In this article, Hook (2020) argues that Lacan provided theoretically valuable ideas to Fanon’s decolonizing project. “In short, then, Lacan’s influence on Fanon cannot, I think, be limited to stressing the multiple historical factors underlying colonialism, although the latter remains of course crucial in countering the psychological reductionism of much of psychoanalysis” (310). Hook is useful beyond the constraints of his temporality and geography. Hook works diligently in this article to avert marginalizing or diminishing the work of Fanon. He is interested in showing the value of Lacan outside of his context and the value of psychoanalysis as a tool that was used by Fanon in his own decolonizing project. Here are some quotes that I found valuable in the text: 306 - “These critiques beg the question, of course, of why Fanon – who was clearly aware of such issues – did nonetheless go ahead and draw on Lacanian and other psychoanalytic resources in his work, even if in crucially strategic, adapted and ‘customized’ ways.”
- “Indeed, was this not, at least in part, one of Fanon’s insights, that certain psychoanalytic conceptualizations can help enlarge our ethico-political sensibilities? “
314 - “One of the reasons that Lacanian theory represents an advance on the types of psychoanalysis so frequently criticized by Fanon in Black Skin, White Masks is that it stresses that the unconscious is never merely individual but is instead, crucially, trans-individual. To make this argument, it helps to stress a few crucial concepts within Lacanian theory.”318 - “Providing that one is not attempting to reduce Fanon’s work to a Lacanian set of ideas (to make Fanon merely a footnote to Lacan), and insofar as we do not denude or elide the crucial political dimension of Fanon’s work by means of depoliticizing applications of psychoanalysis, then Lacanian theory can be – and already has been – an ally to the decolonizing project of Fanonian theorization. There are, I think, greater possibilities for theoretical innovation and expansion by moving between Fanon and Lacan than has been generally acknowledged by Fanon scholars.” Questions: What would Fanon think of this piece? It is purely speculative, but fun to think about. What sorts of theories from Lacan are useful in contemporary academic discourse?