Learn about opportunities for students majoring and minoring in French! Meet FFS faculty and instructors. Meet the French Club and talk to advisers. Learn about internships and study abroad. Enjoy free pizza and a chance to win fun door prizes!
The Humanities Institute Presents: The Spring 2024 Faculty Scholars in Residence
Fabienne Kanor
Marian Trygve Freed Early Career Professor, Associate Professor of French and Francophone Studies
“When not forgotten by history, when not dissolved by the sea, when not strewn by the wind, the « revenants » return”. My experimental documentary series project Tales From the Hold poses and holds this question: What remains of the Africans swallowed up in the belly of the Atlantic Sea, and in the nothingness of the colonial plantations? How can I find their traces through time and space? How to rescue them from oblivion and bring them back to us? As I begin filming the third episode of my collection, titled, “The Last Slave Ship,” in Benin, West Africa, I take a break to present my current work and look back to the genesis of my project.
Abstract
Frantz Fanon’s combative decoloniality is based on a profound appreciation of the role of language and love in the constitution of the human. This presentation explores the idea that Fanon’s approach takes love beyond the scope of romanticism, just like his discussion of language takes language beyond the province of the humanities.
Preparatory Readings:
Nelson Maldonado-Torres, “Outline of Ten Theses on Coloniality and Decoloniality,” Frantz Fanon Foundation, Oct. 2016
Mireille Fanon Mendés France and Nelson Maldonado-Torres, “For a Combative Decoloniality Sixty Years after Fanon’s Death: An Invitation from the Frantz Fanon Foundation”
Nelson Maldonado-Torres, “What is Decolonial Critique?,” Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal, 41.1 (2020): 157-183
Nelson Maldonado-Torres, “Liberation Philosophy and the Search for Combative Decoloniality: A Fanonian Approach” (Draft)
Nelson Maldonado-Torres, “Combative Decoloniality and the Abolition of the Humanities: A Manifesto” (Draft)
Decolonial Operations Manual (link)
Nelson Maldonado-Torres is professor of philosophy at the University of Connecticut, Professor Extraordinarious at the University of South Africa, and Honorary Professor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban, South Africa. A former president of the Caribbean Philosophical Association, he cochairs the Frantz Fanon Foundation with its founder, Mireille Fanon Mendès France, and is a senior associate of the Sowetobased Blackhouse Kollective. His recent publications include the co-edited book Decolonial Feminism in Abya Yala: Caribbean, Meso, and South-American Contributions and Challenges (2022).
A pre-talk meet and greet will begin at 2:00 p.m. and will include snacks and refreshments.
The talk, ‘Decoloniality and Decolonial Thinking: From Theory to Praxis,’ will begin at 2:30 p.m. and will be a 20-25 presentation followed by a Q&A session.
This visit to PSU is jointly organized with the Department of African Studies.
Information Session Schedule
Tuesday, November 14th, 5:00 pm on Zoom (see above)
Wednesday, November 15th, 6:00 pm in 226 Burrowes
Need more info?
Christina Sztajnkrycer cls6628@psu.edu
Heather McCoy hjm10@psu.edu