on but thank you all for coming out this evening. first this is the first ever book i've done. i'm one of the these people who the moment i finished the book i move on. i've been in context with people but i've never launched a book. i decided to give it this time severalfold. i started a celebration that began in nairobi on the rooftop

in january going through mexico to around the world because those were the in the globe and the other is connected to people both sitting here and also you in the audience and what i mean right that is first with me begin with entrance of -- begin with the price itself. they list and put together a series that is committed to something that you don't see happening much in the academy today and didn't academic publishing because you see a lot of people in academic publishing and in the academy are not as much interested in the ideas were dealing at the dreaded doing it dreaded phenomenon called reality. it's more professionalization

location and the opportunity for publishing. it is absurd to think if it's writing for tenure. [laughter] >> you know what i am saying. we could go through the litany of. if you think about some of the people i teach in my classes or when i think through the idea from vietnam to china to latin america the concept of what it is to engage the world has been colonized by the presupposition

that ideas can only be legitimate to the tiny set of market conditions in the academic framework. i'm not an anti-academic. what i'm concerned about is whether it is in the larger scope of intellectual work so it becomes crucial if we are trying to speak to our species which means actually speaking beyond our generation really to do something called saying something. one of the things that becomes crucial here is reflected in the audience i see because you because you see there are people in this audience who are aspiring for the academic profession but i see quite a few people because i know them in different contexts or just simply people that love ideas.

if they would look at him where people are talking about it more but the question of what he says actually moves her spirit. now when we begin thinking through this it becomes crucial to think through the university press is doing. you know what the book culture is doing because it is reminding us of what it means to engage ideas and that doesn't mean to be reading the words on a page. it means to throw oneself into that role of ideas because there's something very powerful

about ideas. some of you when you read the book will notice i talk about power and one of the things about power that is often overlooked is the power, and there is a lot of missed information about power but it ultimately is the ability to make things happen. if you think about the most you think about it because it's going to make sense. it's going to make things happen. it would be very weird if god says i can't. of course the ability to do something means to transcend our bodies and one of the beautiful things about writing is that writing ideas transcend us to reach to others. it's part of the world such that we are in this room right now

and whatever ideas they say can affect people across the globe. it's really miraculous that we in this room can go through this library and engage a thought from thousands of years ago. whoever it may be the idea that he died in 1961 and we are right here not simply talking about him but one of the projects was to deal with what was the occasion by those ideas. one of these as the members pointed out that a lot of people were mad about the things he said. so it's also to battle with profound investments in misrepresenting what he said and it gets even scarier in the

world where the idea is a it's funny reading novels and going to films which we see for instance white men can go around and shoot hundreds of people i massacre, rape, do all that anticult and heroes. but in any remote sense they say i'm going to fight back. it's called violence. it scares the crap out of people because they never spoke about violence in an unapologetic way it made him something that terrified the crap out of a lot of people which is ironic because as i point out in the book he detested violence. the thing was if you really detest violence violence it's not through saying i want to be

so clean you don't do it by getting back into violence. he then argued that there is a form that is the preservation of violence and if you really are against violence the argument is you get off your butt and do something about it. so that's a different way of looking at these issues. i bring this up because the culture is a blog in which i was given some very good questions for the site. if you don't see many answers you can read them their. one of them is why did you write this book and i love these questions. i am not afraid of why he did certain things. one of the reasons i wrote this book is the introduction to the africana philosophy and in a nutshell is the tendency not only in the academy that the

presupposition and the order of things around college that people in indigenous groups because they are linked to an economy that what they could offer its experience in if you want to have ideas and knowledge you have to look at things right. at first it was a good reason you see a lot of things about this experience. the decision is in the voice of their life, but it's always a baritone voice. i have a theory about that but it's another story. if there's a world that tells you that you do not have a point

of view if you will be in the economy of property then something is told to you. i could understand that. but the problem is everyone has an experience of figuring out his or her experience and you are to bring an id or meaning to its experience and a few do it for knowledge then you will be blocked in what i and others called epidemic dependency or colonization. so i've argued that the belongs to all of us and we must take responsibility. it's part of the liberation practice which is why it is vital. in that framework if we collapse this dichotomy is a problem

because whenever you bring up a black intellectual or who is looking at the world from the perspective is a tendency not to want to have that a book of ideas so when i wrote the introduction to the philosophy it was about showing what it is to engage the intellectual history as a philosophical problem so that was two series history in terms of dealing with the more than 1500 years discussion of the modern conception of that history. but it's because of the investment of being more concerned in the biography than that the idea.

you can't imagine which most of it is about his personal life and what they did instead of what they thought so it's bizarre to think it's allowing those matters in the biography over thought and you can see how this connects and more people are concerned. now it is in that spirit the project was twofold. it wasn't simply to engage the thought but to engage the question of engaging the posh said it was a constant relationship of. and it's with that in mind i think the panel because they honed in very well on those questions and i'm going to

address them now. the first thing to bear in mind and i will start with you but i have to add something. simply not here in gauging this but i i asked her to write the afterward. i asked her to write because there's a missing element of important thoughts many of you may not be aware of because it was translated into english but she was part. this was one of the most institution builders. i organized to become at her when she organized the meeting so i wanted not only to talk about how they want people to ask if this woman and a

'-begin-single-quote she's about in a way she's linked just why by asked her to write the afterward because although she's here in this context she was one of the pioneers not only in her intellectual work and in the construction law but she did something connected to this entire panel. we wrote in some of the writings to develop what we called the pedagogical imperative. it's what we understand that where we understand that they are above all a student. but in fact people fell in love with learning that we just continue to learn more. she's always expanding what she

is learning and is organizing meetings around african-american philosophy for the philosophical thought and in fact in the beginning of my career one of the first talks i gave along with norman chandler was organized because she was trying to remind the american philosophical association that there are people who think they are not white or male. the question connects this important way because it made a lot of people mad. what is interesting is a lot of the debate on the left and a few stimulated a lot of the debate on the left he was critical of the notion. there were a lot of people who would argue something in a nutshell that comes down to this you are indigenous people. you should wait until you get developed enough to be an

industrial proletariat so you could enter h. grew universal revolution. that's the kind of pitch rising discourse dominated. but if you go earlier and look at the writings of martin luther king junior, you could look at the writings of lorraine and take over to julia say over to julia cooper and go through the school tradition. all of the effort and some version of a letter from birmingham which is why we can't wait. and that's why we can't wait as a theoretical critique of the dialectic and in fact when you look at the writing there is something you will find out this rather curious and to give you an idea about this, he wasn't only a philosopher. he wasn't only a psychiatrist but what kind of psychiatrist? he wasn't only a classical

psychiatrist because of therapy team is also a certain sick psychologist. and i took about it in the book if you read his writings you will notice his peculiar talent for investigative work. so he's like a sherlock holmes shoving the panthers this thing going on again extremely enough african syndrome or the woman of color. that's a question. one of the things he was tapping into come here reflected in his last biography of last decade of the first century it didn't follow that he had the knowledge of the theoretical perspective that would clarify. it's not that he didn't know black women. he had sisters but the reality

of clinical life was one of excluded if there was good reason for this because most psychiatric facilities had white women and men of color. the reason is you really are going to have a woman of color whether it is in north africa, southern africa, the united states and the period of delirium to the room they are governed by a white man and told to administer therapy. it was a recipe for rape. if you wanted to learn about the life he would have to work in social work because it would

bring the family in and the room and you have a more protected therapeutic subject. in terms of the questions that were asked it connects to a fundamental question in my writing which is that a lot of what has happened is the question of what it means to be human, the crisis around the questions so now adjusts all of these by pointing out the applied model is that the dialectical and in fact if you see the philosophical anthropology that treats the subject as close fails to do with human agency and the fact that they are all always building relations that constitute. we are witnessing it right now.

nobody in the room has any expectation that the very core conceptions at the level of basic relations would have an impact on the identity we have today. we are already shifting to the question of how we look at gender and race and many of these other categories but it's connected to the question of the new technologies of how we are setting up relations with each other that affect question the very idea. many philosophers reject the position that what we really are are actually relations in the making and we think if we change one the others will remain the

same. they thought they could simply pick up and keep the system impact but they will shift the role. you could try but the goal to keep the system impact for the orientation gets to put them in and make them into what is already there is a. it was a critique and there is an interesting one because it's

something i ate until you when i talk about in the book and for those is very crucial to understand. if you think about what it is. as you know they have the privilege and power not to enough to be in relations with those that are not. then you become like a god. but the human world is a world of relations. so once it happens it comes to the question because it is not

gender or class is a super gaming category of the other. what he actually does is to see what happens if they are interacting the production of new relations, so if you are talking about a revolutionary activity around race, gender or any of the categories, what you are doing is arguing about building different kinds of human beings and this becomes something very crucial because as we get into the question of an open dialect and the question that's related to come then we begin to realize this. if you are going to make what you are a close relation to the categories you it means you are

not frozen. if however you are going to talk about them as open relations if it's not about competition then you have to deal with the idea that what you are building is a different kind of world which it is organically related to sue if you think about it in terms of someone like mark's you have to look closely for the relationship. they think he means an identity that no. he needs you may belong to one commitment that the other work may be linked to another. for each to develop where that humanity is going, those that do

not become counter revolutionary. i wrote the virtual transformation and it's connected to the question because you see at first when we think about the virtuality we often try to impose the models on how we understand the technologies and human beings. but what we. that would be discovered but what we discovered is almost everything we tried to predict every time for the technologies. we always use a past version of things we never thought of before and so in effect although there is a two-dimensional reality perhaps it transcends those and we are dealing with new ways to think about what it is.

i know they are talking about the attack on cornell west which is a profound piece of writing for many reasons. you know there are also -- the problem with it is that it's a sticky. if you comment on that it can get away from the issue because at the end of the day the intellectual achievements are there and the conception of what he wanted to do. but i have a question about prince boettcher remember he worked for kennedy to get into office and everybody that everybody knows that he wasn't a conservative.

it was something that doesn't exist today that he should have been outraged to be treated that way when he fought so hard to get the president legitimacy. she shouldn't have been treated that way. but as we know there will be a lot of opportunities because when you deal with the intellectuals come a lot of people want peace because it has a lot of coverage and i noticed very much they were giving shout outs to the peace because they are powerful institutions. one thing i can tell you that always struck me i first

encountered when i was a little boy and by him called out from a bunch of books and put them on the shelf and never read an. however, i was in the house, a little boy that could read and it's a very unusual story. i started speaking at a very early age and i was reading everything in sight. i couldn't understand a lot of it but that spoke to me the language and i kept reading and one of the things when i could understand it more and it was connected because he met me when i gave a talk at brown university where he heard me talk about texas dental and he was shocked and he wanted to see it in a very different way.

when i met nelson. the department was treating him in a profoundly racist way. the idea of what he was committed to was jeopardized. let me stay around a little bit longer and they developed a relationship with a sandwich the talents came to the floor and i bring this up because why i decided to write this t-shirt.

if education is right it's an act of love and about the growth of others and he's absolutely correct by pointing out this question. you see in a lot of my writings one of the things i argue against his ridiculous cliché. it means you pay attention to people's strengths and weaknesses. if you've ever been loved, you have other flaws and you won't have that many other way so part of the question is in fact they can be connected also to their strength. the disconnect to at the two the two that i give you to argument that it is connected to a different radical democracy then what it is in the sovereignty is

that real freedom is for people to be about to live and exercise their right not only to make the world better but also in the process to be able to take responsibility for their own mistakes. there are always people trying to tell you in advance what will work and what will fail. he says you may have failed but who says we will and in fact people in the past would have said set a gathering like this with the democratic constitution was an impossibility if you are here. it's to encounter the possibility by making it transform into the possible. so what i would argue and i have argued is that in the short life of the 36-year-old revolutionary is an understanding that

ultimately if you are going to do what really matters, you have to love so powerfully that you would put yourself out of the way for the interest of doing what needs to be done. ' >> thank you very much. we have some time for questions. what's with the audience participates so we can get you in. i will bring the microphone around. please wait for the microphone for your questions as to if there are first questions please let me know. and please see your name and introduce yourself. when you come up to you wanted to want to do me a favor? >> my name is david norman is.

i'm a student at columbia university. i wrote a paper on the chapter that some people translate. i think that he entered the question that i was caught up of the dichotomy going on so i thought i had a grasp but now it's kind of tenuous if i need to know.

i hate to be imposed or derived from. i would also like to know is there any more profound answer to that but not so profound that i can't answer it? >> could we get this questions in case we run out of time. when you call me and ask me.

it's written 67 years before he was born. and i correct? because you did call and ask if. you do have it in the book. >> d. want to begin or do you have questions that on what he was saying? one of the reasons i was focused on this is because a lot of people work with this dichotomy so they think about the

supposedly mature and at the age of 36 but the thing about what's interesting and this is connected to what one of my students is talking about. one of the things that's interesting. have you ever met some people matter how much they get they are so immature. he was already very mature throughout his writings. but one of the ideas that become hershel is that there is a distinction between texas and joel koichi. ontology of being treats the

idea that there is a sort of province reality. an access control, it means to stand out. this means that there is a collapse of an identity relation in which things become closed source it opens the drug problems and freedom. what does freedom bring? is was connected to something very terrifying. the terrifying things is that it brings with it responsibility. but i would like to show some of the people who understood all the way to the presence and if you look at the black medical transition it was doing something more having some

responsibility. when you come across slave narratives or writings from people that are living under the same conditions that there is a bizarre strange, which is you come across people who look as though they have no control of the objective circumstances around them. if you're a slave you can run every place and they will catch you up, whatever, the options are very limited. they've written about your own extensions. go through the experience of access to joe don't. but if you know you cannot escape and you feel or suffer a sense of responsibility.

remember when i took the power. they want you to have the extent of your body can physically reach and that's what you are doing they can only interact with materials. that's what you do when you're in prison people because it doesn't mean they are here. if can only affect the parameters of the south. even though your options are limited at the told the choices are and this has been the problem of the resignation because you see.

do you lie to yourselves or do all of these things? as part of our part of our freedom is that we have the freedom to escape our freedom but you will go more inward and then implode. you transcend them in other words it can assert how you relate to it. i'm saying because you could experience that you have a unique set of suffering. that is argued in a lot of his writing.

whether it's psychoanalysis language philosophy they offered them complete but once you bring other forms of pressure they will deal with the particularity. if they were complete it is through which we were created as human beings and we understand our ability to advise the jews because we are linked to freedom so that he means is that it's

pushed to the wayside but the human condition isn't just to experience this but for all more radical. it's a symbol of carrying. they call it responsible. and that's where we've talked about it for years. it's a crucial one.

i just wanted to comment that i find your critique of academics incredibly refreshing to. of spiritual a spiritual nourishment is one of the reasons why because ideas are.

i wanted to know what you think of if you're optimistic or pessimistic because i feel a. to professionalize a become white,.

it's more and more closed off from the real world. i think my colleagues could add to this but one of the things i could mention is i've been doing a lot of work with helping developing alternative production, and among them is what i do with.

it's what the market: as asian. one of the things to bear in mind as i bring this up one thing i would like to mention because it is about the market: as a chef individuals there are many of color who do get caught into making themselves for sale to the highest bidder and that is connected to something very powerful in the market. one of the things in other places i talk about it and in the book is that the market

talks about the theological dimensions in other words it is insufficient to the markets, but they become almost godlike. it means the market has to make sure there there's nothing that's an exception to it. the old model of what it is to be an intellectual is that schooling intellectual work and creativity is a state to be at the one that is where the market would reach a. if you look at market fundamentalism that is not to admit. so it could be a plaintiff refuge.

>> the easiest way is to shift from ideas to the question of jobs and this is something. we had an artist professor which means although she has also a job, her work is in the art and a similarly when you have an intellectual project it's not just a job if you are falling in love with it through which you have an intellectual home. that doesn't work if your goal was to be the market: associate. what is fascinating is have you noticed any intellectual makes

it much whether it's a public, novelist the first thing to go through many peoples mind can we get them a job at a university. why do we presume that it is in the job? there has been an effective job done > spaces which there could be intellectual work. the more intellectual to rely on the framework not as a site of research and thought both of them pointed. when it begins to have been a good life and -- but i find weird is there are people who try to sell their political

identity as a commodity. they want you to hire them at universities not because of conservation to knowledge with a creative idea that because you like their politics. and in many ways defend this new republic article is pure colorization to link into the economy about what would make more marketable. what makes you presume those things? there is a presupposition that you put in the highest places but many people say no all the time too those things.

the fundamental investment is to make you see that if you do not follow the mechanism to make yourself into a commodity you are not being rational. if you are going to resist ginny to face the model of rationality because there are many conceptions and if you follow them you can come out as unreasonable. i usually put it this way, no one wants to be married to a nationally rational person because there's a point at which reasonability requires knowing what you stand for a knowing which rule may have to break because they've undermined the

integrity. it's connected to the process we talked about because of a childlike point of view of there are good guys, bad guys that anybody with adult responsibility you have to make the decision over responsibility itself and you may have to say here are the limits that they can open open a fortune for the possibilities of advanced if you are resisting the market conversation if you choose it a

lot of people for instance don't care about what you think they just care that job you have and that is it's good to have you thought of as more valuable the fact of the matter is if you're going to take the position that there's other things more valuable you will have different choices to make and you might have to go through the hard work of developing the possibilities effect the fact of the matter is we are here needing a lot of press that a while back was considered an academic left. the books were with these other kinds of prices.

we made a decision not only us but others like us to. it's the commitment of what the community is trying to do. the stronger the press get, the people that are getting intellectual work have a place to do it. he went to a place where they could intellectually do work to the presumption of vocational training. so he created these resources

but the actual institutions we build what web enabled those things to function. he said what we would've tried to do ridiculous in fact we should resist imperialism. talk about the colonization. but at least it's in a framework in which it is an alternative system of knowledge. in building that it's now 18

years later and it would be ridiculous for them to come out. our whole point is to have a world of things we never thought of and that's what it is if you're dealing with ideas. it's not the point about pessimism. i of pessimism. i believe in the disk was. i don't ask whether i can succeed or not. we need simply to try to see what happens. we have a praxis model. if we succeed whatever that is

never could have imagined and that's what intensity of pessimism. i know there are other questions. [applause] in the interest of time please thank professor gordon. [applause] [inaudible conversations]

diana and the chair it argued that government redistribution policy, regulation and economic debt

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