Senghor, Negritude and Transcendental Realism

Senghor's choice for Tempels' Bantu ontology would not have been gratuitous, but based on his aesthetic interest; pointing to the reflective capacity of art, just in a political sense —as ideological— rather than a cultural one. That would not be gratuitous either, but would respond to his own determination in that sense, as in Du Bois's error; which is not surprising, if it epistemologically solves the understanding of reality as nature, in culture.

This is the innate property of art, in its own formal condition, from the archaic era to Modernity in the West itself; but it is also a current phenomenon and common to all culture, in their mythological traditions, as representations of that reality. Only here would there be a couple of fallacies, for which this is not fulfilled, although it does point to that intuition; since as a postmodern, his case has already passed the distortion of Modernity, in its structural dysfunction.

As a principle, however, and as formal in its own character, art would retain this reflective capacity; but for that same reason, not in conceptualism, which make it dysfunctional, depriving it of that representational capacity. This formal representation would occur by sympathetic analogy, referring to the structure of the phenomenon represented; distorted in the convention of the right sense, presuming the understanding of the phenomenon, due to its rationality.

This is what delegitimizes postmodern conceptualism, although it understands it in its desystematization of modernity; which would not be in the formal apotheosis with which it is fulfilled in the Baroque —as classical—, but in this contradiction. The problem is then not of art, as a practice of craftsmanship, but in its displacement through philosophy; with its professional specialization, in modern intellectualism, which is what establishes it as such, and not postmodern.

That is to say, modern art responds to its classical formal nature, but is displaced in that same modernity; giving rise to the postmodern crisis, which is of its own modernity, and not of its classical and formal tradition. In fact, and returning to Senghor, the art he postulated was not the formalist of popular traditions; but the conceptual one of this intellectualist conventionalisms, as can be seen in his wonderfully solved poetry.

It is therefore a poetics or aesthetic philosophy rather than art, with its object in a political, not aesthetic concept; legitimized in the historical transcendentalism of its political determination, not in its formal properties. That is why Senghor has to resort to a conventional ontology, without resting on the very property of poetry; which is counterproductive, reducing it to the ideological value that it intended to overcome, as a mere alternative.

This is the contradiction marked by Sartre in its critical essay (Black Orfeo), and what defines Negritude as romanticism; highlighting the ambiguity of its object, as political and not properly aesthetic, and therefore without an existential function. For this reason, he is not interested in an ontology proper to these cultures, and which he would find in their popular traditions; with which he would have avoided the criticism – also excessive – of Franz Fanon, with an ontological sufficiency of culture.

The conflict of Negritude is thus resolved, as the very extension of that of the West, in its internal contradiction; reproducing the same excesses that it criticizes, and for the same reasons that it criticizes in them, in its determinism. This limits its scope, since Negritude does not manage to constitute itself as an alternative postulation; although it still evidences the insufficiency of this Western tradition, in that modern stage as its apotheosis.

That would be the value of Negritude, as of postmodern criticism, not the critique of the West, but of its modernity; understood as a contraction to the functional principles of the tradition that culminates in that stage, not its alternative. Of course, none of this is perceptible from the very parameters of that contradiction, determined by it; but only from an instance capable of reconciling its terms, which is precisely the meaning of Transcendental Realism.

Senghor, la Negritud y Realismo Trascendental

La opción de Senghor por la ontología bantú de Tempels no habría sido gratuita, sino basada en su interés estético; apuntando a la capacidad reflexiva del arte, sólo que en sentido político —como ideológico— en vez de cultural. Eso tampoco sería gratuito, sino que respondería a su propia determinación en ese sentido, como en el error de Du Bois; lo que no es extraño, soluciona epistemológicamente la comprensión de lo real como naturaleza, en la cultura.

Esta es la propiedad innata al arte, en su propia condición formal, ya desde la era arcaica en el mismo Occidente; pero es de hecho un fenómeno actual y común a toda cultura, en su tradición mitológica, como representación de eso real. Sólo que aquí habría un par de falacias, por las que eso no se cumple, aunque el esfuerzo sí apunta a esa intuición; ya que en tanto postmoderno, su caso ya ha pasado la distorsión de la Modernidad, en su disfunción estructural.

Como principio no obstante, y en tanto formal en su propio carácter, el arte sí retendría esta capacidad reflexiva; pero por lo mismo no en el conceptualismo, que lo haría disfuncional, privándolo de esa capacidad representacional. Esta representación formal se daría por analogía simpática, referida a la estructura del fenómeno representado; distorsionada en la convención del sentido recto, presumiendo la comprensión del fenómeno, por su racionalidad.

Esto es lo que deslegitima al conceptualismo postmoderno, aunque lo comprenda en su desistematización de lo moderno; que no estaría en la apoteosis formal con que se cumple en el Barroco —como clásico—, sino en esta contradicción. El problema no es entonces del arte, como práctica de suyo artesanal, sino en su desplazamiento por la filosofía; con su especialización profesional, en el intelectualismo moderno, que es lo que lo establece como tal, y no postmoderno.

Es decir, el arte moderno responde a su naturaleza formal clásica, pero es desplazado en esa misma modernidad; dando lugar a la crisis postmoderna, que es de su misma modernidad, y no de su tradición clásica y formal. De hecho, y volviendo a Senghor, el arte que postulaba no era el formalista de las tradiciones populares; sino el conceptual de este convencionalismo intelectualista, como se observa en su maravillosamente resuelta poesía.

Se trata por tanto de una poética o filosofía estética antes que arte, y con su objeto en un concepto político, no estético; legitimado en el trascendentalismo histórico de su determinación política, no en sus propiedades formales. Por eso Senghor tiene que acudir a una ontología convencional, sin descansar en la propiedad misma de la poesía; lo que resulta contraproducente, reduciéndola al valor ideológico que pretendía superar, como mera alternativa.

Esto es lo que sitúa al fenómeno de la Negritud en el espectro del romanticismo típico, como reacción al racionalismo; resaltando la ambigüedad de su objeto, en tanto político y no propiamente estético, y por ello sin función existencial. Por ello no se interesa en una ontología propia de esas culturas, y que encontraría en sus tradiciones populares; con lo que habría esquivado la crítica —también excesiva— de Franz Fanon, con una suficiencia ontológica de la cultura.

El conflicto de la Negritud se resuelve así como extensión misma del de Occidente, en su contradicción interna; reproduciendo los mismos excesos que critica, y por las mismas razones que critica en ellos, en su determinismo. Esto sería lo que limite su alcance, pues la Negritud no alcanza a constituirse como una postulación alternativa; aunque todavía evidencia la insuficiencia de esta tradición occidental, en la de ese estadio moderno como apoteosis.

Ese sería el valor de la Negritud, como de la crítica postmoderna, no la crítica de Occidente, sino de su modernidad; entendida como contracción a los principios funcionales de la tradición que culmina en ese estadio, no su alternativa. Por supuesto, nada de eso es perceptible desde los mismos parámetros de la contradicción, determinados por ella; sino sólo desde una instancia capaz de conciliar sus términos, que es precisamente el sentido del Realismo Trascendental.

Ditirambos electrónicos

Los dramas de videos cortos en las redes sociales comparten muchos elementos con las tradiciones populares; riquezas sólo escritas en las Mil y una noches, amores repentinos y casuales, pero profundos y definitivos. Junto a eso, reyes negros en capas de armiño, con tronos en conventos —y no castillos— medievales; que además tienen sistema eléctrico, medicina nuclear, y cocinas con un equipamiento sólo comprensible con esas riquezas.

También como en Las mil y una noche, los dramas son simples y brutales, como las psicologías son toscas y desdibujadas; ni siquiera ninguno de esos elementos responde a una lógica dramática, y a veces ni siquiera de perspectiva visual. Nada de eso importa, porque se trata del capitalismo trascendiendo al capitalismo, con el sentido sobre la forma; que así la vuelve a hacer funcional, desplazándola desde el protagonismo en que perdiera al arte en su sinsentido.

Eso sí, ninguna de esas historias será una odisea interior o un replanteamiento de la realidad, como en los modernos; sino que son historias sobre la efectividad del poder —en lo que difieren de las tradiciones—, como un objeto peculiar. Es en esto que se trata de sentido, repitiendo la máxima —como axioma existencial— de que el poder nunca es insuperable; resolviéndolo en vericuetos absurdos y repetitivos, menos preocupados por su verosimilitud, que por su obviedad.

En esas historias, el poder se despliega en una espiral que desconoce la dicotomía de malos y buenos, en su relatividad; con gente que desconoce el alcance de la persona con la que lidian, y que se les revela con paroxismo de mitología antigua. Las veces que eso ocurrió entre modernos y postmodernos —Twain, Faulkner, Dostoievski— fue indefectiblemente realista; y también indefectiblemente neutralizado en su eficacia, por el convencionalismo de un mercado intelectualmente estratificado.

Se trataría por tanto de una reconexión con la naturaleza práctica de la cultura, tras el elitismo intelectual moderno; acudiendo a toda forma disponible, no importa su lógica propia, si es o se hace funcional como dinámica. Después de todo, la cultura no era libresca antes de la modernidad, sino que se resolvía en tradiciones orales; ocupándose del sentido, excepto en ese intermezzo moderno, en que se perdió en la subjetividad de lo humano.

No es que no haya habido excepciones, pero siempre en desesperos que apelaron a la experiencia extrema; tan temprano como el siglo XVII con la antinovela francesa, que repetirá Julio Cortázar, o el Realismo Mágico. Estas excepciones son sin embargo la temprana emergencia, que resiente ese nuevo convencionalismo; y que por eso lleva la condición de inconvencionalidad aparente al extremo absurdo, en busca de la experiencia.

No importa que esta producción dramática sea incluso corporativa e industrial, es todavía artesanal y popular; porque es esta clase la que se ha desarrollado tecnológicamente, aún sin conseguir su determinación política. En todo caso, es un producto dirigido a esa clase popular, y que por tanto responde a sus intereses especiales; que son los que introducen el elemento existencial, sobre el político con que se retroalimentan los intelectuales.

¿Realmente James Joice es algo más que estilo, puede decir a su gente —no ya a la pescadera— algo que no sepa?; ese nivel de gratuidad es el que sólo se justifica en la profundidad filosófica, pero justo porque no es comercial. Por eso sólo autores que pueden añadir este extra de absurdo sobreviven a la velocidad brutal de su mercadeo; sea Herman Hesse, con la recurrencia de sus reducciones, en dramas que desconocen la complejidad de lo real; o sea Lezama Lima reproyectando el Idealismo de la Eidos platónica, en un alcance de realismo trascendental; o Borges haciendo ditirambos superficiales con conceptos complejos, para mostrar irresponsable nuestra vanidad.

Hay algo paradójico en este drama de un mercado que se deshace en su inconsistencia, y es su alcance ético; con intelectuales protestando el capitalismo que los habilita, como si la filosofía no hubiera florecido con el comercio. Sólo la disponibilidad de tiempo y recursos posibilitó el lujo jónico de la fisiología, e inmediatamente produjo la sofística; porque alguna utilidad había que darle a aquellos sinsentidos del río que no es el mismo y el no-Ser del no-Ser.

Black conservatism and the lie of the Democratic ideological switch

Democratic liberalism claims a traditional ascendancy over the political identity of blacks, but it is false; it is anchored in a supposed ideological change of 1960, when Kennedy capitalized on the black vote, around Martin Luther King. That is, however, a false narrative, about a circumstantial episode, which did not even actively engage King; who until the last moment maintained his proverbial reticence, in the cultural pragmatism of the American black, naturally conservative.

First, this conservatism must be clarified, because it’s not exclusive to black culture but to culture in general; as a structure that organizes existence as a human being, therefore of existential rather than political value. For this reason, it even reproduces the thermodynamic principle, as morphodynamics, in the conservation of resources; already from that existential function, but even reaching the political expression, in which it is resolved as a historical reality.

The ideological conflict is then artificial and not organic, arising from the political determinism of Modernity; and which therefore responds to the positive rational reduction of politics, not to the reality of culture itself. It’s worth to mention that this notion of culture is that same meta-politic theoretics are looking now, because the insufficiency of dialectic; since reality can’t be reduced to its political expression, but have its determinations outside it, without being metaphysic. History is then trialectic rather than dialectic, imposing the objective circumstances over the subjectivism of economy; which never respond to universal categories, but to the punctuality of the individual and its own circumstances, as culture.

Hence the intrinsically conservative character of this North American black culture, due to its political marginality; in the conservation of its resources as existential, in the family, tradition, individual responsibility, etc.; in the face of which, the ideological organization results in a squandering of those resources, without any practical result. That is why every political investment, since Roosevelt's New Deal, stumbles upon this same black skepticism; which will only give way momentarily, when caught up in the existential political crossroads, such as that of Dr. King. This intertwines presidential candidate Kennedy's call to his wife Coreta, with his father's open commitment; as a concrete pressure, to which King's pragmatism yields, but not an ideological change of the party.

Of course, this is taken advantage of by the intellectualism of the Boule Movement, which is traditionally liberal; to the point of having sacrificed the autonomy of the Niagara Movement with Du Bois, to found the NAACP. This is the tradition that anchors the political identity of the American black to this manipulative sponsorship; as seen in the open field operation of the Black Lives Mater, always in an electoralist and democratic function; without, however, managing to transcend a really popular ascendant, in its middle-class pretensions.

Above that, the truth is that the liberal tradition loses its consistency of intellectual projection, already unsustainable; a third of a millennium since its triumphant postulation, when it has tried all its possibilities and only fails. Since then, the West has helplessly witnessed its structural desynchronization, in this growing inconsistency; by which the references, which made existence in culture possible, have been and continues to be lost.

The phenomenon is therefore deeper and more complex than this tension, compromising the existence of the black; because, even in an incredible paradox, it appeals to an emergent and apotheosic development of conservatism; not only in this political confrontation, but in this as an expression of that deeper phenomenon, in its determinations. This conservatism then becomes the spine of political culture, as believed even by the most liberal of the blacks; because it was W.E.B. Du Bois himself who postulated the conservation of this cultural singularity, in favor of the whole culture.

About te Ethnic Manipulation as Politics

The problem with political determinism is that it distorts the ontological function of culture, which is existential; in the provision of its determinations as ideology, which thus ceases to be existential, as properly political. Hence historical transcendentalism, in that sort of political romanticism, coming from the idealist tradition; appealing to an Arcadian communitarianism in primitive societies, which ignores the motive of the economic function.

However, reality is punctual and immediate, with a transcendence typical of its own immanent condition; which is even why it is reduced to historical from Dialectical Materialism, without still being able to avoid Manichaeism. That is the problem of racial vindication in historical transcendentalism, which is political rather than existential; appealing to a transcendence of the original culture, which is impossible after the trauma of its economic redeterminations; which in the specifically African case, include a high political component, in the restructuring of society.

The most serious problem here would be that political romanticism, responding to the political fiction of ideology; as an artificial and not organic tension, in the crisis of European absolutism, which gave rise to the modern revolution. It is not for nothing then the centrality of the French contradiction, crawling even through German ideology; to redetermine the cultural structure from the epistemology of its idealist tradition, with dialectics as a canon.

That is already dysfunctional, in its very epistemological nature, reducing reality to its dichotomous tensions; postulated as well as its very political determination, when politics is only the expression in which it is realized; not its determination, which as ontological is structural, and therefore comes from culture, not from society. That is what distortion consists of, which subordinates the individual to the Kantian imperative, ordering that idealist tradition; in a redetermination that reduces the cosmological to ideological, and with it to the existential function as political.

Hence, all this is resolved as a moral question, and thus neoconservative, displacing the cultural functions; which, as we have already seen, go from being existential to political, subordinating the individual in transcendentalism. In turn, it comes from the Cartesian reversal, with its secularization of the religious problem, as moral instead of cosmological; not expressly but already on its epistemological basis, on which Kant later postulates his imperatives.

All this explains its purely Western nature, racially defined as te whiteness of all te contemporary conflicts; which are not merely political, although expressed as such, but ontologically determined in culture. Hence the falsity of those vindicationist archaisms, which manipulate racial tensions as political; when their determination is racially defined by their Europeanness, even if they are postulated as universal.

In fact, this claim to universality comes from Christian humanism, which is also European and academic; on the very basis of modern Enlightenmentism, culminating this distortion of culture in general, with that of European culture. Nevertheless, all this —even if artificial in its intellectualism— was possible because it was credible in its circumstance; and that would be what has changed in at least three hundred years since its apotheosis, with the postmodern crisis of culture.

The problem, however, is one of whites, among whites and for whites, who only manipulate racial tension; making profits even after slavery has been abolished, with the same displacement of the political function; that goes from economic, with the industrial boom, to properly political, in the expression with which society is carried out. Not for nothing, manipulation crosses the intellectually specialized elites, assuming the representation of the popular; which is possible only in the convention of historical transcendentalism, lacking existential consistency.

Whatever happened to neoliberalism!

In the first place, it was not liberal but neoconservative, and that is the problem with paradoxes, they are misleading; especially in this case, in which the bourgeoisie tried to surpass its own intelligence, only to deceive itself. The problem of neoliberalism was in the feudal nature of Modernity, contained by democratic conventions; because the contribution of Modernity was the moderation —not the overcoming— of medieval structures, with those conventions.

That is what explains the relativity of modern democracy, without it becoming unhinged —as it could have been— in anarchy; contained in the authoritarian elitism of modern intellectuals, not in the access of the popular class to power. These intellectuals were also fed by a dissident aristocracy, which they legitimized in their populism; and this was the ideological development of liberalism, legitimizing sovereignty in the people instead of in God; but also marginalizing that people who legitimized it from effective power, because of their alleged intellectual incapacity.

This explains populism, because the revolution is never popular but populist, in another of those political turns; but more importantly, it explains the surreptitious growth of the middle class, to that apotheosis of intellectual excellence. After all, as a parameter of culture, it is also a parameter of cultural mediocrity, in more of those paradoxical twists; giving meaning to that professionalization that distorts the economy with technocracy, displacing pragmatism.

That is what wounded the bourgeoisie, the betrayal of an aristocracy too authoritarian to become bourgeois; unlike in England, where he aristocracy was too strong to allow that trickery to the Monarchy in its own authority. That is why absolutism was so relative in England, without allowing its monarchy the political excesses of France; for there is no such thing as history, but the peculiar developments that organize culture.

So the problem with neoliberalism was not its bourgeois nature, but its political decharacterization as a class; for which it agreed to rely in the business schools of the universities —oh, intellectualism!—, instead of in real practice. That would be why it ends up subordinating productivity to planning, in the corporate culture of the political; and thus ending up like the political, wearing down its own material base in theorical projections, like socialism.

This decapitalization may not be theoretically visible, dissolved as it is in the growing inflation of the economy; with the devaluation of wages, which moves their value to the profit of investors, in an apparent increase of productivity. This would have been the kind of trick with which Louis XVI's finance minister financed American independence; but at the expense of the solvency of that same monarchy, and which he ended up blaming for its waste, as it still does.

It is also true that there is no such thing as a socialist economy, but a state capitalism, as a corporate culture; which is the Leninist distortion of Marxism, facing its own failure to create an effective economic alternative. In this regard, Necker's trick was not precisely this apparent productivity, but the budget against debt; but what is at issue is the technocratic character of these tricks, reducing intelligence to sleight of hand.

Neoliberalism was thus the last bourgeois offensive, but a bourgeoisie already weakened in its lack of character; that committed it to the technocracy of modern politicians, too mediocre to be effective in their intellectualism. In reality, neoliberalism would have been the alternative to socialism, in the face of the inevitable death of Soviet communism; appropriating the technocratic structure of political corporatism, with the inefficiency of classical empires; from the moral rhetoric of meritocracy, as false as it was authoritarian, but as irrational as the feudal aristocracy never was.

So neoliberalism was so weakened that no one noticed its death, under the siege of surreptitious socialism; so weak that it cannot fail to lead to anarchy, paradoxically from a classical conservatism, not real liberalism. That makes sense, as an effort to preserve political resources, after the cultural debacle of rationalism; which is anthropological, pushing the whole of Western civilization into the abyss, with that blind faith in platonic elitism.

 

About the issue of Afro-Hispanic review dedicated to Georgina Herrera

Almost four years after her death, The Afro-Hispanic Review dedicates a thematic issue to Georgina Herrera; and the delay may — but is not known — due to the tense negotiation over its questionable legitimacy. The number was planned at the very moment of his death, and I was invited to participate by Juana María Cordones, who was a guest editor; but which I conditioned on the exclusion of Roberto Zurbano —for reasons that everyone should know—, to which she refused.

Neither the reluctance of the invitation nor the refusal are important, because they are banal and subjective; but the appearance of this number points to an appeasement, even more offensive than the original offense. I did not condition my participation on Zurbano's exclusion out of arrogance, but because of his disrespect and opportunism; and the fact that they excluded him without renewing my invitation, speaks of that arrogance and opportunism on themselves, and of cowardice and weakness.

It is not a struggle between two mediocrities, but about Georgina Herrera's ascendance in her motherhood; usurped —or pretended— by Zurbano in his manipulations, on the negrerismo of the North American universities. Put like this, they could even made him the guest editor, since the offense is even greater, if Herrera's son is excluded; it does not matter the reason, beyond the irresponsible hypocrisy with which her motherhood is spoken of and praised.

Right here Zurbano is mentioned, as the origin of the outrage to Georgina Herrera, so it is clear that it is about dignity; something that has been unknown to that magazine, with that arrogance of French aristocrats at the end of the eighteenth century. That explains the naturalness, with which they spend public money on patting each other, while they continue to exploit blacks; ignoring in this also the dignity of those who do not need them, because they do not live on another people's money.

They had alternatives for this number, which at least would have saved their face, in a situation that deserved care; even if they had had to take the fief from the white master, and there is no black person —from Vanderbilt to Puerto Rico— who dares to do so much. That, even more than the personal, is what hurts about this slamming door, as a weakness of a race incapable of dignifying itself; in proof that nothing has changed, but only that they have increased the payroll of foremen and butlers.

In fact, and as is typical of racial behavior, this number does not even do justice to Georgina Herrera; because it ignores its importance, more axial than anecdotal, in the determination of the black cosmos in Cuba. That, which occurs in the intense power of her poetry, is mostly manipulated as a poetics of resistance; that hides in it the existential scope, with which it reorganizes the Cuban ethos, in its true dimension.

Too many important people have collaborated in that number, and no one knows the conditions or why they did it; the good will of some is enough not to go around offending them all, in what would be an act of unforgivable vanity. However, to those who do know that they acted with duplicity and cowardice, it only remains to lament the poverty and pettiness; if they are so transcendentalists, they should know that this is what will remain of them, the arrogance and ignorance they exhibit.

Nor should nobody exhaust the limits of love, no matter how immense, because it always dries up in the inconsistency; and that would be irreparable, after having grown only from faith and the memory of a distant past. It is not strange that this is done by Cuban cultural institutionalism, to which this thoughtless arrogance is natural; but it is sad that American universities —which use public money— accompanied them like this, into the abyss of that vulgarity.