On Profiling: A Humanist Interpretation of the “Fixing” of Black Bodies

Abstract

In this chapter, I provide another example of how humanist principles serve to frame a hermenuetic, a way of interpreting and reading texts and events.² I believe this exercise, begun in chapter five, is significant in that it provides a sense of an important dimension of humanism’ s function within African American communities. As opposed to simply thinking in terms of institutions and practices, this chapter, along with chapters five and seven, demonstrate that African Americans exercise humanist principles, as Black Christians use Christianity, also in the way they think about and interpret the world.

This essay was presented as part of the Humanist Institute, 2002.