Book launch and panel discussion of The Dialectic Is in the Sea

Beatriz Nascimento (1942–1995) was a poet, historian, artist, and political leader in Brazil’s Black movement, an innovative and creative thinker whose work offers a radical reimagining of gender, space, politics, and spirituality around the Atlantic and across the Black diaspora. The Dialectic Is in the Sea is the first English-language collection of writings by this important figure in the global tradition of Black radical thought.

The book traces the development of Nascimento’s thought across the decades of her activism and writing, covering topics such as the Black woman, race and Brazilian society, Black freedom, and Black aesthetics and spirituality. Introductory essays provide key insights into the political and historical context of Nascimento’s work. We will hear from the co-editors and translators, Christen Smith, Archie Davies, and Beatriz Nascimento's daughter, Bethânia Gomes. Hosted by Elizabeth Cooper, they will be in conversation with Lola Olufemi and Pat Noxolo, who will respond to the book.

Christen Smith is Director for the Center for Women’s and Gender Studies, Associate Professor of African and African Diaspora Studies and Anthropology at the University of Texas in Austin. She is one of the co-editors and co-translators of The Dialectic is in the Sea. Christen Smith researches engendered anti-Black state violence and Black community responses to it in Brazil, as well as Black feminism across the Americas. Her work primarily focuses on transnational anti-Black police violence, Black liberation struggles, the paradox of Black citizenship in the Americas, and the dialectic between the enjoyment of Black culture and the killing of Black people. She is author of Afro-Paradise: Blackness, Violence and Performance in Brazil (Illinois, 2016) and editor, with Lorraine Leu, of Black Feminist Constellations: Dialogue and Translation across the Americas, published by University of Texas Press in 2023.

Archie Davies is a Lecturer in Geography and Fellow of the Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences at Queen Mary University of London. He is one of the co-editors and co-translators of The Dialectic is in the Sea. He is a cultural and historical geographer working across political ecology and the history and philosophy of geography. His research addresses food, hunger, nature, race, and embodiment. His book Josué de Castro and the History of Geography was published by Liverpool University Press in 2022 and his  translation of Milton Santos' For a New Geography was published by the University of Minnesota Press in 2021.

Bethânia Gomes is Beatriz Nascimento's daughter, and one of the co-editors and co-translators of The Dialectic is in the Sea. She was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and pursued a career in classical ballet. In 1992, she joined The Dance Theater of Harlem Company and rose to the rank of principal dancer. She is a teacher, coach, choreographer and co-founder and coordinator of the Brazil Residency along with Robert Garland for The Dance Theatre of Harlem School. Bethania recently published her first children’s book Betha a bailarina pretinha, an autobiographical story about her life as a classical ballerina.

Pat Noxolo is an award-winning researcher and teacher, whose work brings together the study of international development, culture and in/security, and uses postcolonial, discursive and literary approaches to explore the spatialities of a range of Caribbean and British cultural practices. She has been lead researcher on the Caribbean In/securities and Creativity (CARISCC) research network, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, and on the Creative Approaches to Race and In/security, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

Lola Olufemi is a black feminist writer and researcher from London. She is co-author of 'A FLY Girl's Guide to University' (Verve Poetry Press, 2019), author of 'Feminism Interrupted: Disrupting Power' (Pluto Press, 2020) and 'Experiments in Imagining Otherwise' (Hajar Press, 2021). She is a member of 'bare minimum', an interdisciplinary anti-work arts collective and the recipient of the 2020 Techne AHRC Doctoral Training Partnership between The Stuart Hall Foundation, CREAM and Westminster School of Arts. Her work focuses on the uses of the imagination in revolutionary cultural production; its relationship to futurity, political demands and 'imaginative-revolutionary potential'. Her short story, "Red" was shortlisted for the 2020 Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing prize. She tweets at @lolaolufemi_ and is represented by Emma Paterson at Aitken Alexander Associates. Alongside writing, she facilitates reading groups and workshops, occasionally curates and is volunteer co-ordinator at the Feminist Library.