ABSTRACT
Since the 17th century, a central question of Black emancipatory thought has concerned the connection of Blackness to Africa and the fate of this historical tie. Until recently, Afro-liberation campaigns had upheld a politics of reclamation that viewed re-embracing Africa to be foundational to Black resistance. (Edwards 2001; Moses 1998; Kelley 2002). 2 These struggles took many forms in the 20th century: among them Garveyism, Négritude, Pan-Africanism, and Afrocentrism. And whereas each found sustenance in racial solidarity, sedimented by the restitution of a distinct African epistemology or “African personality,” several critiques have recently emerged that advocate abandoning this legacy known as the Black nationalist tradition (Appiah 1992; Gilroy 2000; Mbembe 2002).
