“C.L.R. James: Philosopher of the Dispossessed” by Prof. David Austin

C.L.R. James was one of the great minds of the 20th century. James was a true polymath who made significant contributions in the areas of politics, philosophy, sports and aesthetics, history, literature, literary criticism, and Marxist theory. Ultimately, James was a socialist who fought and thought to change the world. The lecture will explore James’s life and ideas and situate him within his formative years in the Caribbean. Light refreshments will follow the lecture.

David Austin is the author of Dread Poetry and Freedom: Linton Kwesi Johnson and the Unfinished Revolution (2018) and Fear of a Black Nation: Race, Sex, and Security in Sixties Montreal (2013, winner of the 2014 Casa de las Americas Prize). He is editor of Moving Against the System: The 1968 Congress of Black Writers and the Making of Global Consciousness (2018) and You Don’t Play with Revolution: The Montreal Lectures of C.L.R. James (2009). He has also produced radio documentaries for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s Ideas on C.L.R. James and Frantz Fanon. A former youth worker and community organizer, he currently teaches in the Humanities, Philosophy, and Religion Department at John Abbott College and is a Lecturer in the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada.