Problems of Feeling: Affect, Violence, and Practice in Black American Life

Abstract

W. E. B. Du Bois claimed that the unasked question posed to Black people in the early 20th century was “how does it feel to be a problem?” This 21st century dissertation inverts Du Bois’ question, asking, “how does ‘the problem’ feel?” in order to investigate the peril and the potential of the study and analysis of feelings and their operations in Black life, especially its religious varieties. It takes the tragic shooting at Mother Emanuel AME Church in 2015 by self-avowed white supremacist Dylann Roof and the offer of forgiveness extended to Roof by Nadine Collier as the context for this study. This dissertation takes its guiding trope of “the slave ship” from Black Studies scholars Christina Sharpe and Frank Wilderson to make this situation of tragedy and forgiveness go through a series of narrow passages, revisiting the trauma of the archives, confronting the bellicosity of civil society, and examining the shooting victims’ access to the possibilities of rage or anger as responses to moral evil. Forgiveness and affect both reveal themselves as caught up in the wake of structural and moral evil. As such, forgiveness and affect each are ways to extend the bellicosity of society. Therefore, the analysis of emotion is revealed to be equally as important as one’s access to it.