I am a philosopher, writer, and teacher. I write about the space between ethics and law in contexts marked by coloniality.
I teach at Texas A&M Univeristy, where I am an Assistant Professor of Africana Studies and Hispanic Studies. I am also a Visiting Scholar at Columbia University’s Institute for the Study of Human Rights.
My books contribute to the emerging field of decolonial philosophy. My first book was called “a strikingly original portrait” of Simone Weil (1909-1943), one of the first European philosophers to call into question colonialism. She would later be arrested for participating in the French Resistance, including what we would now call “court-watching” at the trials of migrant workers. My recent books are inspired by Caribbean philosophers who created alternative worlds of meaning within colonial conditions. In this poetic spirit, I acknowledge how some legal concepts have closed down ethical relationships while also reading for their political potential. In Choose Your Bearing, I show how claims to human rights have been leveraged not only to change law, but also to outline deeper webs of responsibility. In Another Humanity, I defend what I call the “conceptual sufficiency” of humanity as an organizing frame for decolonial ethics in the face of state repression.
I have lectured on these ideas in South Africa, Brazil, and Germany, as well as across the UK and North America. My research has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities.
My reconstructive orientation, pursuing what we can build amidst coercive realities, has led me to work on several teams that actively bring together theory and practice. I currently serve as a Senior Editor at Pivot Press and as Director of Partnerships for the UNESCO Chair on Health, Race, and Human Rights.
Each year I conduct a few experimental collaborations. At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, I co-wrote a widely shared essay on the role of philosophy in the face of public health emergencies, Theses for Theory in a Time of Crisis. I also hosted David Scott for a conversation on thinking and friendship called Stuart Hall’s Ethics.
In 2023, the online magazine Public Books asked me to write about solidarity, leading to my best-known essay, How to Embrace a Wildfire.
I am currently writing a book about desire.
My Academia page gives an overview of my publications.
CV: full Curriculum Vitae
Contact: bd2838 [at] columbia.edu