MARX, FREUD AND THE GODS BLACK PEOPLE MAKE: EUROPEAN SOCIAL THEORY AND THE REAL LIFE FETISH

Since the early-modern encounter between African and European merchants on the Guinea Coast, the term “fetish” has analogized alleged disorders in European thought to African gods. Yet African gods have a logic of their own that is no less reasonable, given the position of their worshipers in the Atlantic economy, than are the different but equally socially positioned theories of Marx and Freud. This lecture offers a novel perspective on the social roots of these tandem African and European understandings of collective action, illuminating the relationship of European social theory to the racism suffered by Africans and assimilated Jews alike.

自几内亚海岸上非洲与欧洲商人的近代早期接触以来，‘物神（fetish）’这一术语便将欧洲思想中所谓的认知偏差，与非洲神祇相类比。然而非洲神祇自有其内在逻辑：考虑到其信徒在大西洋经济体系中的处境，这一逻辑的合理性丝毫不逊于马克思与弗洛伊德的理论——后者虽与前者迥异，却同样根植于各自的社会处境。本讲座为非洲与欧洲对集体行动的这两种并行认知的社会根源提供了全新视角，阐明了欧洲社会理论与非裔及被同化的犹太族群所遭受的种族主义之间的关联。