Bearing Witness to Atrocity: Racial Violence and the Limits of Representation in Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Works

[eng] Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me (2015) is nowadays considered one of the most detailed registers of the different forms that racial violence takes—from direct manifestations of physical assaults, including arrests, beatings, maimings, and murders; to less conspicuous expressions of racism, such as racist stereotyping, legal disenfranchisement, or redlining (Goodman 2015; Nance 2015; Guerrero 2017). Between the World and Me is the letter that Coates writes to his son, Samori, who is about to enter adulthood and will head off to university soon. Coates knows that once his son leaves, he will no longer be able to protect him; and so he writes driven by the need to caution him against all the threats that may endanger his life just as they had endangered those of countless others before him. Coates’s concerns to protect his son are not unfounded. Trayvon Martin had been murdered in 2012 by a man who believed he looked suspicious; Michael Brown, in 2014, for trying to run away from a police officer. Both were teenagers and unarmed at the moment of their deaths. In between, thousands of others lost their lives to racial violence; and in the next years, the number of Black people murdered in the streets raised significantly. In 2015, when Coates published his memoir, the number reached a historical high—1,134 people of color were killed in the streets in the U.S. The memoir attracted a vast variety of different responses. Many critics celebrated Coates’s beautiful and sharp rhetoric and contended that the carefulness with which he approaches the contentious issues he deals with may in fact help a whole generation push forward (Bodenner 2015; Pollack 2015; Lewis 2016), but several others used Coates’s position to cast doubts on the legitimacy of his arguments and criticized both Coates’s pessimist stand and his understanding of racial brutality, which in his text is presented as a phenomenon that occurs almost only to cisgender heterosexual Black men (Alexander 2015; Bennett 2015; Chatterton Williams 2015; Hilton 2015; Kennedy 2015). Along these lines, this dissertation draws upon the works of Ta-Nehisi Coates to study the extent to which the representation of violence in general, and of racial violence in particular, can be considered a violent act in itself, and it centralizes three main questions. To what effects is racial violence represented, and what does the representation of racial violence entail? Is there an ethical way to narrate racial violence? How does one represent racial violence without creating more violence? In my attempt to provide an answer to these questions, I have divided my thesis into two different chapters that are framed as a chiasmus—it moves past the study of the representation of violence in the first chapter to focus on the violence of the representation of that violence in the second chapter. The first chapter is structured into three different sections. The first one provides a theoretical approach to racial violence with the intention of elucidating a concept that has traditionally been considered nebulous and complex; the second one addresses how racial violence has been explored in the literary tradition that informs Coates’s writings; and the third one consists of an analysis of Coates’s treatment and representation of racial violence in his own works in general, and in his memoir Between the World and Me in particular. Also divided into three different sections, the second chapter of the thesis addresses the question of whether it is possible to represent violence without perpetuating it. The first section explores the theoretical underpinnings of the relation between violence and the representation of violence and lays the groundwork for my subsequent analysis of Coates’s works. In particular, it addresses the centrality of photographic images in documenting racial violence in U.S. history; it pays attention to how the literary works that have inspired Ta-Nehisi Coates’s texts have negotiated the relationship between the representation of violence and violence; and it examines the extent to which Ta-Nehisi Coates’s work may be a form of “black witnessing”—a term that refers to the ways in which Black people have represented, recorded, talked about, testified against and, in all, denounced the racial atrocities they have been subject to (Richardson 2017). The remaining sections focus on the two main ways in which Coates’s work may be connected to violence—his pessimism and his biased approach to gender (Smith 2015, 2017). Whilst section two offers a critical reading of Coates’s hopelessness, which has also been called despair (Kennedy 2015; Rogers 2015) and even nihilism (Bodenner 2015; Lowry 2015), and which critics have considered to be disabling for Black people; section three explores the extent to which Coates’s memoir fails to account for the ways in which Black women are also victims of racist practices. Taking everything into consideration, I mean this dissertation to intervene in contemporary debates on the vexed interaction between the representation of racial violence and racial violence itself, and to think anew the ethical possibilities of both writing and reading literature. In fact, I contend that many valences are at play in any act of representation, and for it to be ethical in its approach to atrocity it needs not only the artist’s ethical engagement with that which is being represented, but also the reader’s— or the viewer’s, if representations are visual. In this thesis I explain that there are many ways for both writers and readers to develop forms of ethical witnessing—by reappropriating images of suffering, writers can in fact resist the normalization of pain and the threat of dehumanizing victims; and by viewing such images “with solemn reserve and careful circulation,” readers, and witnesses in general, can resignify these representations as potential chances to heal and to learn from a past suffused with violence (Richardson 2020a, n.p.). In all, Coates’s works are proof that, disturbing as it is, bearing witness to atrocity also is, in this way, critical and urgent—it both challenges and empowers us to think about new futures and about the limitless possibilities that exist not beyond, but rather regardless of, violence.[spa] El libro de memorias Between the World and Me (2015), de Ta-Nehisi Coates, ha sido considerado por muchos uno de los registros más detallados de las distintas formas de violencia racial ejercidas contra la comunidad negra—desde manifestaciones directas, como asaltos físicos, arrestos, palizas, o asesinatos; hasta otras expresiones menos directas o visibles, como la estereotipación, la privación de derechos, u otras prácticas discriminatorias como el “redlining” (Goodman 2015; Nance 2015; Guerrero 2017). Between the World and Me es la carta que Coates le escribe a su hijo, Samori, que pronto entrará en la edad adulta y se irá a estudiar a la universidad. Coates sabe que, una vez se vaya, él ya no podrá protegerle; por ello, le escribe con la intención de advertirle de todos los peligros que le aguardan por ser un hombre negro. La preocupación de Coates, así como la necesidad de proteger a su hijo, son comprensibles. En 2012, Trayvon Martin fue asesinado por un hombre que creyó que estaba actuando de forma sospechosa. En 2014, un policía disparó a Michael Brown nada más que seis veces por intentar escapar después de un altercado. Ambos eran adolescentes y estaban desarmados en el momento de sus muertes. Entre ambos casos, miles de personas negras perdieron su vida en circunstancias parecidas; y en los años siguientes el número de personas de color asesinadas en las calles aumentó considerablemente. En 2015, el año que Coates publicó su libro de memorias, la cifra alcanzó un máximo histórico—1,134 personas negras fueron asesinadas en las calles de Estados Unidos. La obra provocó una división de opiniones entre sus críticos. Por un lado, algunos lectores admiraron la retórica de Coates y defendieron que la delicadeza y el cuidado con el que habla de ciertos temas dolorosos pueden ayudar e incluso salvar a una generación entera (Bodenner 2015; Pollack 2015; Lewis 2016). Por otro, muchos de sus críticos cuestionaron la legitimidad de sus argumentos y criticaron tanto su visión pesimista del mundo como su aproximación a la violencia racial, que en su texto parece referirse casi de forma única a aquella ejercida contra hombres negros cisgénero y heterosexuales (Alexander 2015; Bennett 2015; Chatterton Williams 2015; Hilton 2015; Kennedy 2015). Siguiendo estas ideas, esta tesis se basa en la obra de Ta-Nehisi Coates para estudiar hasta qué punto la representación de la violencia en general y la representación de la violencia racial en particular pueden considerarse actos violentos en sí mismos, y pretende abordar tres cuestiones principales. ¿Con qué fin se representa la violencia racial y qué implica su representación? ¿Existe una manera ética de narrar la violencia racial? ¿Puede representarse la violencia sin generar más violencia? Para dar respuesta a las preguntas anteriores, esta tesis está organizada en dos capítulos—pasa de analizar la representación de la violencia, en el primer capítulo, a estudiar la violencia de la representación de esa violencia, en el segundo capítulo. El primero capítulo cuenta con tres secciones. La primera ofrece una aproximación teórica a la violencia racial con la intención de dilucidar un concepto que ha sido considerado, a lo largo de los años, elusivo y complejo; la segunda analiza cómo la violencia racial se ha representado en la tradición literaria en la que la obra de Coates se inscribe; y la tercera explora cómo Coates trata el fenómeno en su propia obra. El segundo capítulo, que también está organizado en tres secciones, aborda la cuestión de si es posible representar la violencia sin perpetuarla. La primera sección explora la relación entre la violencia y la representación de la misma. En particular, pone de relieve la centralidad de lo visual para documentar casos de violencia racial en la historia de Estados Unidos; cómo los textos literarios que han inspirado la obra de Coates han negociado esta relación; y la posibilidad de considerar la obra de Coates una forma de “black witnessing”—las maneras en que las personas negras han representado, registrado, hablado, y denunciado las atrocidades raciales a las que han sido sometidas durante siglos (Richardson 2017). Las otras dos secciones exploran los dos aspectos de la obra de Coates que podrían estar relacionados con formas específicas de violencia representativa—su visión pesimista del mundo y su masculinización de la violencia racial (Smith 2015, 2017). La segunda sección ofrece una lectura crítica del nihilismo característico de Coates (Bodenner 2015; Kennedy 2015; Lowry 2015; Rogers 2015) y que muchos críticos han considerado que priva a las personas afroamericanas de su agentividad; y la tercera sección explora cómo la obra de Coates no da cuenta de los modos en que la violencia racial también afecta a las mujeres de color. En conclusión, mi intención es que esta tesis doctoral intervenga en los discursos contemporáneos sobre la interacción entre la representación de la violencia racial y la violencia racial y ayude a repensar las posibilidades éticas de escribir, pero también de leer, literatura. De hecho, en esta tesis defiendo que existen distintas maneras de establecer una relación ética con aquello que leemos—por un lado, los escritores pueden evitar la normalización del dolor y la deshumanización de las víctimas mediante una reapropiación de las imágenes de sufrimiento; por otro, los lectores pueden dar un nuevo significado a las representaciones de la violencia para reconvertirlas en oportunidades para sanar y para aprender de un pasado sumido en la violencia (Richardson 2020a, n.p.). De este modo, las obras de Coates nos ayudan a comprender que, por muy doloroso que sea, narrar la atrocidad es necesario y urgente—es un desafío y una oportunidad para pensar en nuevos futuros y en la infinidad de posibilidades que existen no solamente después, sino también a pesar, de la violencia

Critique of Black Reason

Ressenya de la traducció de Laurent Dubois de Critique of Black Reason, Achille Mbembe (2013). La traducció de Dubois, publicada el 2017, és la primera traducció de l'obra a l'anglès.Book review of Laurent Dubois translation of 2013's Achille Mbembe's Critique of Black Reason. Her translation, published in 2017, is the first translation of the book into English.Reseña de la traducción de Laurent Dubois de Critique of Black Reason, Achille Mbembe (2013). La traducción de Dubois, publicada en 2017, es la primera traducción de la obra al inglés

Between Hopelessness and Despair: Afropessimism and Black Nihilismin Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Works

Most of the criticism that Ta-Nehisi Coates received in the aftermath of the publication of his work Between the World and Meorbits around its lack of hopefulness. Indeed, it is several times in the text that Coates tempers his son’s expectations about foreseeing an end to racial conflictsas he tells him that “I do not believe that we can stop [racists], Samori, because they must ultimately stop themselves” (Between the World 151). Certainly, the previous contention has drawn critics into reading Coates’s work as an attack againstblack agency (Chatterton Williamsn.p.).It is our contention that, far from being read as a manifestation of cynicism, Coates’s negativity also has a galvanizing dimension. In fact, by emphasizing the futility of hope, which for Coates traps black individuals in an “unending pursuit” of progress (Warren“Black Nihilism” 221), heprovides readers with many alternatives to confront the rampant racism that still pervades U.S. society nowadays.Gran parte de las críticas que recibió Ta-Nehisi Coates después de publicar su obra Between the World and Megiran alrededor de su falta de optimismo. En el texto, Coates le explica a su hijo que es complicado ver soluciones a los problemas raciales que les acechan, ya que “no creo que podamos detener [a los racistas], Samori, porque son ellos mismos los que deben hacerlo” (Between the World 151). Ciertamente, el desalentador mensaje de Coates para su hijo ha sido interpretado como una clara negación a la capacidad de agencia de las personas afroamericanas (Chatterton Williamsn. p.). En este artículo proponemos una relectura del cinismo de Ta-Nehisi Coates y explicamos que éste también esconde un potencial para promover un cambio social y político. Así, cuando enfatiza que para las personas afroamericanas la esperanza no es más que una falsa sensación de progreso creada por la supremacía blanca, Coates también está ofreciendo a sus lectores otras maneras de hacer frente al racismo que impera en la sociedad actual

Between Hopelessness and Despair: Afropessimism and Black Nihilism in Ta-Nehisi Coates's Works

[eng] Most of the criticism that Ta-Nehisi Coates received in the aftermath of the publication of his work Between the World and Meorbits around its lack of hopefulness. Indeed, it is several times in the text that Coates tempers his son's expectations about foreseeing an end to racial conflicts as he tells him that 'I do not believe that we can stop [racists], Samori, because they must ultimately stop themselves' (Between the World 151). Certainly, the previous contention has drawn critics into reading Coates's work as an attack against black agency (Chatterton Williams n.p.). It is our contention that, far from being read as a manifestation of cynicism, Coates's negativity also has a galvanizing dimension. In fact, by emphasizing the futility of hope, which for Coates traps black individuals in an 'unending pursuit' of progress (Warren'Black Nihilism' 221), he provides readers with many alternatives to confront the rampant racism that still pervades U.S. society nowadays.[spa] Gran parte de las críticas que recibió Ta-Nehisi Coates después de publicar su obra Between the World and Me giran alrededor de su falta de optimismo. En el texto, Coates le explica a su hijo que es complicado ver soluciones a los problemas raciales que les acechan, ya que “no creo que podamos detener [a los racistas], Samori, porque son ellos mismos los que deben hacerlo” (Between the World 151). Ciertamente, el desalentador mensaje de Coates para su hijo ha sido interpretado como una clara negación a la capacidad de agencia de las personas afroamericanas (Chatterton Williams n.p.). En este artículo proponemos una relectura del cinismo de Ta-Nehisi Coates y explicamos que éste también esconde un potencial para promover un cambio social y político. Así, cuando enfatiza que para las personas afroamericanas la esperanza no es más que una falsa sensación de progreso creada por la supremacía blanca, Coates también está ofreciendo a sus lectores otras maneras de hacer frente al racismo que impera en la sociedad actual

Stability in Bose-Einstein Condensates

Treballs Finals de Grau de Física, Facultat de Física, Universitat de Barcelona, Any: 2014, Tutor: Ricardo MayolIn this work the validity of an analytic approximation expression [1] for the critical number of atoms that a Bose-Einstein Condensate can hold before collapsing when the interaction between them is attractive is checked. In order to do this the system is treated in a more precise way by numerically solving the Gross-Pitaevskii equation. One finds that the variational approach underestimates the number of atoms that can fit in a Bose-Einstein Condensate before it collapses

Vessels of Flesh And Bones

The year when Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me (2015) was published has gone down as the deadliest year for black youth at the hands of policemen, with no less than 1,134 murders recorded. As he states in many interviews, this is one of the reasons that led Coates to pen down his work —to publicly lament so many losses; to confront the difficulties to mourn such violent and untimely deaths; and to shed light on the murderous racist practices that black individuals deal with on a daily basis. To do so, Coates embarks on a journey through history in which he memorializes many black individuals who, until now, have lost their lives in racist violent attacks —from his friend Prince Jones and other several well-known individuals murdered in the last decades, such as Michael Brown or Sean Bell, to, as Toni Morrison puts it, “the disremembered and unaccounted for” (2010, 323). Far from only providing Coates and his son with crucial information about the sociality of blackness, witnessing the death of so many also instils in both a feeling of belonging. Coates’s attempt at developing communal bonds through his narration riffs on the concept of “bottomline blackness”, which Elizabeth Alexandercoined in her analysis of the public responses to Rodney King’s beating, which she regards as an incident that ended up “consolidat[ing] group affiliations” (78) and forging a “traumatized collective historical memory” (79). Drawing on Ta-Nehisi Coates’s celebrated memoir, and bearing into consideration Coates’s telling his son that “there is no real distance between you and Trayvon Martin” (2015, 25), this paper engages in the ongoing discussion about whether literary representations of racist bigotries can foster empathic relations or, on the contrary, disavow easy identification from readers

Prospective design and use of elements in urban parks from the experience of the elderly

Attention to the care and design of urban public spaces is a key factor when considering the quality of urban life. Parks and squares are spaces dedicated for everybody’s use and enjoyment, although some people, depending on their age or available free time, are prominent users of such spaces. This is the case for the elderly. On the other hand, the integration of the users from the point of view of the so-called prospective design (Vinyets, 2000) in the latest trends of design projects, can be translated to environmental design in this case, since, although it is an approach seldom explored, it offers a wide potential for application in the improvement of the collective environment. Interrelating both aspects: collective spaces-prospective design, a study has been developed aimed at learning about a specific group of users, the elderly, through their interaction with one of the public spaces they frequent most, the park. The experiment carried out in different parks and squares of the city of Castellon allowed for the securing of quantitative and qualitative data concerning the use and frequency with which this group makes use of these places, the characteristics that elderly people value most, which therefore, leads to an increase in their satisfaction and enjoyment of this type of environmentLa atención hacia el cuidado y el diseño de los espacios públicos urbanos constituye un factor importante en la calidad de vida de las ciudades. Los parques y plazas son espacios dedicados al uso y disfrute de todos aunque algunas personas, en función de su edad o disponibilidad de tiempo libre, adquieren un protagonismo relevante en su utilización. Este es el caso de las personas mayores. En otro orden de cosas, sucede que la integración de los usuarios desde la perspectiva del denominado diseño prospectivo (Vinyets, 2000) en la dinámica de los proyectos de diseño, puede trasladarse al diseño ambiental en este caso, siendo un enfoque escasamente indagado, que ofrece un amplio potencial de aplicación en la mejora del entorno colectivo. Interrelacionando espacios colectivos-diseño prospectivo, se ha desarrollado una investigación que ha tenido por objeto conocer a un determinado grupo de usuarios, como son las personas mayores, en su interacción con uno de los espacios públicos que más frecuentan que es el parque. La experiencia llevada a cabo en distintos parques y plazas de la ciudad de Castellón, ha permitido obtener datos cuantitativos y cualitativos relativos al uso y frecuencia con que los mismos utilizan estos lugares, las características que más valoran las personas mayores y que por tanto, conducen a un incremento de su satisfacción y disfrute en este tipo de entorno

Perception and wayfinding at Cultural Sites

[EN] Projects of historical and cultural heritage have increasingly achieved a great significance in recent years. The importance of these sites is based on their ability to provide intrinsic value and visitation options, communicating knowledge to everyone, regardless of their abilities. Wayfinding plays an important role in achieving this goal, making cultural heritage more accessible. However, the achievement of accessibility for everyone in these projects is not easy. This requires a sensitive perception of people, of their various situations, and an exercise of restraint to balance the past and present, memory and invention. It is not possible to develop a single objective and universally valid theory. Each case must be studied to provide useful and respectful solutions. A descriptive and analytical methodology has been used, based on the research of cases that contemplate different situations; however, they share the common intention to carefully adapt to the place, with maximum respect for it. This article will study several information and signage projects in these heritage and cultural landscapes that use different resources to make the site more accessible. New technology applications also offer a wide range of opportunities, which vary in perceptive experiences, providing the ability to enhance the specific nature of future devices and signage systems that can be used to interact with people. The knowledge of different signaling options and information media offers the possibility of making a combined use of systems that make it possible to reach a greater number of people. As shown in the conclusion, the variety of visual, tactile, and acoustic elements coexist with digital resources, serving the purpose of highlighting different cultural spaces. This diversity of stimuli can comprise an efficient and dense network of continuously superimposed tools, signs, and symbols, which can provide the place with a voice and make it more inclusive.Fernández -Villalobos, N.; Puyuelo, M. (2018). Perception and wayfinding at Cultural Sites. International Journal of Visual Design. 12(4):19-34. https://doi.org/10.18848/2325-1581/CGP/v12i04/19-34S193412

Atún rojo atlántico (thunnus thynnus) : una especie en peligro de extinción /

Treball presentat a la Facultat de Veterinària de la Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.Treball presentat a l'assignatura de Deontologia i Veterinària Legal (21223