Black Political Thought

Catalog description

Black thinkers have made important yet often unrecognized contributions to political theory and philosophy. This course examines the history of black political thought, focusing on the answers black thinkers have formulated to key questions in political theory, such as: What is justice? What is freedom? What are the conditions of possibility for democracy? How should we theorize race? What is racial justice? More than other intellectual traditions, black political thought has been centrally concerned with racism and inequality, but also black refusal and black life. We will pay special attention to the distinctive concepts and modes of theorizing developed by black thinkers, particularly how they conceive the relationship between race, class, gender, sexuality, etc. Rather than providing an overview of black political thought in all times and places, the course will focus on close readings of a few key thinkers.