UC Berkeley

Thick from Behind the Veil: W.E.B. Du Bois and the Philosophy of Race examines the philosophical contributions of W.E.B. Du Bois. I investigate and develop on the phenomenological, metaphysical, and ethical elements of Du Bois’s early writings. I show how a philosophy of double-consciousness offers critical contributions to an existential understanding of racialization. By focusing on the literary and theoretical aspects of The Souls of Black Folk, I demonstrate how Du Bois’s employs classical Greek philosophy, mythology, and ethics to support and explain the material conditions of Black folk in America. I provide a Du Boisian account of double-consciousness in relation to the making of self-consciousness. I also argue that Du Bois’s literary work in “Of the Coming of John” is a modern reimagination of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. As a result, I illustrate how Du Boisian metaphysics can be understood as a meditation of the human condition in response to metaphysical catastrophe. Lastly, I argue that W.E.B. Du Bois’s metaphorical use of “second-sight” and the concept of “the gift” should be read as an ethics and as a cosmopolitan vision for the role and value that Black and other racially oppressed people have to offer the global community.