Black Studies and the Archive


INF2123H

This seminar (INF2123H – Black Studies and the Archive) engages material, cultural, and metaphorical instances of “the archive” and archival imaginaries pertaining to Black life and Black study. We will examine “archival turns” across various genealogies and intellectual formations for any methodological insights regarding liberation, recollection, and repair. Further, we will reflect on the capacity of Black study to both anchor and rupture our responses to Western hermeneutics and archival practices via three organizing questions: “Who curates and owns what archive(s) and which archives own us?” “What is (im)possible with(out) the archive?” and “What to the displaced, the drowned, and otherwise dispossessed is an archive (now)?”

Exclusion: INF2121H: Specialized Archives: Black Studies and the Archive