Kobena Mercer
Curriculum Vitae
Born in 1960
Education
1990-84
Ph.D, Sociology, University of London Goldsmiths' College
1981-78
BA (Hons), Fine Art, St Martins School of Art, London (2:1)
1978-77
Foundation Course, Plymouth College of Art and Design
1977-74
Tamar Secondary School, Devonport, Plymouth 1973-71 St Johns School, Sekondi-Takoradi, Ghana
Employment
2002-00
Research Associate, Visual Culture, Middlesex University
1999-96
Visiting Professor, Africana Studies, New York University
1996-94
Independent writer and lecturer, London
1994-93
Director, Center for the Study of Cultural Diversity,
California Institute of the Arts, Los Angeles
1993
Visiting Professor, Art History, University of California Los Angeles
1993-90
Assistant Professor, Art History/History of Consciousness
University of California, Santa Cruz
1990-88
Research Projects Officer, British Film Institute, London
1988-87
Part-time Lecturer, Communications MA, Goldsmiths' College
Photography BA, London College of Printing
Cultural Studies BA, North East London Polytechnic
1987-85
Lecturer, Centre for Caribbean Studies, Goldsmiths' College
1984
Part-time lecturer, University of London Extra-Mural Education
1984-83
Community worker, London Borough of Lewisham
1983-82
Sabarr Bookshop, Brixton
Fellowships
2001-1999
Senior Fellow, Vera List Center for Art and Politics,
New School University, New York
2000-1999
Fellow, Society for the Humanities, Cornell University
1992-1993
Fellow, Humanities Research Institute, University of California, Irvine
Fall and Winter Quarters
Books and Monographs
James VanDerZee (monograph) 55 series, Phaidon*
Isaac Julien (monograph) Ellipsis/Film and Video Umbrella, London, 2001*
Keith Piper: Relocating the Remains (artists monograph and CD-Rom)
Institute of International Visual Arts, London, 1997
Welcome to the Jungle: New Positions in Black Cultural Studies, Routledge: New York and London, 1994
Edited Books and Journals
Black Film/British Cinema, ICA Documents n7, Institute of Contemporary
Arts: London, 1988
Screen, Vol 29 n 4, Autumn 1988, co-edited with Isaac Julien
Articles in Journals, Books and Exhibition Catalogues
"documenta 11" frieze n69 September 2002*
"Romare Bearden: African American Modernism at Mid-Century,' in Art History, Aesthetics, Visual Studies ed Michael Ann Holly, Clark Art Institute: Williamstown, Yale University Press, 2002*
"African Photography and Contemporary Visual Culture," Camera Austria n 75, October 2001*
"Art and the Experience of African Cities," in Africas: A Journey and an Exhibition
ed. Pep Subiros, Centre du Cultura Contemporania/Actar: Barcelona, 2001
"Post-Colonial Flaneur: Ike Ude," Camera Austria n 72, February 2001
"In Circulation: Contemporary Writing on African Photography" Writing on Photography (and the Real), ed. John Leslie, Manchester Metropolitan University and LightHouse Media Center: Wolverhampton 2000
"A Sociography of Diaspora," in Without Guarantees: Essays for
Stuart Hall eds. Paul Gilroy, Lawrence Grossberg and Angela
McRobbie, Verso: London 2000
"Ethnicity and Internationality: New British Art and Diaspora-based
Blackness" Third Text n49, Winter 1999-Spring 2000
"Ike Ude: A Dandy in the Naked City" exhibition catalogue ed. Mark
Bessiere, Beyond Decorum: The Photography of Ike Ude, Maine
Institute of Contemporary Art/MIT, 2000
"Decentering and Recentering: Adrian Piper's Spheres of Influence," Adrian Piper, 1969-1999, exhibition catalogue ed. Maurice Berger, Fine Art Museum, University of Maryland: Baltimore, 1999
"African Photography" Encarta Africana (encyclopedia and CD-Rom) eds. Kwame Anthony Appiah and Henry Louis Gates Jr, Microsoft: Seattle,1999
"Inter-Mezzo Worlds," Art Journal V57 n4, Winter 1998 College Art Association: New York
"Mortal Coil: Eros and Diaspora in the Photographs of Rotimi Fani- Kayode" OverExposed: Essays on Contemporary Photography ed. Carol Squires, New Press: New York, 1999
"Thinking Through Homophobia in Black Skin, White Masks" Blackness and the Mind/Body Split ed. Lindon Barrett, Duke University Press, NC (forthcoming)
"Back to My Routes: A Footnote from the Nineties," in Bernice Murphy
ed Pictura Britannica, exhibition catalogue, Musuem of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 1998
"Video Art as a Practice of Hybridization," Marcel Odenbach, exhibition catalogue,ed. Dan Cameron, New Musuem of Contemporary Art, New York, 1998
"Dick and Jane: Allan D'Souza" in Fresh Talk/Daring Gazes: Asian
American Issues in Contemporary Art, eds. Elaine Kim and
Margo Machida, University of California Press: Berkeley (forthcoming)
"Salem Mekuria: Interview," Artist & Influence V XVI, eds. Camille
Billops and James Hatch, Hatch-Billops Collections Inc, New York
1998
"Interculturality is Ordinary," New Connections: Inter-cultural Arts Education and Municipal Policy, ed. Ria Lavriksjen, Tropen Musuem, Amsterdam 1998
"Bodies of Diaspora, Vessels of Desire: The Erotic and the Aesthetic," Transforming the Crown: African, Caribbean and Asian Artists In Britain exhibition catalogue, Caribbean Cultural Centre, New York/University of Chicago 1998
"Eros and Diaspora: The Photographic World of Rotimi Fani-Kayode," Rotimi Fani-Kayode and Alex Hirst: Photographs, Editions Revue Noire, Paris, 1997
"Decolonisation and Disappointment: Reading Fanon's Sexual Politics," The Fact of Blackness: Frantz Fanon and Visual Representation, ed. Alan Read, Institute of Contemporary Arts, London & Bay Press, Seattle, 1996
"To Unbury the Disremembered Past: Keith Piper," New Histories, exhibition catalogue, ed. Milena Kalinovska, Institute of Contemporary Arts, Boston, 1996
"Maroonage of the Wandering Eye: Keith Piper," Portfolio, n48
Portfolio Gallery, Edinburgh, 1996
"Imagine all the People: Constructing Community Culturally," Imagined Communities, exhibition catalogue, ed. Richard Hylton,South Bank Centre National Touring Exhibitions, London 1996
"Art of Africa: africa95," Artists Newsletter, December, 1995
"Art That is Ethnic in Inverted Commas: Yinka Shonibare," frieze n25
November-December, 1995
"Home from Home: Portraits from Places In Between," Self-Evident, exhibition catalogue, ed. Elizabeth McGregor, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, 1995
"Busy in the Ruins of Wretched Phantasia," Mirage: Enigmas of Race, Difference and Desire, exhibition catalogue, ed. David A Bailey, Institute of Contemporary Art & Institute of International Visual Art, London, 1995
"Talking Hybridity," interview with Mark Sealy, Creative Camera, n32
February/March, 1995
"Black Is ... Black Ain't: Tribute to Marlon Riggs," Sight & Sound, August-September, 1994
"The Camera as Kinky Machine," exhibition catalogue, Ajamu: Black Bodyscapes, ed. David A Bailey, Camerawork, London, 1994
"Fear of a Black Penis," Artforum International, V XXXII n 5, April 1994
"Reading Racial Fetishism: The Photographs of Robert Mapplethorpe", in
Fetishism as Cultural Discourse, eds. Emily Apter and William Pietz, Cornell University Press: New York, 1993
"Engendered Species: Danny Tisdale and Keith Piper," Artforum International, V XXX n 10, Summer 1992
"The Fragile Inheritors," Inheritance exhibition catalogue, ed. Roberto Bedoya, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles, 1992
"1968: Periodizing Postmodern Politics and Identity", in Cultural Studies, Lawrence Grossberg, Cary Nelson and Paula Treichler eds., Routledge, New York and London, 1992
"Skin Head Sex Thing: Racial Difference and the Homoerotic Imaginary", in How Do I Look?, eds. Bad Object Choices, Bay Press, Seattle, 1992
"Back to My Routes: A postcript to the 80s", Ten.8, Vol 2 n 3, Critical Decade: Black British Photography in the 80s, eds. Stuart Hall and David A Bailey, 1992
"Dark & Lovely: Notes on Black Gay Image-making", Ten-8, Vol 2 n1, 1991
"Black Art and the Burden of Representation", Third Text, n 10, Spring 1990
"Travelling Theory: The Cultural Politics of Race and Representation", (interview) Afterimage, Vol 18 n 2, September 1990
"Welcome to the Jungle: Identity and Diversity in Postmodern Politics", Identity: Culture, Community, Difference, ed. Jonathan Rutherford, Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1990
"Race, Sexual Politics and Black Masculinity: A Dossier" (with Isaac Julien), Male Order: Unwrapping Masculinity, eds. Rowena Chapman and Jonathan Rutherford, Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1988
"Diaspora Culture and the Dialogic Imagination: The Aesthetics of Black Independent Film in Britain", in Mbye Cham and Claire Watkins eds, BlackFrames: Critical Perspectives on Black Independent Cinema, MIT: Cambridge, MA, 1988
"Sexual Identities: Questions of Difference", introduction, Undercut, n17, Spring 1988
"Black Hair/Style Politics", New Formations, n3, Winter 1987
"Imaging the Black Man's Sex", in Pat Holland, Simon Watney and Jo Spence eds. Photography/Politics:Two, Comedia, London, 1986
"True Confessions: A Discourse on images of Black Male Sexuality", (with Isaac Julien), Ten-8, n22, 1986
"Monster Metaphors: Notes on Michael Jackson's Thriller", Screen, Vol 26 n1, Spring 1986
"Racism and Transcultural Psychiatry", in Nikolas Rose and Peter Miller eds. The Power of Psychiatry, Polity, Oxford, 1986
"Psychiatry and the Corporate State" (with Black Health Workers and Patients Group), Race and Class, Vol XXV n2, Autumn 1983
"Black People, Culture and Resistance" (with Errol Francis), Camerawork n 9, November 1982
Reprints
"True Confessions," and "De Margin and De Centre," (with Isaac Julien) in Amanda Cruz ed. The Film Art of Isaac Julien, Bard College, Center for Curatorial Studies, New York, 2000
"Reading Racial Fetishism: The Photographs of Robert Mapplethorpe," in Stuart Hall and Jessica Evans ed. Visual Culture: The Reader, Sage, London, 1999
"Eros and Diaspora" reprinted in Olu Oguibe and Okwui Enwezor eds.
Reading the Contemporary: African Art from Theory to the Marketplace, Institute of International Visual Arts/MIT, London and Cambridge, 1999
"Skin Head Sex Thing: Racial Difference and the Homoerotic Imaginary" reprinted in Brian Wallis, Marianne Weems and Phillip Yenwine eds. Art Matters: How the Culture Wars Changed America, New York University Press, New York, 1999
"Busy in the Ruins of Wretched Phantasia," reprinted in Anthony Alessandrini ed. Frantz Fanon: Critical Perspectives, Routledge: London and New York, 1999
"Imagine All the People: Constructing Community Culturally" reprinted in Alistair Raphael ed., Annotations 1, Institute of International Visual Arts: London, 1997
"Identity and Diversity in Postmodern Politics," reprinted in John Solomos ed. Race and Racism: A Reader, Routledge, London and New York, 1999
"De Margin and De Centre" (with Isaac Julien), reprinted in Houston A Baker, Manthia Diawara and Ruth Lineborg, eds., Black British Cultural Studies, University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1996; in David Morely and Kuan Chen Hsing eds., Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies, Routledge, New York and London, 1996; in James Proctor ed. Writing Black Britain, Manchester University Press, Manchester 1999
"Monster Metaphors", reprinted in Christine Gledhill ed.,Stardom: Industry of Desire, Routledge: London and New York, 1991; and in Angela McRobbie ed, Zoot Suits and Second-Hand Dresses: An Anthology of Music and Fashion, Macmillan: London, 1989; in Julia Thomas ed. Reading Images [Readers in Cultural Criticism], Palgrave, London, 2000
"Dark and Lovely", reprinted in Martha Gever, John Greyson and Pratibha Parmar eds, Queer Looks: Perspectives on Lesbian and Gay Film and Video, Routledge: London and New York, 1993
"True Confessions", reprinted in Essex Hemphill ed, Brother to Brother: New Writings by Black Gay Men, Alyson: Mass., 1991; and in Thelma Golden, ed, Black Male: Representations of Masculinity in Contemporary American Art, Abrams/Whitney Musuem: New York, 1994.
"Black Hair/Style Politics", reprinted in Martha Gever, Trin T Minh-ha and Cornel West eds. Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Cultures, MIT: Cambridge MA, 1990; in Erica Carter, James Donald and Judith Squires eds., Cultural Remix: Theories of Politics and the Popular, Lawrence and Wishart: London, 1995; and in Ken Gelder and Sarah Thornton eds. The Subcultures Reader, Routledge: New York and London, 1997; in Kwesi Owusi ed. Black Britain: A Cultural Reader, Routledge, London and New York, 2000
"Diaspora Culture and the Dialogic Imagination", reprinted in Manuel Alvarado ed, The Media Reader, British Film Institute: London, 1990
"Recoding Narratives of Race and Nation," reprinted in Peter Brooker and Will Brooker eds. Postmodern After-Images: A Reader in Film, Television and Video, Edward Arnold: London, 1998
"Looking for Trouble", reprinted in Mary McIntosh and Lynne Segal eds. Sex Exposed: Sexuality and the Pornography Debates Virago: London, 1992; in Anne Gray and Jim McGuigan (eds.), Studying Cultures Edward Arnold, London,1993; in Henry Abelove, Aina Barale andDavid Halperin eds. The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader,Routledge, London and New York, 1993; in Drucilla Cornell ed., Feminism and Pornography [Oxford Readings in Feminism] Oxford University Press, New York, 2000
"Looking for Trouble" translated into Japanese, Outright: revue de la pensee d'aujourdoui, n10, Seido Sha:Tokyo, 1998
"Mortal Coil" translated into Japanese OverExposed: Essays on Contemporary Photography, Tankosha/Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography: Tokyo, 2001
"Reading Racial Fetishism," translated into Swedish Den masculina mystiken: Konst, kon och modernitet, ed. Anna Lena Lindberg Studentlitteratur, Lind: 2002
Book, Exhibition, and Conference Reviews
Hew Locke, Cardboard Palace, frieze n70 October 2002 *
Whitfield Lovell: Recent Tableaux, frieze n59 May 2001
Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America, DPICT inc Creative Camera n4 Oct-Nov 2000
L'Afrique par elle-meme: La Photographie Africain de 1840 a nos jours, frieze n43 November-December 1998
"Mapplethorpe: A Biography" by Patricia Morrisroe, frieze n25 November-December, 1995
"Looking for Trouble" [review of Robert Mapplethorpe], Transition, n51 Oxford University Press: New York, Spring 1991
Dick Hebdige, Cut and Mix: Caribbean Culture and Identity, New Society April, 1987
"Third Cinema at Edinburgh", Screen, Vol 26 n5, Autumn 1986 Teun Van Dijk, 'Communicating Racism', Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol 11 n2, Spring 1986
Frank Reeves, 'British Racial Discourse', Theory, Culture and Society, Vol 3 n1, Autumn 1986
Conference Papers
Art History and Identity, Getty Research Institute, June 2001
Shades of Black: Afro-Asian Artists in Britain, Duke University, April 2001
Art History, Aesthetics, Visual Studies, Clark Art Institute, May 2001
Art History and Identity, Clark Art Institute/Getty Institute, November 2000
Surviving the Photograph, Princeton University, October 2000
Evaluating Today's Art Photography, New York University, December 1999
Race & Beauty, Afro-American Studies, Princeton University, December 1999
Making the Spirit of 20th and 21st Century Culture: Placing Black Popular Culture and Performance, Stanford University, October 1999
Afro-Futurism Forum, Downtown Arts Festival, New York University, September 1999
Hair Daze: The Cultural Politics of Black Hair, Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol October 1998
Performing Nations, Institute of International Visual Arts, London, October 1998
Stuart Hall Conference, Open University, Milton Keynes, May 1998
Rhapsodies in Black: Harlem Renaissance, Corcoran Gallery, Washington DC, April 1998
Queer Globalization, Centre for Lesbian and Gay Studies, City University of New York Graduate Center, April 1998
Keynote, The Aesthetic and the World, Centre for Critical Analysis of Contemporary Culture, Rutgers University, December 1997
Trade Routes: Conference of the 2nd Johannesburg Biennale, Johannesburg, October 1997
Keynote, New Connections: Cultural Policy and Arts Education, Tropen Museum, Amsterdam, February 1997
The English Institute, Public Fantasy, Harvard University, October 1996
Keynote, Communication Studies Association of Australia and New Zealand, Brisbane, July 1996
Cartographies of Diaspora, Yale University, April 1996
Blackness and the Mind/Body Split, UC Irvine, October 1995
Respondent, Africa and the History of Cinematic Ideas, National Film Theatre, London, September 1995
Curating Across Cultures, Bellagio Study Centre, Rockerfeller Foundation, Italy, May 1995
Working With Fanon: Contemporary Practice and Critical Reflection ICA London, May 1995
Black Nations/Queer Nations?, Centre for Lesbian and Gay Studies, City University of New York, March 1995
Keynote, Critical Practices, Middlesex University, October 1994
Twilight of Physiognomy? Modernism, Photography and the Body UCLA, May 1991
Race to the Screen, Euclid Arts Centre, Toronto, February 1991
Unravelling Masculinities, UC Davis, February 1991
Transcultural Icons and Diaspora Aesthetics, panel, College Art Association 82nd Annual Conference, Washington DC, Feb 1991
Robert Mapplethorpe: A Symposium, Institute of Contemporary Arts, Boston, September 1990
Identity: Culture, Community, Difference, Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, July 1990
Gender and Global Change, University of Pittsburg, June 1990
Cultural Studies: Now and in the Future, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champagne, April 1990
Public Lectures
Black Atlantic Spaces, Kustfurschulemedien, Cologne, January 2002
Black Atlantic Spaces, Barnard College, New York, May 2001
Black Atlantic Spaces, Slade School of Fine Art, London, April 2001
In Conversation with Steve McQueen, ICA London, October 2000
Debating Diaspora, with Michele Wallace and Nicholas Mirzoeff, Vera List Center for Art and Politics, New School University, New York, October 2000
Performing Difference: On Adrian Piper, Mount St Vincent University, Nova Scotia, July 2000
Whatever Happened to Hybridity? with Kellie Jones, Dan Cameron, and Jan Nederveen Pieterse, Vera List Center for Art and Politics, New School University, New York, April 2000
New British Art and Diaspora-Based Blackness,University of Delaware, November 1999
Hybridity: In and Out of the Fashion Cycle, Handwerker Gallery/Art History, Ithaca College, September 1999
Visual Studies in Diaspora, Getty Summer Institute in Visual and Cultural Studies, University of Rochester, July 1998
Keith Piper's Digital Diaspora, Distinguished Lecture Series, Art History Duke University, February 1997
Migrations of Desire: Black Gay and Lesbian Diasporas, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, July 1996
Bodies in the Black Cube: Steve McQueen, Video Art and Cultural Practice Seminars, Art History, Harvard University, April 1996
Theorising Homophobia in Fanon's Black Skin, White Masks, York University, Toronto, November 1995
Welcome to the Jungle, Photographer's Gallery, London, October 1994
In Conversation, with Stan Douglas, ICA London, September 1994
Multiculture and the Public Sphere, Vancouver Art Gallery and Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, May 1991
Professional Associations
Editorial board member, Screen, Society for Education in Film and Television, London, 1986 - 1990
Editorial board member, New Formations: A Journal of Culture/ Theory/Politics, Lawrence & Wishart: London, 1988 - 1998
Editorial board member, Black Renaissance/Renascence Noir, Africana Studies New York University/University of Indiana Press, 1997 ongoing.
Consultative or Other Service
Readers report, Different, Phaidon May 2001
Advisory Committee, Changing Visions of the American Self, International Center of Photography, New York, September 2000
Readers report, Visual Culture:The Reader, Sage Publications, July 1999
Readers report, Open University MA Cultural Studies Readers, Sage Publications, London, July 1998
Readers report, Roger Silverstone et al, "Hybridization: A Reader" Sage Publications, London, October 1997
Readers report, Gender, Place and Culture: A Journal of Feminist Geography, March 1997
Interviewee, "The Homecoming: A Short Film about Ajamu," dir. Topher Campbell, Arts Council of England, April, 1994
Readers report, May Joseph, "Black British Film and Theatre," Minnesota University Press, March, 1994
Nominator, Film and Video Arts Nomination Panel, Rockerfeller Foundation, New York, July 1992
Interviewee, "I Want Your Sex: European Myths of Black Sexuality", dir. Yaba Badoe, Fulcrum/Channel 4, July 1991
Interviewee, "Black and White in Colour: Black People and British Television: Part I & II" dir. Isaac Julien, British Film Institute/ British Broadcasting Corporation, July, 1991
Readers report, "Richard Wright Memorial Lectures", Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Duke University, January, 1991
Readers report, Trin T Minh-ha film scripts, Indiana University Press, February 1991
Readers report, "James Snead Film Writings", Routledge, New York, December, 1990
Consultant and interviewer, "Black Art and the Burden Representation: Parts I & II", dir. Ann Diak, Open University/British Broadcasting Corporation. June, 1990
Interviewee, "Black Memorabilia", dir. Karen Alexander, The Late Show, British Broadcasting Corporation, May, 1990