Gilroy and James: Embracing Queer Perspectives of Race

Abstract

This Senior Project focused on Fantasy as a speculative genre which does significant-yet-overlooked critical and social work. It also focused on imaginations of a black nation. This is done primary through looking at Paul Gilroy's work, The Black Atlantic, and the historic lineage he comes from. Through other postcolonial and queer theorists, Gilroy's conceptualization and thinking is brought into a larger conversation of social movements and reifying certain ideologies, and how if progress is to be achieved, attention must be focused on those most margainlized, those who are members of multiple marginalized groups, i.e. queer folk, and the marginalization they face. In expanding the discussion, Marlon James's work becomes an interesting platform, as it invalidates some aspects of Gilroy's argument, but is chiefly concerned in advancing the conversation. His latest work, Black Leopard, Red Wolf uses space and fantasy conventions to construct social organizations both familiar and unfamiliar to us, so that we can see the ideology we repeat, and allows us to see what we can do to move beyond.