In this careful and cogent account of the metaphysical structures of antiblack violence, Calvin L. Warren introduces a much-needed philosophical intervention in the claims and propositions of Afro-pessimism. His superb intellectual skills and beautiful philosophizing make this magnificent work important to a whole generation of scholars.
Denise Ferreira da Silva, author of Toward a Global Idea of Race Calvin L. Warren recalibrates Afro-pessimism in new directions while he seriously deepens, extends, and requires that we pay closer and better attention to the claims made by Afro-pessimist thinkers. He turns toward a new philosophy of the Americas that requires a re-reading of philosophy insofar as it is founded in producing the absence of blackness and black people as the foundation of its very possibilities. Poised to re-animate Black studies in an important way, Ontological Terror will be a foundational text of Afro-pessimist thought, even as it exceeds the term. This is a work of accomplishment.
Rinaldo Walcott, author of Queer Returns: Essays on Multiculturalism, Diaspora, and Black Studies Calvin L. Warren recalibrates afro-pessimism in new directions while he seriously deepens, extends, and requires that we pay closer and better attention to the claims made by afro-pessimist thinkers. He turns toward a new philosophy of the Americas that requires a re-reading of philosophy insofar as it is founded in producing the absence of blackness and black people as the foundation of its very possibilities. Poised to re-animate Black studies in an important way, Ontological Terror will be a foundational text of afro-pessimist thought, even as it exceeds the term. This is a work of accomplishment.
Rinaldo Walcott, author of Queer Returns: Essays on Multiculturalism, Diaspora, and Black Studies