Eschewing social scientific approaches, which tend to examine race and racism in terms of quasi-static ideal types, this book surveys differing historical contexts from the era of scientific racism in the nineteenth-century to the post-racial racism of the post 9/11 period, and from Europe to the United States, in order to understand how racism has been articulated in differing situations. It is distinguished by the attention it pays to the on-going power of racial discourse in the contemporary period as a legitimating factor in oppression. It exemplifies methodological openness, combining the work of historians, philosophers, religious scholars, and literary critics, and includes differing theoretical models in pursuing a critical approach to race: cultural studies; trauma theory and psychoanalysis; critical theory and consideration of the "new racism"; and postcolonialism and the literature on globalization. It brings together the work of leading academics with younger practitioners and is capped off by an interview with world-renowned intellectual Cornel West on black intellectuals in America.
This book was previously published as a special issue of Patterns of Prejudice.
1. Naming Race, Naming Racisms: An Introduction Jonathan Judaken 2. Antinomies of Race: Diversity and Destiny in Kant Mark Larrimore 3. A Haitian in Paris: Anténor Firmin as a Philosopher Against Racism Robert Bernasconi 4. Surviving Maurraus: Jacques Maritain’s Jewish Question Richard Crane 5. Kenneth B. Clark and The Problem of Power Damon Freeman 6. Listening to Melancholia: Alice Walker’s ‘Meridian’ Leigh Anne Duck 7. Riots, Disasters and Racism: Impending Racial Cataclysm and the Extreme Right in the United States George Michael and D.J. Mulloy 8. Assia Djebar’s qualam: The Poetics of the Trace in Postcolonial Algeria Brigitte Weltman-Aron 9. "Everybody else just living their lives": 9/11, Race, and the New Postglobal Literature Alfred Lopez 10. So What’s New?: Rethinking the New Antisemitism in a Global Age Jonathan Judaken 11. Black Intellectuals in America: A Conversation with Cornel West Jonathan Judaken and Jennifer Geddes
Biography
Jonathan Judaken is an associate professor of intellectual and cultural history at the University of Memphis.
