Postcolonial Melancholia

In "Postcolonial Melancholia," Paul Gilroy continues the conversation he began in his landmark study of race and nation, "'There Ain't No Black in the Union Jack," "'" by once again departing from conventional wisdom to examine-and defend-multiculturalism within the context of a post-9/11 "politics of security."
Gilroy adapts the concept of melancholia from its Freudian origins and applies it to the social pathology of neoimperialist politics. His unorthodox analysis pinpoints melancholic reactions not only in the hostility and violence directed at blacks, immigrants, and aliens but also in an inability to value the ordinary, unruly multiculture that has evolved organically and unnoticed in urban centers. Drawing on seminal discussions of race by Frantz Fanon, W. E. B. DuBois, and George Orwell, Gilroy goes beyond the idea of mere tolerance and proposes that it is possible to celebrate multiculture and live with otherness without becoming anxious, fearful, or violent.

List of contents

Introduction. On Living with Difference Part One: The Planet 1. Race and the Right to Be Human 2. Cosmopolitanism Contested Part Two: Albion 3. Has It Come to This? 4. The Negative Dialectics of Conviviality

About the author

Paul Gilroy is the Anthony Giddens Professor of Social Theory at the London School of Economics.

Product details

• Authors: P. Gilroy, Paul Gilroy, Gilroy Paul
• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 22.12.2004
• EAN: 9780231134545
• ISBN: 978-0-231-13454-5
• No. of pages: 192
• Dimensions: 165 mm x 241 mm x 15 mm
• Series: Wellek Library Lectures (Hardc; The Wellek Library Lectures; Wellek Library Lectures (Hardc
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Philosophy > Miscellaneous; Non-fiction book > Philosophy, religion > Miscellaneous; Ethnic Studies, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Sociology / General, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Minority Studies, POLITICAL SCIENCE / History & Theory, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Ethnic Studies / General, PHILOSOPHY / Movements / Critical Theory, United Kingdom, Great Britain, Ethnic groups and multicultural studies, Sociology & anthropology, Political science and theory, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Biracial & Multiracial Studies