[Postponed] St. Clair Drake Memorial Lecture Featuring Achille Mbembe

The Department of African & African American Studies at Stanford University presents the 31st Annual St. Clair Drake Memorial Lecture featuring Professor Achille Mbembe (Research Professor in History and Politics at the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research (WISER), University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa)

This lecture titled "The Earthly Community: Reflections on the Last Utopia" has been postponed to a future date (TBD).

About Achille Mbembe:

Achille Mbembe is a Research Professor in History and Politics at the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research (WISER), University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. He is also the Director of the Innovation Foundation for Democracy. He is the author of many books including On the Postcolony (2001), Critique of Black Reason (2013), Necropolitics (2019) and Brutalism (2023). His work has been translated in 16 languages. He is the 2024 Holberg Prize Laureate and the 2025 Spinozalens Award.

Lecture Abstract:

How should we inhabit anew and share as equitably as possible a planet whose life-support system has been so severely damaged by human activities as to be in dire need of repair? There is little doubt that this concern will be at the center of any debate on the future of life and the future of reason in this century. Indeed, questions of cohabitation, of sustainability and durability, of the interlacing of human history and the earth’s history are far from abstract concerns. If there is no significant adjustment in how we conduct our lives, parts of the Earth are likely to become inhospitable in the near future. Drawing on African cosmogonies and the power of African aesthetic and figural objects, this lecture will reflect on the conditions of possibility of a new, truly planetary and inclusive earth ethics.

St. Clair Drake Memorial Lecture:

The St. Clair Drake Memorial Lectures are dedicated to the memory of Professor St.Clair Drake, reowned African American anthropologist and educator, and the founding Director of the Program in African & African American Studies at Stanford University.

St. Clair Drake Memorial Lecture presented by the Department of African & African American Studies (DAAAS). Visit our website at aaas.stanford.edu for more information about the department.