May 11 – A Break from Nation Time: Anarchist Utopias in the Black Arts Movement 🗓

Sean Lovitt, M.A. (University of Delaware)

May 11, 2018, 10-12 a.m., P 103 (Philosophicum)

The Black Arts Movement is normally associated with Black Nationalism, which, although a crucial influence, cannot account for the heterogeneity of the social movements that animated Black Arts in 1960s America. An unexpected anarchist influence persists in the nation-building fantasies of the Black Arts Movement, which upholds an anti-authoritarian and transnational utopian vision within their art and literature. Through archival research, I trace the connections between anarchism and Black Arts Movement works like Amiri Baraka‘s Slave Ship.

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