Black Existentialism and Decolonizing Knowledge – Contradiction Studies

DFG Research Training Group 2686: Contradiction Studies –

Constellations, Heuristics, and Concepts of the Contradictory

DFG Research Training Group 2686: Contradiction Studies –

Constellations, Heuristics, and Concepts of the Contradictory

Contradiction Studies

Black Existentialism and Decolonizing Knowledge

Prof. Lewis R. Gordon (U Connecticut)

06/19/2023 6:00 pm

U Bremen CART 067 (Rotunde) & online

Drawing upon ideas from Fear of Black Consciousness (Penguin, 2022) / Angst vor Schwarzem Bewusstsein (Ullstein Verlag, 2022), this talk will offer a portrait
of Black existentialism, summarizing some of its key problematics with emphasis on problems wrought from Euromodern colonization of knowledge. The talk
will conclude with a discussion of what decolonizing knowledge entails.

Podium:

Prof. Lewis R. Gordon (U Connecticut)
Prof. Rozena Maart (U KwaZulu Natal, RTG Contradiction Studies)
Prof. Sabine Broeck (INPUTS)
Lindokuhle Shabane (RTG Contradiction Studies)

Moderation:
Prof. Kerstin Knopf (INPUTS, RTG Contradiction Studies)

Back to overview

every day

“Living in contradictions is what we experience every day. Why do we know so little about it?”
Gisela Febel

idea of democratic critique

“If you think that acts of contradicting someone always need to point to better solutions, you haven’t really understood the idea of democratic critique.”
Martin Nonhoff

power and resistance

“Michel Foucault says: “Where there is power, there is resistance, and […] this resistance is never in a position of exteriority in relation to power” (History of Sexuality I, The Will to Knowledge, 1976, p. 95)”
Gisela Febel

hierarchy of norms

“If social contradictions are reflected in law, law cannot form a hierarchy of norms free of contradictions.”
Andreas Fischer-Lescano

problem to be solved

“Contradiction is not primarily a problem to be solved but a motor we cannot do without.”
Martin Nonhoff