Mothership Connections

Theodore Walker

Description

Bringing a black Atlantic approach to constructive postmodern efforts to understand and transcend modern worldviews and modern world orders, Mothership Connections draws upon the work of scholars in the tradition of W. E. B. Du Bois, Charles H. Long, Alfred North Whitehead, and Charles Hartshorne. The author shows that connections to the originating influences of transatlantic slavery and black Atlantic experiences are essential to any adequate account of modernity and postmodernity. He also argues that metaphysics is essential to theology and moral theory, synthesizing neoclassical metaphysics and black theology to develop a black Atlantic account of metaphysical aspects of struggle, power, and ethical deliberation.

Preface

Acknowledgments

Series Introduction

Abbreviations

PART ONE: Modernity in Constructive Postmodern and Black Atlantic Views

1. Constructive Postmodern Views of Modernity: David Ray Griffin, William A. Beardslee, Joe Holland, and Frederick Ferré

2. Black Atlantic Views of Modernity: Charles H. Long and Paul Gilroy

PART TWO: Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology: A Description

3. What is Neoclassical Metaphysics?

4. What is Black Theology?

PART THREE: Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology: A Black Atlantic Synthesis

5. Toward a Metaphysics of Struggle

6. Toward a Metaphysics of Power

7. Toward a Metaphysics of Ethics

8. Epilogue: Toward a Fully Adequate Postmodern Theology

APPENDIX A: What is Metaphysics?

APPENDIX B: What is Theology?

Notes

References

Note on Supporting Center

Index

SUNY series in Constructive Postmodern Thought

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Métaphysique
• Philosophie de la religion
• Ethics in religion
• Philosophy of religion
• Metaphysics

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 01 février 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780791485088
• Langue: English

Extrait

Mothership Connections A Black Atlantic Synthesis of Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology

Theodore Walker Jr.

Mothership Connections

SUNY series in Constructive Postmodern Thought

David Ray Griffin, editor

Mothership Connections

A Black Atlantic Synthesis of Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology

Theodore Walker Jr.

STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK PRESS

Published by S TATE U NIVERSITY OF N EW Y ORK P RESS , A LBANY

© 2004 State University of New York

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

For information, address State University of New York Press, 90 State Street, Suite 700, Albany, NY 12207

Production, Laurie Searl Marketing, Anne M. Valentine

Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data

Walker, Theodore, 1953– Mothership connections : a Black Atlantic synthesis of neoclassical metaphysics and Black theology / Theodore Walker, Jr. p. cm. — (SUNY series in constructive postmodern thought) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0791460894 (alk. paper) 1. Black theology. 2. Metaphysics. 3. Postmodernism. 4. Slavery. I. Title. II. Series.

BT82.7.W345 2004 230'.089'96—dc22

10

 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

2003069331

Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology: A Description

Modernity in Constructive Postmodern and Black Atlantic Views

Constructive Postmodern Views of Modernity: David Ray Griffin, William A. Beardslee, Joe Holland, and Frederick Ferré

vii

Acknowledgments

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Abbreviations

PART ONE

Black Atlantic Views of Modernity: Charles H. Long and Paul Gilroy

What is Black Theology?

PART TWO

FOUR

THREE

Preface

What is Neoclassical Metaphysics?

37

25

xi

ix

TWO

ONE

Contents

Series Introduction

9

3

vi

PART THREE

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

Mothership Connections

Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology: A Black Atlantic Synthesis

Toward a Metaphysics of Struggle

Toward a Metaphysics of Power

Toward a Metaphysics of Ethics

Epilogue: Toward a Fully Adequate Postmodern Theology

APPENDIX A

APPENDIX B

Notes

What is Metaphysics?

What is Theology?

References

Note on Supporting Center

Index

SUNY series in Constructive Postmodern Thought

45

53

61

69

73

8

1

87

115

131

133

145

Preface

With respect to black peoples, “black Atlantic” refers to postslavery black populations and settlements on continents and islands up and down both sides of the Atlantic ocean, and to their various black and 1 colored relations across the whole globe. Black Atlantic populations include black Africans, AfroCaribbeans, AfricanAmericans (includ ing AfroNorth Americans, AfroSouth Americans, and AfroCentral Americans), AfroEuropeans, and other hyphenated black Africans. I am an AfroNorth American or, less specifically, an AfricanAmerican. In this book I offer a black Atlantic contribution to constructive postmodern efforts to understand and transcend modern worldviews 2 and modern world orders. After describing constructive postmodern views of modernity (chapter 1), I offer black Atlantic views of moder nity (chapter 2). According to black Atlantic scholars, transatlantic slavery and black Atlantic experiences are major originating, essential, and enduring influences upon modern worldviews and world orders. Then, I offer a black Atlantic contribution to metaphysics and metaethics. After describing neoclassical metaphysics (chapter 3) and black theology (chapter 4), I draw upon these and other resources to develop a black Atlantic account of metaphysical aspects of struggle (chapter 5), power (chapter 6), and ethical deliberation (chapter 7). I am very concerned to introduce black Atlantic scholarship to post modern scholars. Why? Because any adequate account of modernity and its possible transcendence must include sustained analysis of our various connections to transatlantic slavery and black Atlantic experi ences. Here the “our” in “our various connections” refers to all mod ern humans. All humans shaped by modernity are connected to transatlantic slavery and black Atlantic experiences. Constructive

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Mothership Connections

postmodern scholars, please meet black Atlantic scholars, especially Charles H. Long, Paul Gilroy, Vincent Harding, and others instructed by W. E. B. Du Bois. Also, please meet black and womanist theologians instructed by black Atlantic thought, including, among others, James H. Cone, Cheryl Townsend Gilkes, and Emilie M. Townes. I am equally concerned to introduce constructive postmodern meta physics of the neoclassical and processrelational varieties to black and other liberation theologians. Why? Because no theology or theological ethic can be fully adequate until its metaphysical and metaethical pre suppositions are rendered fully explicit, and because, as William R. Jones has shown in his bookIs God a White Racist?,classical meta physics yields nonliberating visions of God. Black and other liberation theologians, please meet neoclassical metaphysicians, especially Charles Hartshorne, Schubert M. Ogden, and Franklin I. Gamwell, and constructive postmodern scholars of the processrelational type, espe cially David Ray Griffin, William A. Beardslee, Joe Holland, Frederick Ferré, Thandeka, John B. Cobb Jr., and others instructed by Alfred North Whitehead. I am also concerned to render these deliberations accessible to stu dents, including beginning students. Accordingly, the appendix pro vides novicefriendly introductions to metaphysics (appendix A) and theology (appendix B).

Acknowledgments

I owe almost everything rightly said to the authors of articles and books cited herein. Each citation is an acknowledgment that implies what is explicitly expressed here—gratitude. I am doubly grateful to three of these authors for reading and criticizing my first draft of this book: Joseph L. Allen, Dwight N. Hopkins, and Charles M. Wood. I am triply grateful to two of these authors—Philip E. Devenish and David Ray Griffin—for criticizing several drafts. If the reader could compare the early and penultimate drafts with the book now in hand, she or he would see that the differences are very significant. For employment and other blessings, including paid research leaves, I am thankful to the Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. For more daytoday help than I can item ize, I am thankful to Sue Ferrell, Duane Harbin, Linda Hervey, Shonda Jones, Mary Ann Marshall, Carolyn McCullough, Ann Ralston, Carolyn Santinga, and our associate dean—Marjorie ProcterSmith. For teaching assistance, I am thankful to Sharon Baker and John Wadhams. I am grateful to David R. Brockman for bibliographic research on Du Bois, to John Wallace (Jay) Cole III and Jason E. Vickers for proofreading and criticism, and to Tom Miles for indexing. And for making the literature so readily available, I am thankful to Bridwell Library. For the essential scholarly gift of regularly scheduled critical dia logue, I am thankful to the students and faculty at the Perkins School of Theology, and to many individuals in the wider PerkinsSMU com munities, including the SMU Graduate Program in Religious Studies and the MaGuire Center for Ethics and Public Responsibility. Before coming to Perkins, I served on the faculty at Hood Theological Semi nary in Salisbury, North Carolina and at BethuneCookman College in

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