Du Bois and Fanon on Black Consciousness and the Politics of Disappearance

• In Event: Centering Body, Mind, and Spirit for Radical Transformation in Racial and Ethnic Sociology

Abstract

W. E. B. Du Bois and Frantz Fanon offer several concepts that are useful for understanding the current reign of racialized terror that many US residents are experiencing. This essay puts Du Bois and Fanon in conversation with one another and pays special attention to their concepts of the veil, the mask, the color line, and the zones of being/nonbeing. Their theories offer insight into the current politics of recognition, disappearance, and consciousness that frame many of the priorities of the conservative movement. The radical politics of Du Bois and Fanon remain relevant and provide tools to analyze the current political moment and the Trump administration’s attempts to erase Black people, Black history and Black consciousness.

Authors

• Margaret Hunter, Santa Clara University

• Zeus Leonardo, University of California, Berkeley