Cornel West

**Cornel Ronald West** (born June 2, 1953) is an American philosopher, author, critic, actor, and civil rights activist. He is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America. West is the Class of 1943 University Professor at Princeton University. He teaches in the Center for African American Studies and in the Department of Religion. West is known for his combination of political and moral insight and criticism and his contribution to the post-1960s civil rights movement. Much of West's work focuses on the role of  race, gender, and class in American society and the means by which people act and react to their "radical conditionedness". West draws on such diverse traditions as the African American Baptist Church, pragmatism and transcendentalism.

In June 2023, West announced his candidacy for President of the United States in the 2024 election. He ran for the Green Party nomination until switching to an Independent bid.

## Early life

West was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and grew up in Sacramento, California, where his father was a general contractor for the Defense Department and his mother was a teacher and a principal. Irene B. West Elementary School, Elk Grove, California, is named for her. While West was a student, he marched in civil rights demonstrations. As the class president in his high school, West organized protests demanding black studies courses. He later wrote that, in his youth, he admired "the sincere black militancy of Malcolm X, the defiant rage of the Black Panther Party [...] and the livid black theology of James Cone." In 1970, West graduated from John F. Kennedy High School. He enrolled at Harvard University and took classes from philosophers Robert Nozick and Stanley Cavell. In 1973, he graduated _magna cum laude_ in Near Eastern Languages and Civilization.  "Owing to my family, church, and the black social movements of the 1960s", he says, "I arrived at Harvard unashamed of my African, Christian, and militant de-colonized outlooks. More pointedly, I acknowledged and accented the empowerment of my black styles, mannerisms, and viewpoints, my Christian values of service, love, humility, and struggle, and my anti-colonial sense of self-determination for oppressed people and nations around the world."

### Ph.D and other degrees

In 1980, he earned a Ph.D. from Princeton, where he was influenced by Richard Rorty's pragmatism. The title of his dissertation was _Ethics, historicism and the Marxist tradition_, which was later revised and published under the title _The Ethical Dimensions of Marxist Thought_.

In his mid-20s, he returned to Harvard as a W. E. B. Du Bois Fellow before becoming an Assistant Professor at Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York.  In 1985, he worked at Yale Divinity School in what eventually became a joint appointment in American Studies. While at Yale, he participated in campus protests for a clerical labor union and divestment from apartheid South Africa. He was arrested and jailed at one of the protests. As punishment, the University  cancelled his leave for Spring 1987, leading him to commute from Yale in New Haven, Connecticut, where he was teaching two classes, across the Atlantic Ocean to the University of Paris.

He then returned to Union and taught at Haverford College in Pennsylvania for one year before going to Princeton to become a Professor of Religion and Director of the Program in African-American Studies (1988–94). He worked with novelist Toni Morrison to improve the Princeton program.

In 1994, West accepted an appointment as Professor of African-American Studies at Harvard University, with a joint appointment at the Harvard Divinity School.  West taught one of the University's most popular courses, an introductory class on African-American Studies.  In 1998, he was appointed the first Alphonse Fletcher University Professor.  This professorship allowed West to teach both African-American studies and Divinity, Religion, and Philosophy.

In 2001, after an argument with Harvard President Lawrence Summers, West returned to Princeton, where he has taught ever since.

The recipient of more than 20 honorary degrees and an American Book Award, he is a long-time member of the Democratic Socialists of America, for which he now serves as Honorary Chair. He is also a co-chair of the Tikkun Community and the Network of Spiritual Progressives.  West is on the Board of Directors of the International Bridges to Justice, among others. West is also much sought-after as a speaker, blurb-writer, and Honorary Chair.

Critics, most notably _The New Republic_ Literary Editor Leon Wieseltier, have charged him with opportunism, crass showmanship, and lack of scholarly seriousness.

West remains a widely cited scholar in the popular press in African-American Studies and Studies of Black Theology.

West is a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity. He is a member of the fraternity's World Policy Council, a think tank whose purpose is to expand Alpha Phi Alpha's involvement in politics and social and current policy to encompass international concerns.

### Entertainment career

West appears in both _The Matrix Reloaded_ and _The Matrix Revolutions_,  playing Councilor West, who serves on the council of Zion. West's character advises that "comprehension is not a requisite of cooperation."  In addition, West provides philosophical commentary on all three Matrix films in The Ultimate Matrix Collection, along with integral theorist Ken Wilber.

Cornel West has also made several appearances in documentary films, such as the 2008 film _Examined Life_, a documentary featuring several academics discussing philosophy in real-world contexts. West, "driving through Manhattan, . . . compares philosophy to jazz and blues, reminding us how intense and invigorating a life of the mind can be."
He also appears in conversation with Bill Withers in the Bill Withers documentary, _Still Bill_. West also makes frequent appearances on the political talk show _Real Time with Bill Maher_.

On the musical front, West recorded a recitation of John Mellencamp's song "Jim Crow" for inclusion on the singer's box set _On the Rural Route 7609_ in 2009. In 2010, he completed recording with the Cornel West Theory, a Hip Hop band endorsed by West. He has also released two hip-hop/soul/spoken word albums, one under "Cornel West" (entitled Street Knowledge), the other under "Cornel West & B.M.W.M.B." (entitled Never Forget: A Journey of Revelations). Both works are musical expressions of West's personal politics and beliefs from his previous written works.

## Dispute with Lawrence Summers

In 2000, economist and former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers became president of Harvard. In a private meeting with West, Summers allegedly said West was missing too many classes, contributing to grade inflation, neglecting serious scholarship, and spending too much time on his economically profitable projects.  Some people say that Summers suggested that West produce an academic book (work that is typical of senior Harvard professors). West had written several books, some of them widely cited, but his recent output was primarily  co-written and edited volumes. Summers also objected to West's production of a CD, the critically panned _Sketches of My Culture_, and to his political campaigning. According to West's book _Democracy Matters,_ Summers wrongly accused him of canceling classes for three straight weeks during 2000 to promote Bill Bradley's presidential campaign. West contends that he had missed one class during his tenure at Harvard "in order to give a keynote address at a Harvard-sponsored conference on AIDS." Summers also allegedly suggested that since West held the rank of Harvard University Professor and thus reported directly to the President, he should meet with Summers regularly to discuss the progress of his academic production.

West contends that popular coverage of the controversy obscured the true issues at stake in his dispute with Summers.  West argues that Summers's vision of academia is against a deep democratic commitment that strives to connect with society at large.  He contends that the controversy with Summers shows that "a market-driven technocratic culture has infiltrated university life, with the narrow pursuit of academic trophies and the business of generating income from grants and business partnerships taking precedence over the fundamental responsibility of nurturing young minds."   According to West,  he was highly regarded in the academic community, "had more academic references than fourteen of the other seventeen Harvard University Professors", and "had nearly twice as many such references as Summers himself." At the time, West had been focused on reaching wider audiences as part of his effort to encourage civic engagement—especially amongst youth—in the hope of revitalizing what he calls a deep democratic commitment that would counteract the encroaching political nihilism that he argues threatens the future of American democracy.  While West does not deny the importance of academics engaging the more specialized concerns of their fields, he strongly opposes the sentiment that academia must limit itself to those  interests.  Academia and academics, he contends, have an important role to play in promoting public discourse that cannot be achieved if professors lock themselves in their ivory towers instead of engaging society-at-large and the salient issues of the day.  This was the root of the quarrel, according to West.

Summers refused to comment on the details of his conversation with West, except to express hope that West would remain at Harvard. Soon after, West was hospitalized for prostate cancer. West complained that Summers failed to send him get-well wishes until weeks after his surgery, whereas newly installed Princeton president Shirley Tilghman had contacted him frequently before and after his treatment. In 2002 West left Harvard University to return to Princeton. West lashed out at Summers in public interviews, calling him "the Ariel Sharon of higher education" on NPR's _Tavis Smiley Show_. In response to these remarks, five Princeton faculty members, led by professor of molecular biology Jacques Robert Fresco, said they looked with "strong disfavor upon his characterization" of Summers and that "such an analogy carries innuendoes and implications... that many on the Princeton faculty find highly inappropriate, indeed repugnant and intolerable."

Harvard University's undergraduate student newspaper, _The Harvard Crimson_, suggested in October 2002 that the premise of _Law and Order: Criminal Intent_ episode "Anti-Thesis" was based on West's conflicts with Summers.

## Dispute with President Barack Obama

West publicly supported 2008 Democratic Presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama.  He spoke to over 1,000 of his supporters at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, N.Y.C. on November 29, 2007.  However, West now calls Obama  a "black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet of corporate plutocrats." In an interview, West said:> As a young brother who grows up in a white context, brilliant African father, he's always had to fear being a white main with a black skin. All he has known culturally is white.His comments about President Obama have drawn criticism from other African-Americans, including Melissa Harris-Perry and Al Sharpton.

West criticized President Obama when Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, saying that it would be difficult for Obama to be "a war president with a peace prize".

### Views on race in America

West has called the U.S. a "racist patriarchal" nation where "white supremacy" continues to define everyday life. "White America," he writes, "has been historically weak-willed in ensuring racial justice and has continued to resist fully accepting the humanity of blacks." This has resulted, he claims, in the creation of many "degraded and oppressed people hungry for identity, meaning, and self-worth." Professor West attributes most of the black community's problems to "existential angst derive[d] from the lived experience of ontological wounds and emotional scars inflicted by white supremacist beliefs and images permeating U.S. society and culture."

In his view, the September 11, 2001 attacks gave white Americans a glimpse of what it means to be a black person in the United States—feeling "unsafe, unprotected, subject to random violence, and hatred" for who they are. "The ugly terrorist attacks on innocent civilians on 9/11," he said, "plunged the whole country into the blues."

### Politics

West has described himself as a "non-Marxist socialist" (partly due to Marx's opposition to religion) and serves as honorary chair of the Democratic Socialists of America, which he has described as "the first multiracial, socialist organization close enough to my politics that I could join". He also described himself as a "radical democrat, suspicious of all forms of authority" on the _Matrix_-themed documentary _The Burly Man Chronicles_ (Found in _The Ultimate Matrix Collection_).

West believes that "the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's ugly totalitarian regime was desirable," but that the war in Iraq was the result of "dishonest manipulation" on the part of the Bush administration. He asserts that Bush Administration hawks "are not simply conservative elites and right-wing ideologues", but rather are "evangelical nihilists — drunk with power and driven by grand delusions of American domination of the world". He adds, "We are experiencing the sad gangsterization of America, an unbridled grasp at power, wealth, and status." Viewing capitalism as the root cause West warns, "Free-market fundamentalism trivializes the concern for public interest. It puts fear and insecurity in the hearts of anxiety-ridden workers. It also makes money-driven, poll-obsessed elected officials deferential to corporate goals of profit — often at the cost of the common good."

West has been involved with such projects as the Million Man March and Russell Simmons's Hip-Hop Summit, and worked with such public figures as Louis Farrakhan and Al Sharpton, whose 2004 presidential campaign West advised.

In 2000, West worked as a senior advisor to Democratic presidential candidate Bill Bradley. When Bradley lost in the primaries, West became a prominent endorser of Ralph Nader. Some Greens sought to draft West to run as a presidential candidate in 2004.  West declined, citing his active participation in the Al Sharpton campaign. West, along with other prominent Nader 2000 supporters, signed the "Vote to Stop Bush" statement urging progressive voters in swing states to vote for John Kerry, despite strong disagreements with many of Kerry's policies.

In April 2002 West and Rabbi Michael Lerner performed an act of civil disobedience at the U.S. State Department "in solidarity with suffering Palestinian and Israeli brothers and sisters". West said, "We must keep in touch with the humanity of both sides." In May 2007 West joined a demonstration against "injustices faced by the Palestinian people resulting from the Israeli occupation" and "to bring attention to this 40 year travesty of justice".  In 2011, West called on the University of Arizona to divest from companies profiting from the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories.

West also serves as co-chair of the Tikkun Community. He co-chaired the National Parenting Organization's Task Force on Parent Empowerment and participated in President Clinton's National Conversation on Race. He has publicly endorsed _In These Times_ magazine by calling it: "The most creative and challenging news magazine of the American left". He is also a contributing editor for _Sojourners Magazine_.

West supports of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA.) in its Kentucky Fried Cruelty campaign, aimed at eliminating what PETA describes as KFC's inhumane treatment of chickens. West is quoted on PETA flyers: "Although most people don't know chickens as well as they know cats and dogs, chickens are interesting individuals with personalities and interests every bit as developed as the dogs and cats with whom many of us share our lives."

In 2008, West contributed his insights on the current global issue of modernized slavery and human trafficking in the rockumentary Call+Response.

West is a member of the Campaign for Peace and Democracy.

During the 2016 United States presidential election, West was a strong supporter and campaigned for Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. After Sanders lost the Democratic nomination, West supported Jill Stein of the Green Party.

## 2024 presidential election

In June 2023, West announced his candidacy for President of the United States in the 2024 presidential election. At first he said he was going to run for the People's Party, but then switched for the Green Party nomination.

On October 5, 2023 West announced that he was abandoning his candidacy for the Green nomination, and would instead continue his presidential bid as an independent candidate.

## Published works

- _Black Theology and Marxist Thought_ (1979)
- _Prophesy Deliverance! An Afro-American Revolutionary Christianity_ (1982)
- _Prophetic Fragments_ (1988)
- _The American Evasion of Philosophy: A Genealogy of Pragmatism_ (1989)
- _Breaking Bread: Insurgent Black Intellectual Life_ (with bell hooks, 1991)
- _The Ethical Dimensions of Marxist Thought_ (1991)
- _Beyond Eurocentrism and Multiculturalism_ (1993)
- _Race Matters_ (1993)
- _Keeping Faith: Philosophy and Race in America_ (1994)
- _Jews and Blacks: A Dialogue on Race, Religion, and Culture in America_ (with rabbi Michael Lerner, 1995)
- _The Future of the Race_ (with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., 1996)
- _Restoring Hope: Conversations on the Future of Black America_ (1997)
- _The War Against Parents: What We Can Do For America's Beleaguered Moms and Dads_ (with Sylvia Ann Hewlett, 1998)
- _The Future of American Progressivism_ (with Roberto Unger, 1998)
- _The African-American Century: How Black Americans Have Shaped Our Century_ (with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., 2000)
- _Cornel West: A Critical Reader_ (George Yancy, editor) (2001)
- _Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against Imperialism_ (2004)
- Commentary on _The Matrix_, _Matrix Reloaded_ and _Matrix Revolutions_; see _The Ultimate Matrix Collection_ (with Ken Wilber, 2004).
- _Post-Analytic Philosophy_, edited with John Rajchman.
- _Hope On a Tightrope: Words & Wisdom_ (2008).
- _Brother West: Living & Loving Out Loud_ (2009).
- _The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto_ (with Tavis Smiley, 2012).
- _Pro+Agonist: The Art of Opposition_ (2012)

## References

- "Cornel Ronald West". _Contemporary Black Biography_, Volume 33. Edited by Ashyia Henderson. Gale Group, 2002. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: The Gale Group. 2004. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/BioRC
- "Cornel West y la política de conversión". Thomas Ward. _Resistencia cultural: La nación en el ensayo de las Américas_. Lima, Universidad Ricardo Palma, 2004, págs. 344-348.
- Nishikawa, Kinohi. "Cornel West." _The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature_. Ed. Hans Ostrom and J. David Macey, Jr. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2005. 1714-18.

## Other websites

- An Interview with Cornel West
- Interview with Dr. Cornel West by JK Fowler on The Mantle March 18, 2011
- Faculty bio at Princeton Religion department
- Faculty bio at Princeton Center for African American Studies
- Interview with Cornel West  from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum
- CSPAN Booknotes The Cornel West Reader, 2/22/00
- "Cornel West Gives Black Scholars a Bad Rap" By John McWhorter
- Dr. Cornel West Releases Long-Awaited Memoir - video report by _Democracy Now!_
- Cornel West on Charles Rangel, Bush & Kanye West and Obama Admin

## Infobox (philosopher)

- **region**: Western Philosophers
- **era**: 21st-century philosophy
- **color**: #B0C4DE
- **image**: Cornel West by DW Nance 5 (cropped2).jpg
- **caption**: Cornel West in 2016
- **birth name**: Cornel Ronald West
- **birth place**: Tulsa, Oklahoma, United States, U.S.
- **school tradition**: Pragmatism, Existentialism, Africana Philosophy, Historicism
- **main interests**: Democracy, Race (classification of human beings), Race, Philosophy of religion, Ethics
- **influences**: Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, W. E. B. Du Bois, James Hal Cone, James Cone, Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Karl Kautsky, György Lukács, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Søren Kierkegaard, Arthur Schopenhauer, Herman Melville, Michel Foucault, Antonio Gramsci, Richard Rorty, William James, John Dewey
- **notable ideas**: Race Matters, Democracy Matters
- **alma mater**: Harvard University
Princeton University
Yale Divinity School