“The Focus on Black People Really Helps”

In this episode, the Centre Directors Rahel Jaeggi and Robin Celikates speak with this year’s Benjamin Chair, Tommie Shelby, about his beginnings as a philosopher, his particular approach to philosophy, Marxism, the Black Radical Tradition, about solidarity and his plans for the Benjamin Lectures on „The Polictical Ethics of the Oppressed“. Tommie Shelby is Lee Simpkins Family Professor of Arts and Sciences and the Caldwell Titcomb Professor in the Department of African and African American Studies and the Department of Philosophy at Harvard University. Tommie Shelby holds the Benjamin Chair 2025 at the Centre for Social Critique. Shelby will deliver the Walter Benjamin Lectures entitled “Political Ethics of the Oppressed – On Freedom, Solidarity, and Self-Respect” at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW) on the 18th, 19th and 20th of June 2025. With special thanks to: Isette Schuhmacher (Co-Moderation, Editorial Processing) und Marvin Ester (Mixing, Audio-Editing, Cut).