What are the politics of conversion? What is the currency that manifests with this transmutation? What does it look like? What is the buying power of this new form of currency? Is it an individual or a collective resource?
The politics of conversion, as detailed by West, is a “turning of the soul, which is done through affirmation of ones worth —an affirmation fueled by the concern of others. A love ethic must be at the center of the politics of conversion. The best exemplar of this love ethic is depicted on a number of levels in Toni Morrisons’ great novel Beloved."
West posits that self love and love of others are both modes towards increasing self valuation and encouraging political resistance in ones community.
- As an extension, I would like to posit that political resistance in any substantial aspect is not mindless civil disobedience. It is as Mouser introduces, “to ocularize, or render spectacularly visible, some purported injustice (Mouser, 2024).”
"The modes of valuation and resistance are noted in subversive memory —the best of ones path without romantic nostalgia —and guided by the universal love ethic."
- The love ethic and the reconstituted narrative that introduces a new lexicon to aptly describe, articulate the Black experience outside of the confines of the limited language of Eurocentric ideology. One that speaks more accurately to the metaphilosophical dynamics of the native soul after mental decolonization.
Wests’ purpose in using Beloved was to demonstrate its ability “to be construed as bringing together the loving yet critical affirmation of Black humanity found in the best Black nationalist movement, the perennial hope against hope for transracial coalition in progressive movements, and the painful struggle for self affirming sanity in a history in which the nihilistic threat seems insurmountable.”
-Yogabrofessor
Montmarquet, J. A., & Hardy, W. H. (2000). Reflections An Anthology of African American Philosophy. http://ci.nii.ac.jp/ncid/BA65356223
Mouser, R. (2024). How to read a riot. Journal of Ethics & Social Philosophy, 26(3). https://doi.org/10.26556/jesp.v26i3.2316
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