Pursuing Trayvon Martin : Historical Contexts and Contemporary Manifestations of Racial Dynamics

On February 26, 2012, 17-year-old African American male Trayvon Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old biracial (Caucasian and Peruvian) male in Sanford, Florida. Martin was shot and killed within a gated community, where he was visiting his father, Tracy Martin, and the latter s fiance. Martin, returning from a store where he had purchased a bag of Skittles and a bottle of Ice Tea, was unarmed. The encounter between Martin and Zimmerman proved fatal for Martin. As for Zimmerman, 45 days passed before he was charged with any crime. Pursuing Trayvon Martin: Historical Contexts and Contemporary Manifestations of Racial Dynamics attempts to capture what we, a critical cadre of scholars, think about this potentially volatile situation in the moment. The text addresses issues across various thematic domains, as we have delineated various concerns that are broad and yet relevant. Some of these themes include: how Trayvon Martin's killing might be depicted within the specifically historical context of racism, especially as some have compared Martin s situation to that of Emmett Till and Rodney King; how contemporary conceptions/perceptions and treatment of Black bodies and/or black embodiment from the historical perspective of white supremacy in the United States continue to function or not function in our contemporary moment; how we ought to think about the political and legal implications of the Trayvon Martin case within the context of the politics and laws that have historically informed and shaped black people's lives; how we should think critically about the historical exclusion of black bodies/embodiment in public space and the ramifications for the ways in which black people must navigate public space today; and, finally, how we should think about the ways in which the historical negative gendering of black girls and boys/black men and women, with respect to their white counterparts, in a white supremacist society, have impacted various intersections of race and gender in our contemporary setting. On February 26, 2012, 17-year-old African American male Trayvon Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old biracial (Caucasian and Peruvian) male in Sanford, Florida. Martin was shot and killed within a gated community, where he was visiting his father, Tracy Martin, and the latter's fiancé. Martin, returning from a store where he had purchased a bag of Skittles and a bottle of Ice Tea, was unarmed. The encounter between Martin and Zimmerman proved fatal for Martin. As for Zimmerman, 45 days passed before he was charged with any crime. Pursuing Trayvon Martin: Historical Contexts and Contemporary Manifestations of Racial Dynamics attempts to capture what we, a critical cadre of scholars, think about this potentially volatile situation in the moment. The text addresses issues across various thematic domains, as we have delineated various concerns that are broad and yet relevant. Some of these themes include: how Trayvon Martin's killing might be depicted within the specifically historical context of racism, especially as some have compared Martin's situation to that of Emmett Till and Rodney King; how contemporary conceptions/perceptions and treatment of Black bodies and/or black embodiment from the historical perspective of white supremacy in the United States continue to function or not function in our contemporary moment; how we ought to think about the political and legal implications of the Trayvon Martin case within the context of the politics and laws that have historically informed and shaped black people's lives; how we should think critically about the historical exclusion of black bodies/embodiment in public space and the ramifications for the ways in which black people must navigate public space today; and, finally, how we should think about the ways in which the historical negative gendering of black girls and boys/black men and women, with respect to their white counterparts, in a white supremacist society, have impacted various intersections of race and gender in our contemporary setting About the Contributors Introduction Chapter 1: Now You See It, Now You Don’t: Magic Tricks of White Supremacy in the U.S. Chapter 2: Imagined Communities: Whitopia and the Trayvon Martin Tragedy Chapter 3: Indignity and Death: Philosophical Commentary on White Terror, Black Death and the Trayvon Martin Tragedy Chapter 4: No Bigots Required: What the Science of Racial Bias Reveals in the Wake of Travyon Martin Chapter 5: Two Forms of Transcendence: Justice and the Problem of Knowledge in the Trayvon Martin Case Chapter 6: The Irreplaceability of Continued Struggle Chapter 7: Dead Black Man, Just Walking Chapter 8: Distorted Vision and Deadly Speech: Enabling Racial Violence through Paradox and Script Chapter 9: “Seeing Black” through Michel Foucault’s Eyes: “Stand Your Ground” Laws as an Anchorage Point for State-Sponsored Racism Chapter 10: Should Black Kids Avoid Wearing Hoodies? Chapter 11: Can We Imagine This Happening to a White Boy?Chapter 12: A Mother’s Pain: The Toxicity of the Systemic Disease of Devaluation Transferred from the Black Mother to the Black Male Child Chapter 13: Social Presence, Visibility, and the Eye of the Beholder: A Phenomenology of Social Embodiment Chapter 14: Trayvon Martin, Racism, and the Dilemma of the African American Parent Chapter 15: Refusing Blackness-as-Victimization: Trayvon Martin and the Black Cyborgs Chapter 16: Politics, Moral Identity, and the Limits of White Silence Chapter 17: Trayvon Martin and the Tragedy of the New Jim Crow Chapter 18: “What Are You Doing Around Here?”:Trayvon Martin and the Logic of Black Guilt Chapter 19: Trayvon Martin: When Effortless Grace is Sacrificed on the Altar of the Image Coda: Through the eyes of a mother: Reflections on the rites of passage of black boyhood On February 26, 2012, seventeen-year-old African American male Trayvon Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, a twenty-eight-year-old white Hispanic American male in Sanford, Florida. Zimmerman killed Martin in a gated community. Pursuing Trayvon Martin: Historical Contexts and Contemporary Manifestations of Racial Dynamics, featuring a new preface by editors George Yancy and Janine Jones written after the June 2013 trial, examines the societal conditions that fueled the shooting and its ramifications for race relations and violence in America. Pursuing Trayvon Martin: Historical Contexts and Contemporary Manifestations of Racial Dynamics attempts to capture what a critical cadre of scholars think about this potentially volatile situation in the moment. The text addresses issues across various thematic domains that are both broad and relevant. Pursuing Trayvon Martin is an important read for scholars in the fields of philosophy, criminal justice, history, critical race theory, political science, critical philosophies of race, gender studies, sociology, rhetorical studies, and for anyone hungry for critical ways of thinking about the Trayvon Martin case.