On (Racial) Fetishism: Hegel and Marx

Rocío Zambrana writes about the epistemic and historical-material bases of capitalist modernity and its racial/gender order, especially from decolonial thought and praxis, particularly in the context of financial capitalism in the Caribbean. She is currently writing a book entitled Metamorphosis of Value: Epistemic Protocols in the Long Durée, which traces the emergence of figures of speculation (economic/racial) endemic to capitalism through a consideration of the trade-plantation complex in early modern Caribbean. She is also working on a collection of essays on Hegel, race, and modernity. Zambrana teaches philosophy at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras. She co-edited Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy (2018-2024) and has been a columnist for 80grados. She co-edits the forthcoming series Constelaciones de filosofía feminista (Herder). Zambrana is the author of Hegel’s Theory of Intelligibility (University of Chicago Press, 2015), and Colonial Debts: The Case of Puerto Rico (Duke University Press, 2021). Deudas coloniales: el caso de Puerto Rico, Roque Salas Rivera’s translation of Colonial Debts, was published by Editora Educación Emergente in 2022. Zambrana received her Ph.D. in philosophy from the New School for Social Research in 2010, and was faculty in philosophy at the University of Oregon (2010-19) and at Emory (2019-23) before joining Philosophy at UPRRP in 2023.

Cosponsored by the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, Department of Philosophy, Effron Center for the Study of America, and Program in Latin American Studies.

Image credit: Detail of painting by Jacob Lawrence. Although the Negro was used to lynching, he found this an opportune time for him to leave where one had occurred. 1940-41. Casein tempera on hardboard. 18 x 12.” MoMa, Gift of Mrs. David M. Levy.