Theorizing a Black Imperative for Human Flourishing: A Typology of Attention (ToA)

There is general agreement that systemic racism and entrenched discriminatory policies impede African American progress. The potent emphasis on racism receives a staggering amount of attention in Black culture, with social media, businesses, organizations, politics, and universities weighing in. While claims of racism are not contested herewith, this essay argues that the chromosomal imprinting mechanism of the racist trope, via repetition, is a specie of existential usurpation, which disrupts the intellectual, human, cultural, and economic capital of Black Americans, away from other issues of equally compelling significance. Existential usurpation reigns through magnification and monopolization. This essay argues further, that if Black Americans are to succeed in a highly technologized world, other keen issues also need tending. Employing facts, statistics, and Adinkra symbols used by the Akan people of Ghana, it offers a Typology of Attention (ToA) (nine key explanatory variables) to explicate issues that should guide us to sustained Black progress—human flourishing—in the twenty-first century.