“Protect the human and you are now killing the human. Why?!”: A materialist-rhetorical reading of black racial precarity under COVID-19

Nancy Henaku

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

Abstract

In the midst of the upsurge in Coronavirus deaths, George Floyd, an African American man was lynched in broad daylight in the US. A police officer knelt on his neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds even as Floyd repeatedly indicated that “I can’t breathe.” While this incident resulted in global outrage and demonstrations partly because of America’s history of racialization and geopolitical visibility, there were several incidents of violence against Black subjects elsewhere, including the African continent, that did not attract as much global attention. Despite differences in contexts and levels of reaction, there are connections and patterns in the Floyd case and Black experiences elsewhere under COVID-19 that require critical exploration. This chapter examines the precariousness of global Black subjectivity during the Coronavirus pandemic through a materialist-rhetorical lens. Its transnational reading connects examples from the US, China, South Africa, Ghana, and other African (Diasporic) contexts, arguing that irrespective of where Black people are located in the world, they live unlivable lives that can be attributed to colonial matrices of power, with their racialized, gendered, sexualized, neoliberal, and postcolonial dimensions. Such Black racial precarity, the chapter contends, is further heightened by the “chaoness” of a world in crisis.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationCommunicative Perspectives on COVID-19 in Ghana
Subtitle of host publicationAt the Intersection of Culture, Science, Religion and Politics
PublisherTaylor and Francis
Pages83-99
Number of pages17
ISBN (Electronic)9781000936544
ISBN (Print)9781032360461
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jan 2023

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