Patrick D. Anderson's favorite books on colonialism and its impact on human nature and society

The first time I read Césaire, I was not prepared for his complete evisceration of Western colonialism. It compelled me to reexamine my understanding of Western culture and philosophy and to accept that colonialism is at the heart of modern Western civilization.  

Before reading Césaire, I tended to think of racism as a psychological problem that could be fixed through education or some similar individual intervention. After reading Césaire, I came to understand racism as a symptom of a broader colonial economic and political structure. 

I think Césaire’s most compelling and relevant argument is his interpretation of fascism as colonialism-turned-inward. Western powers practiced colonial policies on colonized people for centuries, with little protest among Western publics until fascists turned colonial methods against Western publics themselves.

I thought Césaire’s arguments couldn’t be exceeded—then I read Fanon, whose critique of colonialism forced me to reconsider the relationship between humanity and society.

Fanon so convincingly describes the colonizer-colonized relationship that I felt compelled to rethink politics, society, and even human nature.  I found Fanon’s visceral description of colonial dynamics captivating and insightful, his beautiful prose conveying tough truths.

Notwithstanding the focus on violence early in the book, I noted a strong humanistic thread running through the argument, which showed me his analysis was driven not by hatred of the colonizers but by a love for humanity.  

The biggest lesson I learned from Fanon is that social change requires a lot more philosophy—and a lot more action—than we commonly assume.

The first time I read Cleaver, I winced at his controversial personal history of sexual violence, but when I re-read the book, I found Cleaver to be a fascinating prison intellectual with compelling theories about literature, history, and human nature. 

Because I read the book philosophically rather than for its literary merits, I found the organization of the book—which begins with personal letters—difficult to follow. The second time I read the book, I essentially read it backward, starting with the theoretical essays and moving to the examples, and the book made more sense. 

I do not fully accept Cleaver’s theories of race, gender, and sexuality, but there are enough nuggets of truth in his writing that I come back to this book over and over again. 

I love Allen’s book for two reasons: his exceptional documentation of the Black Power movement and his innovative sociological contributions. 

As a student of African American intellectual history, I learned a great deal from Allen’s clear explanation of the similarities and conflicts between Black Power organizations—Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Black Panther Party, and others. Allen’s first-hand account of these movements provided me with powerful insight into the political and intellectual history of Black Power. 

What’s more, Allen’s innovative notion of “domestic neocolonialism” provided me with a new, powerful tool of critique for the post-Civil Rights era. Using Allen’s domestic neocolonialism model, I have been able to make sense of why integration seems to have simultaneously ushered in racial progress and new forms of racial oppression. 

Thomas’ book taught me that, when we adopt a colonial analysis, we have to rethink every category of analysis: “masculinity” and “femininity,” “heterosexual” and homosexual,” and so on. I also came to accept that there is a deeply sadistic eroticism in all racial and colonial oppression.  

I learned that Western colonialism simultaneously positions African-descended people outside the category “human” while also projecting Western categories of gender and sexuality onto these colonized peoples in order to unjustifiably blame them for the worst behavior imaginable.  

Thomas convinced me that modern theories of gender and sexuality not only fail to provide sufficient critiques of oppression but that they re-inscribe oppressive conceptions of identity by smuggling colonial ideology in the back door, inspiring me to rethink everything I thought I knew about identity.