PROUD FLESH Inter/Views: Sylvia Wynter

Abstract

Welcome to the house of Sylvia Wynter. For this interview conversation, she received us physically and intellectually at her new home somewhere in Oakland, California. Was it this visit or another when we were met with the most amazing meal--to eat--as well as a monumental plate of ideas? It was a few moons ago but you’d never know. This talk was so fully, so completely engaging that it seemed like only a few minutes had passed by once we were done for the day, a perception which this record of it clearly belies. She covers so much material with each answer to each question prepared, often in advance of the asking. She strains to have us meet the call of her words with a response of understanding (“You see?” “You understand what I’m saying?” “The point that I’m trying to make is . . .”). She thinks and urges us to think and re-think as if our very lives depend on it--because they do!