ACADEMIC RACISM AND FORMATION OF SOCIAL SCIENCES IN AMERICA: W.E.B. DU BOIS AND THE INTERSECTIONALITY BETWEEN SCIENCE AND POLITICS

Abstract

The main objective of the article is to introduce the sociological thinking of W.E.B. Du Bois at the intersection between scientific elaboration and political activity, delineating his contribution to the history of the constitution of social sciences in a non-exhaustive way. In doing so it introduces the author to a Portuguese-speaking audience, especially the Brazilian, who has been deprived of the potent reflection and theoretical influence of one of the most widely read authors today, in particular, for his intentional exclusion from the so-called canon of sociology. One of the thesis around its exclusion is that the contribution of Du Bois' work would in fact represent a historical alternative that was partially “disregarded” for its racial belonging. The moments the text covers   understand Du Bois concept of “race” as a social construction in the beginning of the 20th century, his reading of the consequences of the dominance of the West over the Asian and African continent and the reconfiguration of the social world after the Second War. We conclude that Du Bois' thinking is present in all these historical contexts, pointing to the limits of sociology, proposing advancement and innovations. His thinking is directly related to the elaboration of an interpretation of the African and black experience in a transnational and diasporic perspective that began with his decisive participation in the proposition of the Pan-African congresses.