#frank b wilderson iii

[homonationalist]

Afropessimism, then, is less of a theory of more of a metatheory: a critical project that, by deploying Blackness as a lens of interpretation, interrogates the unspoken, assumptive logic of Marxism, postcolonialism, psychoanalysis, and feminism through rigorous theoretical consideration of their properties and assumptive logic, such as their foundations, methods, form, and utility; and it does so, again, on a higher level of abstraction than the discourse and methods of the theories it interrogates. Again, Afropessimism is, in the main, more of a metatheory than a theory. It is pessimistic about the claims theories of liberation make when these theories try to explain Black suffering or when they analogize Black suffering with the suffering of other oppressed beings. It does this by unearthing and exposing the meta-aporias, strewn like land mines in what these theories of so-called universal liberation hold to be true. If, as Afropessimism argues, Blacks are not Human subjects, but are instead structural inert props, implements for the execution of White and non-Black fantasies and sadomasochistic pleasures, then this also means that, at a higher level of abstraction, the claims of universal humanity that the above theories all subscribe to are hobbled by a meta-aporia: a contradition that manifests whenever one looks seriously at the structure of Black suffering in comparison to the presumed universal structure of all sentient beings. Again, Black people embody a meta-aporia for political thought and action—Black people are the wrench in the works. Blacks do not function as political subjects; instead, our flesh and energies are instrumentalized for postcolonial, immigrant, feminist, LGBTQ, transgender, and workers' agendas. These so-called allies are never authorized by Black agendas predicated on Black ethical dilemmas. A Black radical agenda is terrifying to most people on the Left—think Bernie Sanders—because it emanates from a condition of suffering for which there is no imaginable strategy for redress—no narrative of social, political, or national redemption. This crisis, no, this catastrophe, this realization that I am a sentient being who can't use words like "being" or "person" to describe myself without the scare quotes and the threat of raised eyebrows from anyone within earshot, was crippling.

Frank B. Wilderson III from "For Halloween I Washed My Face" in Afropessimism (2020)

#frank b wilderson iii #afropessimism #antiblackness #reading #bolding is mine he uses italics a lot

[yngsuk]

[...] vertigo—that sense of unhinged reality, a communion with death and that realm which exceeds life—seems to threaten a total loss of self as incommensurable metaphysical frameworks and sensory maps meet. This episodic experience is made possible by what Frank Wilderson has called a “paradigmatic necessity,” namely that blackness is “a life constituted by disorientation rather than a life interrupted by disorientation”. A life constituted by disorientation has as its essential feature what Fanon diagnosed as an “aberration of affect”—autophobia and self-aversion—an effect of realizing selfhood in the terms of our present global hegemonic mode of the subject: its transindividual and systemic scales of value “woven out of a thousand details, anecdotes, stories” imposes an antiblack system of meaning and affective economy. In global hegemonic terms, the African is cast “out of the world” and is thus without standing in relation to the constitution of the reality construct. It is not an absence of alternative metaphysical frameworks and perceptual matrices that produces the vertigo I describe; rather, vertigo is an effect of the inability of these alternatives to find footing within “the world” due to ever-renewed processes of foreclosure that take the nullification of black mater as the horizon of the reality concept and threshold of the sensible world.

Zakiyyah Iman Jackson, Becoming Human: Matter and Meaning in an Antiblack World

#quote #zakiyyah iman jackson #frank b. wilderson iii #frantz fanon #antiblackness #afropessimism #*ayden

[fluoresensitive]

WE CUT HEADS, a reading guide to yah yah's sweeney todd retelling

Some books I've read/will be reading to help me write We Cut Heads! I definitely expect this this will grow, but these are the ones on my mind right now. The ones I've read already are italicized!

THOSE BONES ARE NOT MY CHILD by Toni Cade Bambara

WE REAL COOL: BLACK MEN AND MASCULINTY by bell hooks

BLACK SKIN, WHITE MASKS by Franz Fanon

AFROPESSIMISM by Frank B. Wilderson III

TENDER IS THE FLESH by Agustina Bazterrica

NO LONGER HUMAN by Osamu Dazai

MACBETH by William Shakespeare

SONG OF SOLOMON by Toni Morrison

THE DELECTABLE NEGRO: HUMAN CONSUMPTION AND HOMO-EROTICISM WITHIN U.S. SLAVE CULTURE by Vincent Woodard

THE BLUEST EYE by Toni Morrison

FROM HELL by Alan Moore, Eddie Campbell

THE JUNGLE by Upton Sinclair

#🦢 #we cut heads #wip; we cut heads #i wanna do a film version for this too b/c like. the movies...the MOVIES.

[cosmicanger]

“white people are not simply “protected” by the police, they are—in their very corporeality—the police.”

— Frank B. Wilderson III

“All White people are the police; and all White “civilians”—-if we can even deploy such irony—will continue to deputized their Whiteness to murder Black bodies at their own discretion and leisure.”

#theory #quotes

[caltropspress]

RAPS + CRAFTS #21: Andrew Mbaruk

1. Introduce yourself. Past projects? Current projects?

I’m Andrew Mbaruk, a Black poet living in Vancouver, Canada. I make "literary lo-fi rock rap," drawing from my diverse reading of poetry and classic literature for the "literary" aspect; – it’s "lo-fi" due to the imperfect sound quality, "rock" as the music predominantly features electric guitars, and "rap" because, if I had to use just one genre to categorize it, it’d be rap–I’m obviously rapping in the songs.

On one of my songs I describe my style as “assistant-professorial and janitorial”--it’s a blend of literary, academic, and philosophical elements with a touch of real-life experiences, viewed through my postmodern/modernist collage aesthetic.

Some of my recent albums are Why I Am Not a Painter (a 2023 song anthology), Black Squirrel: A Memoir (an autobiographical album through Extraordinary Rap), and Oiseau=textual: the flying rap album (centered around birds). Collaborations include Affect Theory and the Text-to-Speech Grandiloquence with Rhys Langston, Papier-Mache Chalet with Th’ Mole, Ultraviolet Flamingo with Vellum Bristol or Jouquin Fox, and Hip-Hop, With a Twist of Lemon with Mantis the Miasma.

Currently, I’m working on a series of lo-fi rock rap albums, each titled Abolish Canada. Abolish Canada [1] and Abolish Canada [2] are already available on my Bandcamp page.

2. Where do you write? Do you have a routine time you write? Do you discipline yourself, or just let the words come when they will? Do you typically write on a daily basis?

I write whenever I’m awake and in the mood, which is often at home. This could be in the middle of the night or just as frequently in the afternoon. Currently, I find myself in the writing room...surrounded by books... On my desk are three old dictionaries and a book of selected poems by Wallace Stevens, alongside an energy drink can and crumpled papers... Scattered throughout the room are various poetry books, and books on theory and philosophy, from Marx and Hegel to Frank B. Wilderson III and David Marriott... These books are mostly on a couch doubling as a larger desk, and atop an old synthesizer from the 1980s... On the floor stand an electric guitar and amp, alongside pedals and tangled cords at my feet... Two walls are giant windows, one of which is usually open even in winter (I’m often smoking). I’m undisciplined, though I still write almost daily – though there’s the occasional lapse, like these past few days...

3. What’s your medium—pen and paper, laptop, on your phone? Or do you compose a verse in your head and keep it there until it’s time to record?

During 2017-2018, I primarily used pen and paper for my writing. But, since then, I’ve transitioned to typing most of my raps on a computer. Occasionally I’ll compose a verse while walking, relying on my Android. The inconvenience of keeping verses in my head until I can write them down...that’s a problem I face during work shifts – cleaning Vancouver’s streets, e.g....and one song I crafted mentally while washing dishes at a burger bar. Using a recording medium like paper or a word processor is best though – it allows me to carefully consider connections between different parts of a verse, because I have the entire composition visible on a page or on a screen.

4. Do you write in bars, or is it more disorganized than that?

I used to have a more disorganized writing style, especially in the first few years of this rapping project... Initially, I didn't even see my work as a part of rap. It was only when I started collaborating with other rappers and producers that I began to structure my writing in bars.

While there are still moments when I write in a more formless manner, I stick to a more regular form these days, lines that last four beats. Typically, I'll create four lines that rhyme (using slant rhymes) entirely parallel to each other:

(e.g., “abnegating dactylic hexameter his vacation, a trip with dead passengers the Latin pages of literate Sapphic verse as the painting's acrylic red flags ablur”),

followed by another set of four, or maybe a couplet or two

(in this case, “as heroin mixed with the China White terror, his literary dynamite exposing the Pindaric champion; explosions, the thin shards of glass in him”),

and then another quatrain or couplet, or sometimes a set of six or eight rhyming lines, or sometimes more...and so on.

I never thought I'd become so formal or strict in my approach. I've always been inclined towards poetry that adheres to (for example) Charles Olson’s "projective verse", but surprisingly, weirdly, this structured approach is working for me now.

5. How long into writing a verse or a song do you know it’s not working out the way you had in mind? Do you trash the material forever, or do you keep the discarded material to be reworked later?

It’s different with every verse and song. Sometimes I’ll finish the entire thing and throw it out/delete it. Usually some part of the aborted material returns in a new form. I work in a "collage" style and see my rhymes as Deleuzian rhizomes, so I can easily connect my rhymes like Lego... It’s totally acceptable within my project to incorporate disparate fragments – unless the lyrics are focused by a constraint, as on my album about birds (Oiseau=textual: the flying rap album) or the one about the Iran-Contra scandal (The Iran-Contra Project).

6. Have you engaged with any other type of writing, whether presently or in the past? Fiction? Poetry? Playwriting? If so, how has that mode influenced your songwriting?

I’ve written poetry, fiction, a screenplay... The rapping basically grew out of my experiments with print poetry – I started making poems called "phonotexts," recorded poems, in 2014... I made a spoken word album called Phono=textual: a novel in mono... It took about three years for these "phonotexts" to become rap songs.

7. How much editing do you do after initially writing a verse/song? Do you labor over verses, working on them over a long period of time, or do you start and finish a piece in a quick burst?

I try to edit as I write, then I'll record the thing, sometimes using some instrumental that I'm not actually going to use – just to hear it, so I can edit it some more. Then I record the song immediately. It usually takes a few hours or an evening.

Sometimes I work on a song for a few days.

8. Do you write to a beat, or do you adjust and tweak lyrics to fit a beat?

I begin with the words and a rhythm usually... I write lyrics, then I make the drums, then I record the verse or verses, then finally I'll add guitars and synthesizer and whatnot.

9. What dictates the direction of your lyrics? Are you led by an idea or topic you have in mind beforehand? Is it stream-of-consciousness? Is what you come up with determined by the constraint of the rhymes?

I usually begin with one small idea, just a line or a few words, and I grow a verse or verses from the one idea through free association, playing with meaning and rhyme. I’m often propelled by chance, but just as often propelled by a thematic goal, and this can change midway through writing.

10. Do you like to experiment with different forms and rhyme schemes, or do you keep your bars free and flexible?

I’ve sneaked sonnets into my raps, and I’ve invented something called “rhyme chiasmus” (a rhyme scheme where two rhyming sounds are repeated in a chiastic pattern for many bars) but I’m usually freer.

11. What’s a verse you’re particularly proud of, one where you met the vision for what you desire to do with your lyrics?

The song "Electrons," track 01 of Abolish Canada [1]...though it goes on a bit too long I think, the bit right at the beginning is very good maybe. That song, and in fact the entirety of Abolish Canada [1]... That’s where I’ve most closely achieved much of what I intend with my words.

12. Can you pick a favorite bar of yours and describe the genesis of it?

My lines make their meaning through the relation to other lines. So, my favourite passage in my writing – "the human soul stuck in your body / fluent in post-structural ornithology” – is shaped by what surrounds it.

The song is called "Under the Oiseau=text." It’s about reading and about birds. And about reading birds as signs, an ancient practice.

I thought of these words because a bird, a pigeon, rose flapping before me as I walked along Commercial Drive in Vancouver. I decided to make an album about birds in that moment, and began writing "Under the Oiseau=text" as soon as I got home. Here’s the lyric in its context:

sans serif, these words upon my gravestone bearing the withered flower tossed - the Baudelairean inner albatross, the human soul stuck in your body fluent in post-structural ornithology . . .  . . .his words draw you a map of the geographer perched upon a branch in the binoculars, this scholar of math as it pertains to flight, the neurographer mapping the brain with light

13. Do you feel strongly one way or another about punch-ins? Will you whittle a bar down in order to account for breath control, or are you comfortable punching-in so you don’t have to sacrifice any words?

I shorten lines and always try to do verses in a single take.

14. What non-hiphop material do you turn to for inspiration? What non-music has influenced your work recently?

Afropessimism, John Ashbery’s poetry, nature, the congressional report on the Iran-Contra scandal, and the letter N. Also, I collect and read dictionaries.

15. Writers are often saddled with self-doubt. Do you struggle to like your own shit, or does it all sound dope to you?

Some of my stuff I dig especially, other stuff I’m okay with, most of the stuff I don’t like no one can hear anywhere. Grand Lunatic I’m not crazy about, Andra Mbalimbali I’m not crazy about, Neuro=textual: a novel of ideas is not my favourite of my albums. From late in 2022 and throughout 2023, that stuff I like – though I’m on the fence about some projects like Black Squirrel and The Iran-Contra Project. The earlier stuff evinces potential realized by Oiseau=textual: the flying rap album and Abolish Canada [1]... That’s how I see things.

16. Who’s a rapper you listen to with such a distinguishable style that you need to resist the urge to imitate them?

Rappers who depend less on rhyme and just say really interesting shit, like AKAI SOLO or my friend Jouquin Fox, I can’t do that. I tried using a little less rhyme on The Iran-Contra Project, my concept album about Iran-Contra, and I’m sure I can’t do that. The constraint of rhyme is essential to my style.

17. Do you have an agenda as an artist? Are there overarching concerns you want to communicate to the listener?

Yes, I am trying to communicate many things to the listener. I am saying nothing specifically, and consequently saying many different things. (Any one of these different things I could write about at length, but it has been recommended to me that I just leave it at “I am saying nothing specifically, and consequently saying many different things” – nice and succinct.)

RAPS + CRAFTS is a series of questions posed to rappers about their craft and process. It is designed to give respect and credit to their engagement with the art of songwriting. The format is inspired, in part, by Rob McLennan’s 12 or 20 interview series.

Photo credit: unknown (hit me up)

[allslost]

...we also suffer as the hosts of Human parisites, though they themselves might be hosts of parasitic capitalism and colonialism. I had looked to theory...to help me find/create the story of Black liberation- Black political redemption. What I found instead was that redemption, as a narrative mode, was a parasite that fed upon me for its coherence.

Frank B. Wilderson III, Afropessimism, (16)

#frank wilderson #afropessimism #narrative

[deadtothefuture]

“Black liberation, as a prospect, makes radicalism more dangerous to the U.S. This is not because it raises the specter of an alternative polity (such as socialism, or community control of existing resources), but because its condition of possibility and gesture of resistance function as a negative dialectic: a politics of refusal and a refusal to affirm, a ‘program of complete disorder.’”

– Frank B. Wilderson III, "The Prison Slave as Hegemony's (Silent) Scandal"

[crvvys]

I have maybe 4 books to read before giving an entire fully baked opinion on this but what some AfAm academics have contributed to social activism is tragic. at least in recent years. a lot of different academic conversations seeped online and made shit worse or annoying but this one keeps sticking out to me as of late.

the spreading of afro pessimism in certain circles which of course spreads to the internet and then the rest of the world. I won’t say afro pessimism is wholly responsible for ALL of the shenanigans bc that’s not true but the idea that a philosophy steeped in American exceptionalism and from what I’m coming to understand, misreadings of other black academics, gaining foot on a global scale to define blackness and the world’s relation to blackness…feels very wrong.

it also creates separation when there should be common ground among people with different backgrounds and experiences. and that isn’t always clear cut either bc some people do take and misinterpret and remove cultural context from words or situations which I also don’t like. but I still think there can be understanding and building between groups that suffer oppression. and afro pessimism severs this connection between oppressed people in the global north to help and stand with people in the global south.

I listened to an interview from one of the major proponents of afro pessimism, Frank B Wilderson III and I was so bothered by a lot of it. it felt very America knows best and better about everything including blackness. despite the fact that blackness in the US differs from other countries, African American history differs from other countries with African diasporas so the historical context can’t be applied the same way. and also AfAms tend to feel very insecure in our place in the world which at times has not led to…positive things. the whole fiasco with African Americans arguing with Egyptians about Egyptian history comes to mind. that is its own discussion but the gall you have to have to argue with people about history that’s not even your own? I understand the context of the argument and the African American perspective and I still think it was audacious.

the mindfuck that is being African American gives context to this stuff but it doesn’t excuse it. and I become more bothered by what we’ve put out into the world that ultimately may be black but is also still American and potentially harmful to others.

I just refuse to believe that anti blackness is this necessary social structure to all other societies. i feel like that’s a very narrow view of the world and ignores a lot of ethnic conflicts that are found everywhere and can often be much more intense than racial conflicts. racism against black people is found in many places obviously but I don’t think we are at the immediate lowest social rank in every society. I just don’t buy that.

i think every nation state has its own population of people whether for ethnic/religious reasons, whatever differs them from the accepted main society, that the state wishes to abuse or crush and those are the people worth listening to and seeking solidarity with.

not to mention afro pessimism seems to legitimise race as like biological almost? which I also don’t like? I just don’t believe that black American academics know enough about the world to make these claims that ultimately defines blackness for everyone else or if they do know enough, they’d admit that race is not static and that it has a historical context within the society that it develops. i have many undeveloped thoughts and criticisms on this though.

#i love being African American but I also believe when you love something you critique it and I always hate how bc of how we experience- #American life that creates this smallness within us that leads a lot of us to these identity seeking journeys #we are African descended but we are American and you can’t remove yourself from that worldview!!! You just can’t. the less accepting of this #part of us the more insecurity I see which leads to American worldview points anyway bc your worldview is still narrow #i don’t seek to remove my worldview but I want to expand it and hear from other people and not conclude that my American lens knows all #and I feel embarrassed when I hear my people not wanting to do the same when we are culpable for many of the US’ wrongdoings as well

[professorfaber]

Every society has a murderous hierarchy: someone’s always knocking at the basement door, trying to get free. But life is prismatic—it’s possible to be Black and degraded in America while also profiting from wanton extraction of resources overseas, oppressing millions of non-Black others, and living on land stolen from indigenous people. We are always joined in our sufferings, often by somebody we can’t see through the darkness. We speak of solidarity precisely because the empathetic act of analogy is a way of acknowledging this complexity, and of training our ethical senses, again and again, to widen the circle of our concern. Any system of thought that has refined itself beyond the ability to imagine kinship with the stranded Guatemalan kid detained at the U.S. border, or with the functionally enslaved Uyghur in China, or, again—I can’t get over it—with the Native American on whose stolen ancestral ground you live and do your business, is lost in its own fog.

#mine

[dykevillanelle]

savannah “dykevillanelle”’s 2022 reading list!

{ books read 2015 x books read 2016 x books read 2017 x books read 2018 x books read 2019 x books read 2020 x books read 2021 }

books read: 93 (goal was 100 but sometimes we have a hard year) pages read: 32,179

top 5 fiction:

(best) the overstory (richard powers)

the stars and the blackness between them (junanda petrus)

no one is talking about this (patricia lockwood)

girl, woman, other (bernardine evaristo)

last night at the telegraph club (malinda lo)

top 5 nonfiction:

(best) afropessimism (frank b. wilderson iii)

recovery from schizophrenia: psychiatry and the political economy (richard warner)

the age of surveillance capitalism: the fight for a human future at the new frontier of power (shoshana zuboff)

virology: essays for the living, the dead, and the small things in between (joseph osmundson)

crying in h mart (michelle zauner)

bottom 5:

girl made of stars (ashley blake herring)

the four winds (kristen hannah)

aphrodite made me do it (trisha mateer)

come closer (sara gran)

(worst) lovecraft country (matt ruff)

full list and reviews, in order read, under the cut

yolk (mary h.k. choi) [ya, realistic fiction | ★★★★★]

the secret scripture (sebastian barry) [ historical fiction | ★★★]

she drives me crazy (kelly quindlen) [ya, romance | ★★]

last night at the telegraph club (malinda lo) [historical fiction | ★★★★★]

the stars and the blackness between them (junanda petrus) [romance | ★★★★★]

come closer (sara gran) [horror | ★]

racism without racists: color-blind racism and the persistence of racial inequality in america (eduardo bonilla-silva) [nonfiction, sociology | ★★★]

something to talk about (meryl wilsner) [romance | ★★] 

real life (brandon taylor) [realistic fiction | ★★★★] 

invisible no more: police violence against black women and women of color (andrea j. ritchie, editor) [nonfiction | ★★★★★] 

queenie (candice carty-williams) [realistic fiction | ★★] 

the seven husbands of evelyn hugo (taylor jenkins reid) [historical fiction, romance | ★★★] 

how we get free: black feminism and the combahee river collective (keeanga-yamahtta taylor, editor) [nonfiction | ★★★★★]

one last stop (casey mcquiston) [romance | ★★★★] 

patsy (nicole dennis-benn) [realistic fiction | ★★★] 

hani and ishu’s guide to fake dating (adiba jaigirdar) [ya, romance | ★★★] 

my year of rest and relaxation (ottessa moshfegh) [realistic fiction | ★★★★]

wilder girls (rory power) [ya, horror | ★★★★] 

not straight, not white: black gay men from the march on washington to the AIDS crisis (kevin j. mumford) [nonfiction | ★★★] 

sex object: a memoir (jessica valenti) [memoir | ★★] 

severed (ling ma) [science fiction | ★★★★] 

blood meridian, or the evening redness in the west (cormac mccarthy) [historical fiction, classics | ★★]

her royal highness (rachel hawkins) [romance | ★★] 

i’m thinking of ending things (iain reid) [horror | ★★★] 

things have gotten worse since we last spoke (eric larocca) [horror | ★★★★★] 

evicted: poverty and profit in the american city (matthew desmond) [nonfiction | ★★★★] 

boy parts (eliza clark) [realistic fiction, horror | ★★★★] 

crying in h mart (michelle zauner) [memoir | ★★★★★] 

leave the world behind (rumaan alam) [science fiction, horror | ★★★★] 

killing the black body: race, reproduction, and the meaning of liberty (dorothy roberts) [nonfiction | ★★★★] 

no one is talking about this (patricia lockwood) [realistic fiction | ★★★★★] 

my best friend’s exorcism (grady hendrix) [horror | ★★★★] 

helter skelter: the true story of the manson murders (vincent bugliosi) [true crime | ★★] 

perfume: the story of a murderer (patrick süskind) historical fiction, horror | ★★★]

the tattooist of auschwitz (heather morris) [biography | ★★] 

recovery from schizophrenia: psychiatry and political economy (richard warner) [nonfiction | ★★★★★] 

lovecraft country (matt ruff) [horror | ★] 

pretty girls (karin slaughter) [horror | ★★★] 

therapeutic communication: knowing what to say when (paul l. wachtel) [nonfiction | ★★★] 

maybe you should talk to someone: a therapist, her therapist, and our lives revealed (lori gottlieb) [memoir | ★★] 

the examined life: how we lose and find ourselves (stephen grosz) [memoir | ★★★]

written in the stars (alexandra bellefleur) [romance | ★] 

klara and the sun (kazuo ishiguro) [klara and the sun | ★★★] 

go tell it on the mountain (james baldwin) [realistic fiction, classics | ★★★★★]

luster (raven leilani) [realistic fiction | ★★★] 

queer and trans artists of color: stories of some of our lives (nia king, editor) [anthology, interviews | ★★★]

annihilation (jeff vandermeer) [science fiction, horror | ★★★★] 

my sister, guard your veil; my brother, guard your eyes: uncensored iranian voices (lila azam zanganeh, editor) [nonfiction, essays | ★★★★]

girl made of stars (ashley herring blake) [ya, realistic fiction | ★] 

the age of surveillance capitalism: the fight for a human future at the new frontier of power (shoshana zuboff) [nonfiction | ★★★★★] 

folklorn (angela mi young hur) [science fiction, fantasy | ★★★★★] 

girl, woman, other (bernardine evaristo) [realistic fiction | ★★★★★] 

aphrodite made me do it (trista mateer) [poetry | ★] 

we do this ’til we free us: abolitionist organizing and transforming justice (mariame kaba) [nonfiction, essays | ★★★★★] 

the chinese lady: afong moy in early america (nancy e. davis) [biography | ★★★] 

the parisian (isabella hammad) [historical fiction | ★★★★★] 

under the udala trees (chinelo okparanta) [historical fiction | ★★★★] 

the overstory (richard powers) [realistic fiction | ★★★★★]

queen of teeth (hailey piper) [horror | ★★★] 

the southern book club’s guide to slaying vampires (grady hendrix) [horror | ★★★★]

the vegetarian (han kang) [horror | ★★★] 

the priory of the orange tree (samantha shannon) [fantasy | ★★★★] 

harlem shuffle (colson whitehead) [historical fiction | ★★★★] 

the poppy war (r.f. kuang) [fantasy | ★★] 

parable of the sower (octavia butler) [science fiction | ★★★★] 

the idiot (elif batuman) [realistic fiction | ★★★★★] 

tender is the flesh (agustina bazterrica) [horror | ★★★★] 

the four winds (kristin hannah) [historical fiction | ★★] 

manhunt (gretchen felker-martin) [horror, science fiction | ★★★★] 

tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow (gabrielle zevin) [realistic fiction | ★★★★] 

ace of spades (faridah àbíke íyimídé) [ya, horror | ★★★★★]

nona the ninth (tamsyn muir) [science fiction | ★★★★★] 

blitzed: drugs in the third reich (norman ohler) [nonfiction | ★★★] 

virology: essays for the living, the dead, and the small things in between (joseph osmundson) [nonfiction, essays | ★★★★★] 

we have always lived in the castle (shirley jackson) [horror | ★★★★] 

the black flamingo (dean atta) [ya, poetry | ★★] 

things we lost to the water (eric nguyen) [realistic fiction | ★★★★] 

ruinsong (julia ember) [ya, fantasy | ★★] 

flung out of space (hannah templar & grace ellis) [graphic novel, biography | ★★★★★] 

everything i never told you (celeste ng) [mystery | ★★★★★] 

here the whole time (vitor martins) [ya, romance | ★★]

why freud was wrong: sin, science, and psychoanalsis (richard webster) [biography | ★★★★] 

sea of tranquility (emily st. john mandel) [science fiction | ★★★★] 

free food for millionaires (min jin lee) [realistic fiction | ★★★★] 

my heart hemmed in (marie ndaiye) [horror | ★★★] 

greywaren (maggie stiefvater) [ya, fantasy | ★★★★] 

bad gays (huw lemmey & ben miller) [biography | ★★★★★] 

cinderella is dead (kalynn bayron) [ya, fantasy | ★★] 

eileen (ottessa moshfegh) [realistic fiction | ★★★] 

artemis (andy weir) [science fiction | ★★★★] 

my heart is a chainsaw (stephen graham jones) [horror | ★★★] 

the orange eats creeps (grace krilanovich) [science fiction, horror | ★★] 

afropessimism (frank b. wilderson iii) [nonfiction, memoir | ★★★★★]

#bookblr #books #angel.txt #2022 reads #book roundup

[webionaire]

BLACK STUDIES—as modeled by the transdisciplinary work of contemporary thinkers such as Kimberlé Crenshaw, Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Saidiya Hartman, Kara Keeling, Katherine McKittrick, Christina Sharpe, Fred Moten, and Frank B. Wilderson III—has grown increasingly central to critical thought in the art world and the academy, with especially urgent implications for art-historical praxis: How do the discipline’s notions of objecthood and objectivity shift in light of transatlantic slavery’s production of persons as property? How must art-historical methods, given their origins in racist, sexist, and colonialist epistemologies, be retooled to engage with complexities of Black life and expression that are designed to evade capture? What becomes of art history as an intellectual enterprise when the ethical imperatives and liberatory horizons of Black studies occasion an interrogation of both the discipline’s objects of analysis and its political imaginaries? This year marks the publication of two groundbreaking books that address these questions.

[homonationalist]

At one point Sameer spoke of being stopped and searched at Israeli checkpoints. He spoke in a manner that seemed not to require my presence. I hadn't seen this level of concentration and detachment in him before. That was fine. He was grieving. "The shameful and humiliating way the soldiers run their hands up and down your body," he said. Then he added, "But the shame and humiliation runs even deeper if the Israeli soldier is an Ethiopian Jew." The earth gave way. The thought that my place in the unconscious of Palestinians fighting for their freedom was the same dishonorable place I occupied in the minds of Whites in America and Israel chilled me. I gathered enough wits about me to tell him that his feelings were odd, seeing how Palestinians were at war with Israelis, and White Israelis at that. How was it that the people who stole his land and slaughtered his relatives were somehow less of a threat in his imagination than Black Jews, often implements of Israeli madness, who sometimes do their dirty work? What, I wondered silently, was it about Black people (about me) that made us so fungible we could be tossed like a salad in the minds of oppressors and the oppressed? I was faced with the realization that in the collective unconscious, Palestinian insurgents have more in common with the Israeli state and civil society than they do with Black people. What they share is a largely unconscious consensus that Blackness is a locus of abjection to be instrumentalized on a whim. At one moment Blackness is a disfigured and disfiguring phobic phenomenon; at another moment Blackness is a sentient implement to be joyously deployed for reasons and agendas that have little to do with Black liberation. There I sat, yearning, in solidarity with my Palestinian friend's yearning, for the full restoration of Palestinian sovereignty; mourning, in solidarity with my friend's mourning, over the loss of his insurgent cousin; yearning, that is, for the historical and political redemption of what I thought was a violated commons to which we both belonged—when, all of a sudden, my friend reached down into the unconscious of his people and slapped me upside the head with a wet gym shoe: the startling realization that not only was I barred, ab initio, from the denouement of historical and political redemption, but that the borders of redemption are policed by Whites and non-Whites alike, even as they kill each other. It's worse than that. I, as a Black person (if person, subject, being are appropriate, since Human is not), am both barred from the denouement of social and historical redemption and needed if redemption is to attain any form of coherence.

Frank B. Wilderson III from "For Halloween I Washed My Face" in Afropessimism (2020)

#frank b wilderson iii #antiblackness #afropessimism #reading #i take issue with some of his wording but sharing for the core idea #which he elaborates on later #decided to read this after watching origin which was...a mess

[yngsuk]

Capacitated categories come into being through analogical relations with others; in the process of self-actualization, they can plausibly resist full subsumption by the analogical register. Analogies, moreover, signal how possibility and actuality coordinate nature and history in ways that call forth and foreclose the incapacity philosophically marked by the slave. Analogies flow into and out of slaves as their constitutional condition. [Frank B.] Wilderson’s “ruse,” therefore, is at least twofold: 1) the ruse that there is something behind the analogy that can be safeguarded, usually a human essence which the “enslaved” modifier, in recent academic fashion, is meant to hold in reserve, and 2) the ruse that the tools for safeguarding are synonymous with (or at least not too diferent from) modes of apprehension already available. Instead of recovering human potential behind the slave-animal analogy (which, given available conceptual tools, has the effect of reducing slaves to proto-laborers, more deeply deactualized humans than those laborers reduced to pure capacity), engaging the slave-animal-labor nexus through anti-blackness triggers the seemingly vertiginous possibility that Marxist dialectical imagining, under the open sign of species-being, extends the ruse and short-circuits its revolutionary animus. Indeed, the act of going behind the curtain of analogy and recovering the human subject only confirms the agent of recovery. While analogical being is a form of analogical becoming, the slave holds no such potential or, rather, the only potential of the slave is as being-for-others, which is why slave analogies have no defense in or against the world. If the slave does have potential, it is lodged in the potential to destroy the very order of things. Afro-pessimism calls for a Fanonian “end of the world” instead of an “end to analogizing” because the end involves an end to the grammatical relays between analogy and actualization, word and worlding, species and history, the subject and the acts of discovery, description, reflection, and reparation.

Sara-Maria Sorentino, Slave/Animal/Labor: Marxist Incapacity and The Direction Analogy Flows

#quote #sara-maria sorentino #frank b. wilderson iii #frantz fanon #slavery #antiblackness #abolition #afropessimism #philosophy #*ayden

[pansexualdemic]

I'm going to uplift voices by blazing my own post and tag spamming instead of mentioning Frank B Wilderson III by name! This totally isn't about more attention for me!

i didn't ask for your validation

[the-intellectual-journal]

The Unapologetic Role of the Public Intellectual through Frank B. Wilderson III

Image from Afropessimism with Frank B. Wilderson III

Frank B. Wilderson III has consistently sparked controversy and meaningful discourse within Black intellectual circles and the public sphere throughout his career. As the child of a university professor and advocate for making the Pledge of Allegiance non-mandatory in his middle school, he was destined to emerge as a radical intellectual. Wilderson has also been a pioneer in the philosophical framework known as Afropessimism which challenges humanism and ontology. In Afropessimism, Black[ness] is positioned at odds with humanism — rejecting the belief in a universal human experience. The framework of Afropessimism contends that the gratuitous violence inflicted upon Black people globally is an integral part of humanity. Frank B. Wilderson’s Afropessimist philosophical framework and radical intellectualism not only challenge societal norms but also redefine the role of what it means to be a public intellectual.

Wilderson’s academic and political career exemplifies his intellectual commitments. He pursued his undergraduate studies at Dartmouth studying government and philosophy. After completing his studies at Dartmouth, he received his Master of Fine Arts degree from Columbia University in fiction writing and his Ph.D. in rhetoric and film studies from the University of California, Berkeley. Throughout Wilderson’s life, he was deeply involved in civil rights activism in Berkeley, California, and the African National Congress in South Africa where he was also a professor. Along with his activist and professional background, Wilderson has written many works ranging from his experiences in apartheid South Africa to his critiques of Marxist philosophies and African-American epistemologies. One of Wilderson’s renowned works titled “Gramsci’s Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society” argues that conventional Marxist discourse shaped by intellectuals like Gramsci fails to address the unique position of the Black subject, the slave, in civil society. Wilderson argues the Black experience is marked by a historical trauma that disarticulates the foundations of hegemony. The mark of historical trauma reveals a structural impossibility for the Black subject to partake in civil society as envisioned by Marx. 

In April 2020, Wilderson published his book “Afropessimism” and is described by Wilderson as:

Combining trenchant philosophy with lyrical memoir, Wilderson presents the tenets of an increasingly prominent intellectual movement (Afropessimism) that sees Blackness through the lens of perpetual slavery. Drawing on works of philosophy, literature, film, and critical theory, he shows that the social construct of slavery, as seen through pervasive anti-Black subjugation and violence, is hardly a relic of the past but the very engine that powers our civilization and that without this master-slave dynamic, the calculus bolstering world civilization would collapse.

The book marked the initial exposure of the public to the philosophical framework of Afropessimism and the civil unrest after the death of George Floyd a month later only underscored its relevance and urgency. Wilderson’s text evoked strong reactions from the general public eliciting a spectrum of reviews. The reactions ranged from those who resonate with the ideas he raises to others who do not perceive him as someone to be taken seriously, exemplary of what it is to be a public intellectual. One internet user who read the book described it as “... the global reality of blackness as slavery to humanity. The writing is compelling, beautiful, and elegant. The theory is clear and unsettling. The truth of it is relentless. Be careful how you use the term human from now on. Be forewarned when you meet one.” to “the theory is incomplete and reductive…” “Afropessimism” also garnered critical appraisal from various outlets such as The New Yorker, The Nation, and The New York Times. Additionally, The New York Times asked Wilderson in an interview to persuade someone to read his book in 50 words or less to which he replied “With the narrative drive of a captivating novel and the intellectual rigor of critical theory, “Afropessimism” illustrates how black death is necessary for the material and psychic life of the human species. A high-wire act between rage and paranoia, or a breath of sanity? Read it and decide.” The book not only exposes readers to this distinctive philosophical framework but also invites readers to critically engage with the complex parallels between race, society, and the human condition. Furthermore, this exemplifies what a public intellectual should do—offering and providing knowledgeable perspectives that encourage questioning and challenging conventional standards.

Examining Wilderson’s work in the context of the supposed decline of public intellectuals in the United States requires scrutinizing the nature of his intellectual contributions and how they challenge prevailing narratives. Wilderson's approach to philosophy and race positions him as a distinctive figure within the contemporary intellectual landscape. Wilderson is unapologetic when it comes to challenging established norms which presents a departure from the more restrained styles associated with previous generations of public intellectuals. This departure also prompts a critical question: Does Wilderson’s methodology signify a resurgence of public intellectuals who are willing to disrupt the status quo? Or perhaps it exemplifies a shift toward unconventional forms of intellectual engagement? 

In “Afropessimism,” Wilderson calls for an end to the world as a resolution to the structural violence that the Black subject experiences. The New Yorker published a piece on Wilderson's book titled “The Argument of Afropessimism” and said “But, unlike hooks, Wilderson does not choose to imagine possible futures. The only way to cure the condition of slavery that ails Black people, he says, is “the end of the world.” There will have to be a total end to things—an apocalypse. From civilization’s ashes something truly new might finally grow.” Furthermore, this is a radical and transformative response whether one agrees with the ideas the book presents or not. However, as much as Wilderson has contributed to Afropessimism, he does not necessarily go into depth about what that resolution to anti-Blackness looks like. What does the end of the world look like for the liberation of the Black subject? Is it the abolition of the police, the overthrowing of capitalism, imperialism, and all the institutions that participate in the exploitation of the Black being?

Wilderson’s intellectual contributions have had a significant impact on the public, especially in the aftermath of the civil unrest from the death of George Floyd, a global pandemic, economic recession, and a surge in a culture war propelled by the right wing. As the American public, particularly those that are Generation Z and millennials become increasingly aligned with politics that challenge the status quo, there is an interesting observation unfolding. The disarray of American institutions has left many young Americans disillusioned which has led to a turn towards radical political ideologies. In a similar context, police abolition and the works of public intellectual Angela Davis surged around the same epoch as Afropessimism did. 

The material conditions of a particular society shape the type of dialogue that enters public discourse and the works of Wilderson and Davis is an exemplary observation of this phenomenon. In a similar vein, there is a reactionary response to the emergence of radical leftist intellectuals and discourse, exemplified by individuals like Matt Walsh who has published strong opposing opinions on transgenderism in contemporary American society. Additionally, Wilderson’s and Walsh’s ability to elicit strong reactions from the public and esteemed publications suggests a polarizing influence that is representative of public intellectuals who challenge norms. This polarization is a response to a broader shift where the public appears to be invested in intellectual figures who do not shy away from controversy. 

Wilderson’s works also offer a contemporary lens through which to analyze the evolution of public engagement with the intellectual in connection with the essay “Are Public Intellectuals a Thing of the Past?” by Stephen Mack. The essay addresses the anxiety surrounding the influence of intellectuals in society and challenging perceptions of anti-intellectualism in American society. In the context of Wilderson, Mack’s essay on public intellectuals emphasizes the shift in focus from the decline of a specific class to the functionality of intellectual work which resonates with Wilderson’s radical unapologetic approach.

 One noteworthy excerpt from Mack’s idea of the role of the citizen and the public intellectual states:

It is also, however, the obligation of every citizen in a democracy. Trained to it or not, all participants in self-government are duty-bound to prod, poke, and pester the powerful institutions that would shape their lives. And so if public intellectuals have any role to play in a democracy—and they do—it’s simply to keep the pot boiling. The measure of public intellectual work is not whether the people are listening, but whether they’re hearing things worth talking about.

As Mack articulates in his essay, the obligation of every citizen in a democracy is to actively engage with and question the powerful institutions that shape their lives. This aligns with the perspective that a public intellectual such as Wilderson holds in keeping the societal discourse dynamic. Wilderson’s assertive and radical approach, whether people may agree or disagree serves as a testament to the obligation of citizens to challenge powerful institutions and social structures. In this context, Wilderson’s public intellectual work is not solely determined by his popularity but by whether his ideas stimulate conversations that are worth having within the democratic framework. Furthermore, Wilderson’s intellectual contributions, particularly within the framework of Afropessimism are not simply an expression of ideas but a call to action that radically challenges metaphysics and other structures that perpetuate anti-Blackness.

 In the case of Wilderson, his role as a public intellectual not only embodies the democratic ethos but also challenges and redefines it. His activist and academic background push the boundaries of the democratic framework and provoke meaningful dialogue, which keeps the “pot boiling” as Mack mentions in his essay. Mack also raises concerns about the oversimplified characterization of anti-intellectualism and its capacity to impact shaping public perceptions and the role of intellectual contributions in society. Furthermore, public intellectuals often serve as a conduit between academia and public understanding where they take complex ideas, such as Wilderson’s Afropessimism and translate them into accessible language. The translation of intellectual work to make it digestible for a general audience bridges the gap between specialized knowledge and public engagement — which fosters a democratic exchange of ideas and empowers citizens to meaningfully contribute to society.

[palpessoptimist]

12:15 in The Institute of Black Imagination. podcast "E.53 On Afropessimism Part 2of 2 | Frank B. Wilderson III": 

“but I don't agree with is a sense that America can be improved through logical conversation and rational dialogue with the other, no America is a murderous Juggernaut, its job is to

murder, okay? that's what it's about, that's its reason for being.

it has killed more people around the world than than Hitler Genghis Khan and

Attila the Hun put together! okay? um that's what it does, okay?  that's how it gets its energy, okay? uh whether you're a democrat or a republican so I decided that I had to move in the world

in a way that would ultimately bring me more aggro but make me feel better about myself and the way I moved through world number one and number two when I spoke even if I'm speaking to a class or a mixed race audience you know I'm not really speaking to them I'm only speaking to black people, in other words everyone else in the room is just listening, everyone else anyone who's reading this book, is not black, is just listening and how do I get to that through? by bringing the funk with the energy that allows for black people to say I support the Palestinians against the Israelis but I also laugh at the Palestinians and ridicule the the puniness of their demand in comparison to the the totality of my demand that my embodied demand, okay? and so um ridicule uh

humor. sarcasm. and no sacred cows. has been how I've tried to roof

Response of podcast presenter: 14:26:

"you know I'm gonna you know zero in on that Palestinian thing because I could feel I could feel a future hair stand up on somebody's head when they hear that and so I think you know it begs to maybe unpack that right which is to say that the demands that the Palestinians have there is an actual reparation for geography, right? meaning that it is just a return to land and then there is equilibrium right,  like that is the you know the denuma and the restitution, after the conflict right and you know what you posit in the book and kind of in this Theory really large is that there is no reparation for black people, right, there is no land that can be returned even if we're speaking about class struggles right like that is a restitution or access to Capital, right, which then resolves the conflict you know even when it pertains to gender studies it is what some level...

#Youtube