Abstract

I use Heidegger’s Being and Time to understand and critique racial discourse, but to also determine Heidegger’s reach into issues like racial identity. I start by examining how his introductory statements in Being and Time on the term “existentiell” suggest a path towards a conception of identity. I then go into how a racial identity could, through his terminology, be conceived as what I call a “fear existentiell.” I demonstrate how society assists the individual in maintaining a racialized existence that is embedded in fear. I move toward an examination of Heidegger’s three concepts of death to demonstrate how two of these death concepts are often attached to a racial identity through racial discourse. I move into a discussion that relies on W.E.B. Du Bois’s conception of the black American as a problem for America and, using his seminal question, “How does it feel to be a problem?” I show that the individual’s existence, as discussed in Heidegger, becomes a problem for itself through the racial discourse about its identity. I call this “Being-a-problem.” At first, I discuss it as inauthentic, as it is driven by social fear and generalized discussions about racial identity; however, I later demonstrate how it can move from inauthentic Being-a-problem to authentic Being-a-problem. I end with an analysis of racial discourse, showing that it exemplifies what I call, “race reports,” which are comprised of reports about the individual’s racial identity that conceal a person’s potential for authenticity.