Symposium Focuses on Phenomenology and the African and Africana Worlds

The Simon Silverman Phenomenology Center will hold its 32nd annual symposium, Phenomenology and the African and Africana Worlds, on Friday, Feb. 14, and Saturday, Feb. 15, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Africa Room of the Union.

The symposium, which is free and open to the public, will explore phenomenology in Africa and the diaspora—its challenges, its possibilities and its insights.

According to Dr. Jeffrey McCurry, director of the Phenomenology Center and organizer of the event, some of the most interesting and challenging phenomenology work is being done by African and Africana thinkers, philosophers, cultural theorists, psychologists and theologians.

“Phenomenology,” McCurry explained, “is about gaining a greater understanding of the human experience, but much of phenomenology has focused on the experience of people of European descent from the North Atlantic world.”

McCurry believes this symposium will allow phenomenology to truly become what it claims to be by opening it up to the range of global realities and possibilities associated with the human experience.

The symposium will explore how phenomenology, as an approach to understanding, can illuminate dimensions of African and Africana experience and in turn how the experience can illuminate and challenge traditional notions of phenomenology.

Featured presenters at the symposium include:

  • Dr. Elias Bongmba, professor of Religious Studies at Rice University, who will present Phenomenology of the Face: African Perspectives.
  • Dr. Kathryn T. Gines, assistant professor of Philosophy at Pennsylvania State University, who will present Black Looks: Objectification, Subjectivity and ‘Looking Back.’
  • Dr. Valentin Y. Mudimbe, the Newman Ivey White Professor of Literature at Duke University, will present Phenomenology and an African Practice: A Testimony.
  • Dr. Tsenay Serequeberhan, professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Morgan State University, who will present Continental and African Philosophy: A Thematic Encounter.

Registration for Phenomenology and the African and Africana Worlds is requested and can be completed by visiting www.duq.edu/phenomenology or by emailing phenomenology@duq.edu.