POLS 355 Critical Fanonism

This course will be devoted to reading the work of Frantz Fanon, a canonical figure in postcolonial theory, cultural studies and critical race theory. In addition to engaging Fanon's ideas about language, violence, white supremacy, and colonialism (to name a few topics), this course will be organized around critically engaging Henry Louis Gates' highly contentious and influential article, "Critical Fanonism." Through this lens we will evaluate two claims Gates puts forward for why Fanon's work is so influential: 1) because of his concern with the relationship between subject formation, on the one hand, and oppression and liberation, on the other; and 2) because his work is "a moving Rochblatt with legs," allowing theorists to project onto his text whatever message they desire. And we will also evaluate Gates' embrace of psychoanalysis as the appropriate lens to read and critique Fanon's work. To this end, we will examine how Fanon engages the philosophical traditions of psychoanalysis and phenomenology by reading, first hand, the canonical texts Fanon was reading as he developed his work.