Reapproaching the Spatialization of Blackness: Acts of Violence in Educational Contexts

• In Event: Curriculum, Bodies, and Space in Educational Contexts

Abstract

I take up Sylvia Wynter's notions of bio-mythoi (homo narrans) and Toni Morrison's Africanist Presence to interpret acts of violence that Black students experience in the classroom. I analyze St. Augustine of Hippo's "inner turn" and "original sin" as metaphored through references to lightness and darkness. I then trace Immanuel Kant's ontologization and secularization of original sin into a color-coded taxonomy of humanity, intellect, and morality. Thus, I demonstrate how the concepts of "lack," "non-being," "sin," and "evil/immorality" connect with ontological properties inextricably lodged within flesh and labeled as "black." I apply this genealogical trace to the documentary film, "America to Me,"to address how conceptions of blackness become enfleshed and projected onto Black students.

Author

• Sarah Ishmael, University of Wisconsin-Madison