Frantz Fanon

Psychiatrist and political philosopher from Martinique who trained in Lyon, headed a psychiatric ward at Blida-Joinville in Algeria and joined the Algerian independence struggle. His work analyses the psychological and political effects of racism and colonialism.

Key ideas

• The lived experience of racialisation and the colonial gaze
• Colonialism as violence that structures mind and society
• Critique of the national bourgeoisie after independence
• Decolonisation as the creation of new human beings

Major works

• Black Skin, White Masks (1952)
• A Dying Colonialism (1959)
• The Wretched of the Earth (1961)
• Toward the African Revolution (1964, posthumous)

In the conversation

• Discussion Sartre’s “look” and Fanon on being fixed by another’s gaze Claire Dubois · 2 replies
• Reading group Reading group: Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, “On Violence” Sana Mir · 5 replies