ASRC 3024 - Darkness at its Heart: Placide Tempels and Joseph Conrad

Spring. 4 credits. Letter grades only.

G. Farred.

Placide Tempels’ “Bantu Philosophy” constitutes a particular difficulty for the thinking of African philosophy. Reading Tempels alongside Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” as well as the work of other African philosophers (VY Mudimbe; Houtinji foremost among them), this course will take up the questions provoked by the two foundational works. This course will also turn literature, most notably the fiction of Chinua Achebe, to argue for the literary as a necessary – and not supplementary – interrogative tool.