An exploration of the ways that Black intellectuals arrived at a critique of Western knowledge
Of Black Study explores how the ideas of Black intellectuals created different ways of thinking and knowing in their pursuit of conceptual and epistemological freedom.
Joshua Myers explores the work of thinkers who broke with the racial and colonial logics of academic disciplinarity. Bookended by meditations with June Jordan and Toni Cade Bambara, the book focuses on how W.E.B. Du Bois, Sylvia Wynter, Jacob Carruthers and Cedric Robinson contributed to Black Studies approaches to knowledge production within and beyond Western structures of knowledge.
Especially geared toward understanding the contemporary evolution of Black Studies in the neoliberal university, Of Black Study allows us to consider the stakes of intellectual freedom and the path toward a new world.
About the Author
Joshua Myers is an Associate Professor of Africana Studies at Howard University. He is the author of Cedric Robinson: The Time of the Black Radical Tradition and We are Worth Fighting For: A History of the Howard University Protest of 1989.
What People Are Saying
'Magnificent... the best recent treatment we have of the great Black Radical Tradition! Joshua Myers's powerful and profound examination of his towering figures lays bare the silences and evasions of contemporary Black academic studies. His vision of an alternative world grounded in the practices of Black everyday people is a clarion call for Black intellectual creativity and courage' Cornel West
'A blueprint that helps to elevate the Black imagination so that a new architecture can create a better world. Myers’ reference to the work of Sylvia Wynter, June Jordan and Toni Cade Bambara gives visibility to Black women as thinkers and not individuals standing in the shadows of men. This is long overdue' Ethelbert Miller, writer and literary activist
'Indispensable. In a sustained flash of deep, critical devotion, Joshua Myers has become one of our most important intellectual historians and the preeminent theorist of black study’ Fred Moten, cultural theorist, poet and scholar at New York University
‘For those who are, or wish to become, engaged in this work of radical re-thinkings, Myers’ Of Black Study is a necessary consideration.’ Lucius T. Outlaw (Jr.), Professor, Vanderbilt University
‘Myers has blown the abeng. Through a beautifully woven, ethically attuned communion with Du Bois, Wynter, Carruthers, Robinson, Jordan, and Bambara, he charts a habit of thought that for more than a century has produced a body of knowledge robust enough to elaborate the fullness of black life. Let us answer the call Of Black Study’ Minkah Makalani, Director, Center for Africana Studies
Table of Contents
Introduction: Living (June Jordan)
1. Of Hesitance (W. E. B. Du Bois)
2. Of Human (Sylvia Wynter)
3. Of Speech (Jacob H. Carruthers, Jr.)
4. Of Order (Cedric J. Robinson)
Conclusion: Dreams (Toni Cade Bambara)