The dying Black body in repeat mode: the Black 'horrific' on a loop

What does it mean to watch a Black man dying in repeat mode? This paper deconstructs the notion of consuming Black death in a loop (or repeat mode) online and its redistribution in the virtual realm centring the Black body in this pornotropic assemblage. The spectacularisation of Black death and its...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Identities (Yverdon, Switzerland) Switzerland), 2022-11, Vol.29 (6), p.711-729
Main Author: Ibrahim, Yasmin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
afropessimism
black consciousness
black death
black humanism
Black people
Blackness
Death & dying
Enactment
Human body
Humanism
Insurgency
Oppression
paraontology of blackness
Plague
Racial identity
Redistribution
Refusal
Slavery
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Summary:What does it mean to watch a Black man dying in repeat mode? This paper deconstructs the notion of consuming Black death in a loop (or repeat mode) online and its redistribution in the virtual realm centring the Black body in this pornotropic assemblage. The spectacularisation of Black death and its juxtaposition as a banal encounter is examined against the history of slavery and White oppression. The enactment of Blackness as lacking form or ontology redrafts the virtual sphere in enacting a politics of refusal for reconstituting Blackness adduced through its fluidity. The virtual as an unstable and disembodied realm is re-read as a generative graveyard for reclaiming Black consciousness and Black humanism. In countering the 'Black horrific' the paper discerns digital platforms' agentic and sensuous potential as a stage for performative insurgency to resurrect an affective Black body politic through the disembodied formlessness of the virtual sphere.
ISSN:1070-289X
1547-3384
DOI:10.1080/1070289X.2021.1920775