Wednesday 26th of August 2020 from 6.00PM till 7.30PM in the downstairs meeting room of the Thistle Hall, on the corner of Cuba & Arthur Streets, Te Aro, Wellington. Please enter by the the grey door on Arthur Street marked Hall Entrance.
The eruption of mass protests in the wake of the police murders of George Floyd, and many other black men and women, have challenged the impunity with which officers of the law carry out violence against Black people and punctured the illusion of a postracial America. The Black Lives Matter movement has awakened a new generation of activists.
In this stirring and insightful analysis, activist and scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor surveys the historical and contemporary ravages of racism and persistence of structural inequality such as mass incarceration and Black unemployment. In this context, she argues that this new struggle against police violence holds the potential to reignite a broader push for Black liberation.
Winner of the 2016 Lannan Cultural Freedom Prize for an Especially Notable Book.
Required reading
This session will be convened by Noah Brennan and the required reading will be the last chapter, chapter seven, of the text below.
Chapter seven: Taylor, Keeanaga-Yamahtta (2016). From #blacklivesmatter to black liberation. Chicago: Haymarket Books.
Download the chapter pdf using the link above or order hard copy from Haymarket Books.
Please use our Facebook event to let us know you plan to attend.
Questions to consider
Questions for the next meeting of the Little Red Reading Group:
- How does Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor view racism, capitalism and sexism? Is it enough to critique racism without critiquing capitalism? Does she consider ‘Black Capitalism’ a satisfactory alternative?
- In what ways can we see what Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is discussing in “From Black Lives Matter to Black Liberation” in contemporary times? How can we interpret this through a Marxist lens?
- Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor states that “Black liberation is bound up with the project of human liberation and social transformation”. What does this mean and how can Marxists apply these lessons (and that of the Black Lives Matter protests) to an Aotearoa context?
Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash