This lecture will be given in English

This activity is one of two with the participation of Dana Francisco Miranda and organized by CRIA's GIGPQ. In this event, the philosopher Dana Miranda will present on his current book project, The Coloniality of Happiness. In this project, Miranda explores how one can and should understand black wellbeing in a world structured by racism and coloniality. Using primarily the works of the Afro-Martinican psychiatrist and philosopher Frantz Fanon and his account of “sociodiagnostics,” this project examines depression and suicide within the African diaspora. Employing existential phenomenology, Africana philosophy, and psychiatric models, Miranda argues that Afro-diasporic subjects face systematic un-wellness under “disordered” socio-political arrangements. 

The session will be followed by a reception at 19pm.

About the author:

Dana Francisco Miranda is currently an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Boston. He graduated with a doctorate of philosophy from the University of Connecticut-Storrs investigating the philosophical significance of suicide, depression and well-being among the Africana Diaspora. He currently serves as Secretary for Digital Outreach & Chair of Architectonics for the Caribbean Philosophical Association[1], Faculty Fellow for the Applied Ethics Center (University of Massachusetts Boston)[2], and Co-Director for PIKSI-Boston (Philosophy in an Inclusive Key Summer Institute)[3]. Some of Miranda’s recent peer-reviewed publications include “Hierarchies of Foreignness: The Writing of Man in the New World” (Journal of World Philosophies, 2021), “Signals Crossed: White Double Consciousness and the Role of the Critic” (Philosophy of Education, 2021), and “The Violence of Leadership in Black Lives Matter” (The Movement for Black Lives, 2021). In his upcoming book project, Dr. Miranda draws from the philosophy of Frantz Fanon and auto-ethnography, among other methodological approaches, to bring attention to how mental health is the product of “systematic unwellness under disordered sociopolitical arrangements.”[4] In the process, Miranda provides a critical understanding of what it means to suffer from depression and to provide mental health care in a world “disordered” by “coloniality and racism.”

[1] The Caribbean Philosophical Association (caribbeanphilosophy.org)
[2] https://www.umb.edu/ethics/
[3] PIKSI-Boston (weebly.com)
[4] https://www.danafmiranda.com/