Skip to Main Content
 

Global Search Box

 
 
 
 

Files

File List


brownlee final.pdf (879.29 KB)

ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

Being and Otherness: Conceptualizing Embodiment in Africana Existentialist Discourse (The Bluest Eye, The Fire Next Time, and Black Skin, White Masks)

Brownlee, Jonathan J.
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1594134915974717

Abstract Details

2020, Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, English (Rhetoric and Writing) PhD.
This dissertation explores the writings of three authors associated with the philosophical and literary approach known as Africana existentialism (AE). There are two main exigencies which this study addresses: 1) What insights can rhetoric and writing scholars obtain from analyzing the work(s) of Africana existentialism regarding the concept of embodiment? 2) How might these insights impact our conceptual understanding of embodied practice and our ability to teach in a diverse classroom setting? Through a hermeneutic analysis of three AE works, The Bluest Eye, The Fire Next Time, and Black Skin, White Masks, three key features of black embodiment were found. The three key features of black embodiment are as follows: 1) There is a context in which blackness exists as opposition or in contrast to the theory and glorification of whiteness. 2) Cultural products, narratives, and symbols put forth by Western mass culture can negatively impact many people who exist in/as black bodies. These products, symbols, and narratives can have an onerous psychological impact on black people. 3) There is an importance and irreducibility to black experiential facticity—a phenomenological knowledge gained from being in the world as a black body—and claims about experiential facticity go beyond typical academic arguments and discussions about the constructed nature of blackness. This emphasis on experiential facticity uncovers issues of divergent epistemologies and ideologies, and such divergences may spring from cultural positionality. My research sets forth three possible paths which might alleviate some of the problems that arise from divergent epistemologies and ideologies. First, it is extremely important for teachers to check their own ideological blind spots for beliefs and approaches which may stifle views which sound different than their own. Next, teachers should use rhetorical listening in order to improve cross-cultural communication. Lastly, teachers can develop and use heuristic practices or theories of acquisition which will let people apply concepts to their own personal, situated experience.
Sue Carter Wood, Ph.D. (Advisor)
Nermis Susana Mieses, D.M.A. (Other)
Raymond A. Craig, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Lee Nickoson, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
224 p.
African American Studies; Composition; Philosophy
Embodiment; Africana Existentialism; rhetorical history; epistemology; experiential facticity; Toni Morrison; Frantz Fanon; James Baldwin; The Bluest Eye; The Fire Next Time; Black Skin, White Masks; race

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Brownlee, J. J. (2020). Being and Otherness: Conceptualizing Embodiment in Africana Existentialist Discourse (The Bluest Eye, The Fire Next Time, and Black Skin, White Masks) [Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1594134915974717

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Brownlee, Jonathan. Being and Otherness: Conceptualizing Embodiment in Africana Existentialist Discourse (The Bluest Eye, The Fire Next Time, and Black Skin, White Masks). 2020. Bowling Green State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1594134915974717.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Brownlee, Jonathan. "Being and Otherness: Conceptualizing Embodiment in Africana Existentialist Discourse (The Bluest Eye, The Fire Next Time, and Black Skin, White Masks)." Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University, 2020. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1594134915974717

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

bgsu1594134915974717
500
© 2020, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Bowling Green State University and OhioLINK.