Imagination under Racial Capitalism: the Affective Salience of Racialised and Gendered Tropes of 'Black excellence'

Racialised capitalism shapes embodiment and subjectivity, specifically imagination and aspiration. A central predicament is why racial capitalism is so persistent, even drawing in those it harms to be its advocates under banners like 'Black excellence'. Focussing on the affective dimensions of cultural tropes of 'Black excellence', I aim to answer the following questions: How does racial capitalism shape imaginations? How does imagination sustain and/or resist racial capitalism? 'Western' social theory rests on 'abyssal thinking', the creation of an abyss between what is imaginable and what is not, the latter rendered non-existent and less worthy (Sousa Santos, 2007). I aim to find out how an "economy of exhaustion and fatigue" (Vergès, 2021) affects the imagination and thus affects what is recognised as existent. Looking at affective economies (Ahmed, 2004) of aspiration makes a difference to how we understand racism and racialised subjectivity. As
the imagination is contested, subjective, intimate and embodied, I aim to use in-depth open-ended interviews as well as visual methodology to comparatively understand how Black people from different walks of life imagine otherwise and how they conceptualise and employ notions of 'Black excellence'