Dignity or Death

This book sets out to understand the ethical dimension of Black lives and deaths in the modern period. Recent events—from the brutal murder of George Floyd to the pervasive violence meted out daily on the streets of our cities—have demonstrated all too clearly the fundamental trait that shapes our contemporary moment: the Black condition is defined by indignity.

Ajari takes dignity as his starting point because dignity is what white people try to abolish in their violence toward Black people, and it is what they deprive themselves of in exerting this violence. Dignity is also what Black people collectively affirm when they rise up against white domination. When a young Black man or woman’s dignity is taken from them as the result of assault, rape, or assassination at the hands of the state, the roots of a long history of struggle, conquest, and affirmation of African humanity are exposed and shaken. Above all, dignity is the ability of the oppressed, trapped between life and death, to remain standing.

Dignity or Death offers an uncompromising critical analysis of the European philosophical tradition in order to recover the misunderstood history of radical thought in Black worlds. Slave uprisings, Negritude, radical Christian traditions in North America and South Africa, and political ontology are all steps on a long and troubled path of liberation.

Acknowledgements



Introduction


Part One: Dignity Re-embodied

Chapter One: Decolonizing Moral Philosophy

Chapter 2: Indignity

Chapter 3: Our Dignity is Older than Us


Part Two: Caliban the Political Theologian

Chapter 4: The Universal by Accident

Chapter 5: A Theology of Black Dignity in North America

Chapter 6: Ubuntu: Philosophy, Religion, and Community in Black Africa

Part Three: Forms-of-death in the European Necropolis

Chapter 7: Recognition and Dignity in the Era of Global Apartheid

Conclusion: Black Political Ontology and Black Dignity



Notes

Index

“In the controversy raging in many countries about ‘decolonial’ thought, this book by the young philosopher Norman Ajari will not go unnoticed. Its ambition, richness, and militant passion will give others the means to learn more about this new paradigm and to take stock of its internal diversity.”
Etienne Balibar

"[T]his book ... announces Ajari as one of the most vital Afro-descendant French philosophical voices to emerge in recent years."
French Studies

Norman Ajari teaches at the University of Edinburgh