Of masks and veils: understanding raceclass subordination through Fanon and Du Bois

Frantz Fanon and W. E. B. Du Bois’s writings focus their analysis on the racial oppression that Black people experience in the United States and diaspora. Both thinkers were influenced by Marxism and they built their theories of race subordination in conversation with global systems like capitalism and colonialism. This article puts Fanon and Du Bois in conversation with one another, while highlighting their engagement with Marxism to interpret antiblack racism. The term “raceclass” (Leonardo, Z. 2012. “The Race for Class: Reflections on a Critical Raceclass Theory of Education.” Educational Studies 48 (5): 427–449.) captures the entanglement of these interlocking systems of oppression and the unique ways they impact Black communities, as interpreted through Fanon and Du Bois’s writing. This article highlights the specific impact of race and class relations on Black existence in order to explain their inseparability with respect to Black suffering and Black resistance to it.