An Introduction to Africana Philosophy

by Lewis R. Gordon

• ISBN13: 9780521675468
• ISBN10: 0521675464
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-06-02
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

In this undergraduate textbook Lewis R. Gordon offers the first comprehensive treatment of Africana philosophy, beginning with the emergence of an Africana (i.e. African diasporic) consciousness in the Afro-Arabic world of the Middle Ages. He argues that much of modern thought emerged out of early conflicts between Islam and Christianity that culminated in the expulsion of the Moors from the Iberian Peninsula, and from the subsequent expansion of racism, enslavement, and colonialism which in their turn stimulated reflections on reason, liberation, and the meaning of being human. His book takes the student reader on a journey from Africa through Europe, North and South America, the Caribbean, and back to Africa, as he explores the challenges posed to our understanding of knowledge and freedom today, and the response to them which can be found within Africana philosophy.

Author Biography

Lewis R. Gordon is Laura H. Carnell Professor of Philosophy, Religion, and Judaic Studies at Temple University, Philadelphia

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
Introduction: Africana philosophy in context	p. 1
Groundings
Africana philosophy as a modern philosophy	p. 21
Classic eighteenth- and nineteenth-century foundations	p. 33
Anton Wilhelm Amo	p. 35
Quobna Ottobah Cugoano	p. 40
From David Walker's Appeal to the founding of the American Negro Academy	p. 46
Two Caribbean men of letters: Antenor Firmin and George Wilmot Blyden	p. 56
Conclusion	p. 65
From New World to new worlds
Three pillars of African-American philosophy	p. 69
Anna Julia Cooper and the problem of value	p. 69
W. E. B. Du Bois and the problem of double consciousness	p. 73
Fanon's critique of failed dialectics of recognition	p. 80
Africana philosophical movements in the United States and Britain	p. 91
Prophetic and other recent forms of African-American pragmatism	p. 93
Black feminist and womanist thought	p. 100
Afrocentrism and Afrocentricity	p. 106
African-American analytical philosophy	p. 110
African-American and Afro-British European continental philosophy	p. 120
Cedric Robinson's anthropology of Marxism	p. 128
African-American existential philosophy, phenomenology, and their influence	p. 132
Afro-Caribbean philosophy	p. 157
African philosophy	p. 185
African humanism	p. 186
The theme of invention in recent African philosophy	p. 195
African critiques of invention	p. 200
Recent African political thought	p. 220
Conclusion	p. 249
Guide to further reading	p. 251
Index	p. 260
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