Loving Blackness across Arts and Sciences

This essay reflects on loving Blackness as a pedagogical tool in assigning Honoree Fanonne Jeffers's The Age of Phillis. As such, it articulates the possibilities for regarding the inner lives of Black people beyond the constraints of anti-Blackness and white supremacy. When released from this antagonism, we challenge our students with exploring Black life on its own terms. This approach informs how we brought STEM students and advanced English literature students together to reconsider and reimagine the potential narrative strands found in pre-nineteenth-century Black history and the promises of Black futures using The Age of Phillis as a model.

Automated summary

This essay reflects on the use of loving Blackness as an educational tool to go beyond anti-Blackness and white supremacy, and to focus on the inner lives of Black people. The author uses Honoree Fanonne Jeffers's The Age of Phillis as a model to reconsider the narrative strands of pre-nineteenth-century Black history and the promises of Black futures, bringing together STEM students and advanced English literature students.