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BIOGRAPHY Martinique and World War II Fanon was born on the , then the most prestigious high school in Martinique, where famed poet Aimé Césaire was Frantz Fanon's teacher. After France fell to the Nazis in 1940, Vichy French naval troops were blockaded on Martinique. Forced to remain on the island, French soldiers became "authentic racists". Many accusations of harassment and sexual misconduct arose. The abuse of the Martiniquan people by the French Army was a major influence on Fanon, as it reinforced his feelings of alienation and his disgust at the realities of colonial Racism . At the age of eighteen, Fanon fled the island as a "dissident" (the coined word for French West Indians joining the Gaullist forces) and traveled to then British Dominica to join the Free French Forces . He later enlisted in the French army and saw service in France , notably in the battles of Alsace . In 1944 he was wounded at Colmar and received the '' Croix De Guerre '' medal. When the Nazis were defeated and Allied forces crossed the Rhine into Germany , along with photo journalists, Fanon's regiment was "bleached" of all non-white soldiers and Fanon and his fellow black soldiers were sent to Toulon instead. In 1945 Fanon returned to Martinique. His return lasted only a short time. While there, he worked for the parliamentary campaign of his friend and mentor Aimé Césaire , who would be the greatest influence in his life. Although Fanon never professed to be a Communist , Césaire ran on the communist ticket as a parliamentary delegate from Martinique to the first National Assembly of the Fourth Republic . Fanon stayed long enough to complete his Baccalaureate and then went to France where he studied Medicine and Psychiatry . He was educated in Lyon where he studied literature, drama and philosophy, sometimes attending Merleau-Ponty 's lectures. After qualifying as a Psychiatrist in 1951 , Fanon did a residency in psychiatry under the radical Catalan psychiatrist Francois Tosquelles , who invigorated Fanon's thinking by emphasizing the important yet often overlooked role of culture in psychopathology. After his residency, Fanon practiced psychiatry in France for another year and then (from 1953) in Algeria . He was ''chef de service'' at the Blida-Joinville Psychiatric Hospital in Algeria, where he stayed until his resignation in 1956 . In retrospect one might wonder why Fanon spent over 10 years in the service of France, but his servitude to France's army (and his experiences in Martinique) fueled ''Black Skin, White Masks''. For Fanon, being colonized by a language had larger implications for one's Political Consciousness : "To speak . . . means above all to assume a culture, to support the weight of a civilization" (BSWM 17-18). Speaking French means that one accepts, or is coerced into accepting, the collective consciousness of the French. France While in France, Fanon wrote his first book, '' Black Skin, White Masks '', an analysis of the effect of colonial subjugation on the human psyche. This book was a personal account of Fanon’s experience of being a black man, an intellectual with a French education rejected in France by the French because of his skin color. Algeria Fanon left France for Algeria, where he had been stationed for some time during the war. He secured an appointment as a psychiatrist at Blida-Joinville Psychiatric Hospital. It was there that he radicalized methods of treatment. In particular, he began socio-therapy which connected with his patients' cultural backgrounds. He also trained nurses and interns. Following the outbreak of the Algerian Revolution in November 1954 he joined the FLN liberation front ( Front De Libération Nationale ) as a result of contacts with Dr Chaulet. In '' The Wretched Of The Earth '' (''Les damnés de la terre''), Fanon later discussed in depth the effects on Algerians of Torture By The French Forces . His book was then Censored by France. Fanon made extensive trips across Algeria, mainly in the Kabyle region, to study the cultural/psychological life of Algerians. His lost study of "The marabout of Si Slimane" is an example. These trips were also a means for clandestine activities, notably in his visits to the ski resort of Chrea which hid an FLN base. By summer 1956 he wrote his famous "Letter of resignation to the Resident Minister" and made a clean break with his French Assimilation ist upbringing and education. He was expelled from Algeria in January 1957 and the "nest of Fellagha s {Link without Title} " at Blida hospital was dismantled. Fanon left for France and subsequently traveled secretly to Tunis . He was part of the editorial collective of ''El Moudjahid'' for which he wrote to the end of his life. He also served as Ambassador to Ghana for the Provisional Algerian Government ( GPRA ) and attended conferences in Accra , Conakry , Addis Ababa , Leopoldville , Cairo and Tripoli . Many of his shorter writings from this period were collected posthumously in the book '' Toward The African Revolution ''. In this book Fanon reveals himself as a war strategist; in one chapter he discusses how to open a southern front to the war and how to run the supply lines. Death On his return to Tunis, after his exhausting trip across the . WORK Although Fanon wrote '' and has a preface by Jean-Paul Sartre .1 In it Fanon analyzes the role of class, Race , national culture and violence in the struggle for national liberation. Both books established Fanon in the eyes of much of the Third World as the leading anti-colonial thinker of the 20th century. Fanon's three books were supplemented by numerous psychiatry articles as well as radical critiques of French colonialism in journals like, ''Esprit'' and ''El Moudjahid''. The reception of his work has been affected by English translations which are recognized to contain numerous omissions and errors, while his unpublished work, including his doctoral thesis, has received little attention. As a result, Fanon has often been portrayed as an advocate of violence. In the original French, it is clear this is not the case. Furthermore, his work is interdisciplinary, spanning psychiatric concerns to encompass politics, sociology, anthropology, linguistics and literature. His participation in the Algerian FLN ( Front De Libération Nationale ) from 1955 determined his audience as the Algerian colonized. It was to them that his final work, ''Les damnés de la terre'' (translated into English by Constance Farrington as The Wretched Of The Earth ) was directed. It constitutes a warning to the oppressed of the dangers they face in the whirlwind of decolonization and the transition to a neo-colonialist/globalized world. INFLUENCES Much of Fanon's writings is traced to the influence of Aimé Césaire . But, while it could be said that Fanon's works are directly influenced by the Négritude movement, Fanon reformulated the theory of Césaire and Léopold Senghor by positing a new theory of consciousness. Négritude implicitly based consciousness in racial difference and tension. Fanon's psychological training and experience influenced him to base much of the problems he saw as psychological and as the product of the domination which arises in oppressive colonial situations. That is, consciousness was not of "racial essence" but a fact arising from political and social situations. Fanon's consciousness was not purely black, but extended to colonized peoples of any racial category. Fanon's own explanation of the difference between his theory and that of Blaise Diagne , Senghor and Césaire was based in an evolutionary model where the colonized ideologies transition from assimiliationist, négritude, and finally Fanon's own theory.Lambert (1993), page 258 INFLUENCE Fanon has had an inspiring impact on anti-colonial and liberation movements. In particular, ''Les damnés de la terre'' was a major influence on the work of revolutionary leaders such as , the Tamil s, the Irish , African American s and others. More recently, the South African movement Abahlali BaseMjondolo is influenced by Fanon's work. REFERENCES IN THE ARTS Fanon has become a hero to many people, both as a theorist influenced by Négritude and as an advocate of resistance and revolution, especially with relation to violence in revolution. Often, his mention is more as a symbol that the artist is familiar with the works of classic writers in the struggle against colonialism. Music Rage Against The Machine references Fanon, "grip tha cannon like Fanon and pass tha shell to my classmate" in a track entitled "Year of tha Boomerang" on their 1996 release '' Evil Empire ''. The Wretched of the Earth appears on the inside of the album cover. This use of Fanon in the context of an advocate of violent insurrection can be compared to the use by Rage Against the Machine lead singer, Zack De La Rocha , a track recorded with artists Last Emperor and KRS-One called "C.I.A. (Criminals In Action)." The lyric is: "I bring the sun at red dawn upon the thoughts of Frantz Fanon, So stand at attention devil dirge, You'll never survive choosing sides against the Wretched of the Earth." Here, de la Rocha uses Fanon's name to invoke a sense of power, through being more than a mere anti-authoritarian resistor, but as one who is well educated and is descendant of a great resistor of the past. A similar case of Fanon's name being used to give to artist's revolutionary cause a sense of timeless authority is by Digable Planets . Digable Planets refer to Fanon in their rap-jazz cut "Little Renee" from the Coneheads motion picture soundtrack. Contemporary Art Jimmie Durham , an American Indian conceptual artist, references Fanon's postcolonial thought in a piece entitled "Often Durham Employs..." (1998), with this quote from Fanon- "The zone where the natives live is not complementary to the zone inhabited by the settlers." Cinema British film maker Isaac Julien made a 1995 film mixing interviews of Fanon's relatives and friends with fictionalized incidents of his life. BIBLIOGRAPHY Fanon's writings
Books on Fanon
Films on Fanon
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