John Drabinski
Professor in African American and Africana Studies with a joint appointment in English at the University of Maryland and author of So Unimaginable a Price: Baldwin and the Black Atlantic (Northwestern UP, 2025), speaking about Baldwin and Black Atlantic thought.
Top 3 podcasts with John Drabinski
Ranked by the Snipd community
Feb 18, 2026 • 59min
John Drabinski, "So Unimaginable a Price: Baldwin and the Black Atlantic" (Northwestern UP, 2025)
John Drabinski, a professor of African American and Africana Studies and English, reads James Baldwin as a philosophical thinker. He situates Baldwin within mid-20th century Black Atlantic debates. Short, sharp topics include Baldwin’s focus on the auction block and spirituals, his images of African, white, and Negro, comparisons with Fanon, Black English as a lived world, and the idea of interstitial home life.
Feb 18, 2026 • 59min
John Drabinski, "So Unimaginable a Price: Baldwin and the Black Atlantic" (Northwestern UP, 2025)
John Drabinski, Professor of African American and Africana Studies and English at the University of Maryland, reads Baldwin philosophically. He situates Baldwin in the mid-20th-century Black Atlantic and probes what Baldwin leaves out. Topics include Baldwin’s origin narratives, images of race, Black English as world-making language, and Baldwin’s distinctive optimism versus Afro-pessimism.
Feb 18, 2026 • 59min
John Drabinski, "So Unimaginable a Price: Baldwin and the Black Atlantic" (Northwestern UP, 2025)
John Drabinski, professor of African American and Africana Studies and English, discusses reading James Baldwin as a philosophical thinker. He situates Baldwin within the midcentury Black Atlantic and probes absences in Baldwin’s nonfiction. Topics include Baldwin’s origin narratives, his images of identity, Black English as world-making, alternatives to Afro-pessimism, and Baldwin versus Fanon on culture and shame.
