The Racial Politics of Listening

Deference is often required of the politically vulnerable: the powers and institutions who have control over their lives often come to expect deference, demand it, reward people who give it, and penalize people who don't. Aptly marshalled deference is a way of reversing the uneven flow of epistemic and political currency^—^whether that gets described as trust, authority, entitlement, or the salience of certain considerations, voices, and representatives.The Racial Politics of Listening: Deference, Power, and Relationality is about the recalcitrant aspects of racial injustice in the US, particularly those that block effective communication and practices of accountability. By centering the insights of black religious thinkers (like James Cone) and black literary figures (like Ralph Ellison), this book transforms existing literatures focused on epistemologies of race, ignorance, and social injustice. It is organized around vices of racial superiority that often protect and deepen injustice: paternalism, benevolence, contempt, and callousness. Moving beyond psychological and individualistic models of analysis, Clifton L. Granby identifies institutional arrangements and cultural dynamics that bear directly on early childhood pedagogy, university settings, criminal justice systems, and religious vocabularies (like black theology) that aim to resist divinely sanctioned forms of racial denigration. He argues for the expansiveness of black philosophical traditions: the importance of critically listening and responsibly deferring to them. The book thus shows philosophy becoming attuned to the shifting keys and dynamic concerns of black political and cultural life.