Whither Fanon?: Studies in the Blackness of Being

by David Marriott

Frantz Fanon may be most known for his more obviously political writings, but in the first instance, he was a clinician, a black Caribbean psychiatrist who had the improbable task of treating disturbed and traumatized North African patients during the wars of decolonization. Investigating and foregrounding the clinical system that Fanon devised in an attempt to intervene against negrophobia and anti-blackness, this book rereads his clinical and political work together, arguing that the two are mutually imbricated. For the first time, Fanon's therapeutic innovations are considered along with his more overtly political and cultural writings to ask how the crises of war affected his practice, informed his politics, and shaped his subsequent ideas. As David Marriott suggests, this combination of the clinical and political involves a psychopolitics that is, by definition, complex, difficult, and perpetually challenging. He details this psychopolitics from two points of view, focusing first on Fanon's sociotherapy, its diagnostic methods and concepts, and second, on Fanon's cultural theory more generally. In our present climate of fear and terror over black presence and the violence to which it gives rise, Whither Fanon? reminds us of Fanon's scandalous actuality and of the continued urgency of his message.

Genres: Theory, Philosophy, Race, Nonfiction

432 pages, Hardcover

Published June 5, 2018

Reviews

[Mills College Library]

199.729 M3597 2018

[A YOGAM · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Marriotts „Whither Fanon?“ bricht mit der verbreiteten Lesart von Frantz Fanon als bloßem Polit-Revolutionär und rückt seine Rolle als Psychiater und klinischer Denker ins Zentrum. Marriott zeigt, wie Fanons psychiatrische Praxis während der Dekolonisierungskriege entscheidend zur Formung seiner politischen Theorie beitrug.
Im Mittelpunkt steht die enge Verbindung von klinischer Erfahrung, Soziotherapie und Kulturtheorie. Aus dieser Perspektive entwickelt Marriott das Bild einer komplexen „Psychopolitik“, in der der Kampf gegen Rassismus und „Negrophobie“ zugleich therapeutische, gesellschaftliche und politische Dimensionen annimmt.
So erscheint Fanons Werk nicht nur als Analyse kolonialer Gewalt, sondern auch als Versuch, die seelischen Verwüstungen des Kolonialismus zu verstehen und zu heilen. Marriotts Studie macht deutlich, wie aktuell Fanons Denken in einer Gegenwart bleibt, in der Gewalt gegen schwarze Präsenz weiterhin zum globalen Erfahrungsraum gehört.

[Tapji Garba · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is perfect. What more can I say?