Postcolonial Bergson

Henri Bergson has been the subject of keen interest within French philosophy ever since being championed by Gilles Deleuze and others. Yet his influence extends well beyond European philosophy, especially within Africa and South Asia. Postcolonial Bergson traces the influence of Bergsons thought through the work of two major figures in the postcolonial struggle, Muhammad Iqbal and Lopold Sdar Senghor. Poets and statesmen as well as philosophers, both of these thinkersthe one Muslim and the other Catholicplayed an essential political and intellectual role in the independence of their respective countries. Both found, in Bergsons work, important support for their philosophical, cultural, and political projects. For Iqbal, a founding father of independent Pakistan, Bergsons conceptions of time and creative evolution resonated with the need for the reconstruction of religious thought in Islam, a religious thought newly able to incorporate innovation and change. For Senghor, Bergsonian ideas of perception, intuition, and lan vitalfiltered in part through the work of the French philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardinproved crucial for thinking about African art, as well as foundational for his formulations of African socialism and his visions of an unalienated African future. At a moment of renewed interest in Bergsons philosophy, this book, by a major figure in both French and African philosophy, gives an expanded idea of the political ramifications of Bergsons thought in a postcolonial context.