Documentary screening: C.L.R. James (Fri 3 March 2017)

The Centre for American Studies warmly invites you to a screening and discussion of a new documentary film about C. L. R. James: Every Cook Can Govern: The Life, Impact and Work of C. L. R. James.

The screening takes place on Friday, 3rd March from 1-4pm in Grimond Building, Lecture Theatre 3, University of Kent, Canterbury Campus. The film is approximately 2 hours long, and will be followed by a discussion with an invited speaker, Dr Nicole King (Reading University, author of CLR James and Creolization: Circles of Influence).

All are welcome at this free event. Watch the official documentary trailer to find out more.

The film: The ideas and works of Trinidad-born Marxist revolutionary and writer C.L.R. James come to life as exclusive never-before-seen footage of the man himself is interwoven with testimony from those who knew him along with leading scholars providing astute contextual and political analysis of his life and works. The result is a historical tour-de-force which grapples with James’ thoughts on culture, cricket and society and above all his politics, in particular his outspoken opposition to: colonialism, abolitionist myths, the Second World War and Stalinism and his belief in the capacity of us all to change the world.

Nicole King: Nicole King is a Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Reading and a leading expert on the work of C. L. R. James. She is the author of CLR James and Creolization: Circles of Influence (University of Mississippi Press, 2001), a study that calls attention to James’ internationalism as an articulation of creolization in multiple registers-spatial, temporal and cultural. She has also published research articles and book chapters on authors and topics such as Zadie Smith, Ida B. Wells, Earl Lovelace, gender, migration, identity and pedagogy. Her current research examines representations of American blackness.