Sujaya Dhanvantari | Negotiating Race and Gender in the Existentialist Philosophies of Beauvoir and Fanon | SoPhiA Inclusivity Project

Abstract: The recent turn to critical phenomenology foregrounds historically marginalized perspectives for the development of new strategies capable of responding to ethical crises in the contemporary world. This has prompted a rethinking of the postwar theories of liberation offered by existential humanism. Beauvoir and Fanon provide historical resources for theorizing liberation in our times. Yet, their concepts of oppression, revolution, and liberation are riven with historical tensions in their treatment of race and gender. While Beauvoir makes an essentializing claim in regard to particular racialized subjectivities in her concept of liberation, Fanon excludes the colonized woman from the anticolonial struggle. This lecture addresses these tensions, with the aim of developing a more robust and inclusive concept of liberation, attentive to the traditionally neglected aspects of oppressive existence.

Dr. Sujaya Dhanvantari holds a PhD in the Humanities from Concordia University. Her dissertation title is: “Beauvoir, Fanon, and the Existential Ethics of Liberation: An Anticolonial Inheritance for New Revolutions.”

The 40-minute presentation will be followed by a student-faculty discussion on how to approach inclusivity in the classroom. The event coincides with the opening of the call for applications to the 2019-20 Sheila Mason Bursary, designed to provide financial aid to women, BIPOC, LGBTTQIA+ people, and persons with disabilities enrolled in a Minor, Major or Honours in Philosophy.

Light refreshments will be served.

Please RSVP to the Students of Philosophy Association's Inclusivity Project Coordinator.