Description
Book SynopsisA brilliant debut by lawyer and critic Hawa Allan on the paradoxical state of black citizenship in the United States.
Trade Review"‘All of history is happening right now,’ observes Hawa Allan in this beautifully written history of the complex, paradoxical role of the Insurrection Act in American life. ?Allan’s profoundly moving book exposes the emotional underbelly of slavery’s traumatic legacy on both enslavers and enslaved, and on all the generations since. The affective echo of that moral crisis remains entangled in today’s most urgent conflagrations. In a moment as deeply divided as ours, Allan’s book offers principled and reflective pause." -- Patricia J. Williams author of Giving a Damn
"Hawa ?Allan speaks with the cool, clear, analytical rigor of the highly trained legal scholar, the detached bemusement of the social anthropologist who declines to go native, the eloquence of the poet, and the sublimated autobiographical anger of the unwilling recipient of this country’s doggedly persistent attempts to deny the rights of full and equal citizenship to Americans of acknowledged African descent. Her prose is mesmerizing; her voice is fresh, original, and completely unique.
?Insurrection ?is a profound historical meditation on the American pathology, the brilliant debut of a major thinker on the American intellectual scene." -- Adrian Piper, author of Escape to Berlin
"Eloquently mixing history, autobiography, and philosophy, this powerful account sheds new light on the Black experience in America." -- Publishers Weekly (starred review)
