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38 pages 1 hour read

Black Skin, White Masks

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1952

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Essay Topics

1.

Fanon writes, “For the black man there is only one destiny. And it is white” (178). Keeping in mind Fanon’s view that the black man’s self-alienation and desire to become white are psychopathological, explain the meaning and significance of this quotation.

2.

At multiple points in the text, Fanon engages -- explicitly or implicitly -- with the work of Jean-Paul Sartre, G.W.F. Hegel, Simone de Beauvoir, Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, Jacques Lacan, and Aimé Césaire. Choose one of these thinkers. In what ways does Fanon agree with them, and in what ways do his method and views diverge from theirs?

3.

There is a recurring motif in Black Skin, White Masks of the black subject’s consciousness being shattered and reassembled. Analyze the significance of this motif.

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