Check out Professor Lewis Gordon‘s new interview on The Leadership Center for Social Justice Podcast where he discusses his latest book Fear of Black Consciousness.
“He shares about Black Consciousness as a commitment to life, radical love, and to building a better world and discusses how he sees that playing out in the world.“
Congratulations to Professor and Department Head Lewis Gordon‘s, whose book Fear of Black Consciousness has been chosen as one of the Seminary Co-Op Notable books for 2022!
Now in its seventh year, the Seminary Co-op Notables list celebrates the books published in 2022 that helped define scholarship and inquiry. With the release of this annual list, it continues to advocate for the increased visibility of the crucial work of serious presses and authors and aims to invigorate and inspires readers.
Check out Professor and Department Head Lewis Gordon’s picks for the best philosophy books for beginners!
“Why create a reading list of the best philosophy books for beginners? Well, Bertrand Russell once said that ‘science is what you know, philosophy is what you don’t know’, and when it comes to philosophy – I don’t know nearly enough. The vastness and occasional intangibility of the subject can make it feel inaccessible for novices. Like trying to find the end of a piece of sellotape, it can be frustrating to know where to start. In situations like this, there is only one thing you can do – ask the experts what they’d recommend as philosophy books for beginners. Luckily for me, I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing some of the world’s finest philosophical minds.”
-Phil Treagus Evans, “Philosophy Books for Beginners”
Check out Professor and Department Head Lewis Gordon’s recent interview in Newsweek, “Kanye West Confused About Antisemitism and Racism, Professor Says.”
*Excerpt*
Gordon explained that “the nonracial interpretation of antisemitism doesn’t quite play out in practice, since people who hate Jews use all the logic of race and racism when speaking about Jews, and, internally to Jewish communities, one could be born Jewish (through a Jewish mother) and remain so even when, in some cases, one has converted to other religions.”
“So,” said Gordon, “the short answer is this: Wherever there is antisemitism, there is racism. Wherever there is racism, there is often antisemitism. But bear in mind, antisemitism is a species of racism.”
Check out Professor and Department Head Lewis Gordon’s comments on Kanye West in the Financial Times, “Kanye West and the Age of the Unmanageable.”
*Excerpt*
Lewis R Gordon is an American philosopher whose book Fear of Black Consciousness was published earlier this year. In 2018, he was interviewed for an article about Kanye in which he tried to explain the singer’s drift to the right following a controversial interview the musician had done on TMZ about the history of slavery. “It’s pretty clear that his psychological protection against vulnerability is to push himself to the level of a god,” said Gordon. “People who build up an edifice of pleasing falsehoods to protect themselves eventually lose the connection to certain elements of truth.”
Check out Professor and Department Head Lewis Gordon in a recent article published on The Chronicle of Higher Education titled “A Philosopher Laughs at Death — and the Public Listens.” Gordon discusses the German philosopher Martin Heidegger and his impact on society today.
**Excerpt from article**
Martin Heidegger exemplifies values suitable for people so enwrapped in themselves that they treat their own death as the end of the world,” he told me. “We really don’t need Heidegger today. We didn’t need him then, in his rector lectures at Freiburg in 1933, with his callous investment in cruel charismatic leadership as a form of salvation. Indeed, I would go so far as to argue we never needed him. We need people who transcend self-absorption, psychotic and sociopathic indifference to the suffering of others, and delusions of importance from societal systems designed to support their limited relationship to reality. We need compassion, courage — something Heidegger lacked — and a clear understanding of institutions of power.