How a “blues epistemology” can establish the critical historical consciousness crucial for determining more just futures in the Anthropocene.

A Blues Epistemology for the Anthropocene?

In this reflection on experiences in Natchez, Mississippi, Jason Ludwig, whose research explores racial capitalism and environmental injustice, describes how the town’s Black history—for so long suppressed in favor of an antebellum heritage tourism economy—has been asserted through the efforts of local activists. It is only through paying attention to these histories, he argues, that the intersecting Anthropocenic relations of extraction, enslavement, and inequality are revealed. Ludwig puts forward what writer Clyde Woods termed a “blues epistemology,” as a means of establishing the critical historical consciousness crucial for determining more just futures in the Anthropocene.