Open Casket: Philosophical Meditations on the Lynching of Emmett Till

Open Casket brings political and philosophical clarity to bear on the brutal murder of Emmitt Till and his mother's decision to show the world her son's body.

The open casket is a central motif, a political and ethical focal point, for thinking about Mamie Till-Mobley's pain and suffering and her profound act of truth-telling as she wanted the world to bear witness to the gratuitous, despicable, and atrocious dimensions of anti-Blackness. The critical and powerful essays within this book capture both the horror of Emmett Till's murder/lynching and the powerful agency and the indomitable Black maternal love and courage that Mamie Till-Mobley demonstrated. Through the open casket, Mamie Till-Mobley reclaimed her son's body, and re-signified his dignity and familial-relational meaning to white America, Black America, and the world. It was her agency-in spite of the horror of his disfigured body and the unbearable affective weight that she experienced by such a site/sight-that forced white America to witness the terror of anti-Blackness, to tarry with its own egregious systemic racism.

In solemn recognition of the 70th anniversary of Till's murder, George Yancy and A. Todd Franklin gather interdisciplinary voices to articulate the political, spiritual, and existential significance of Black hope in the face of seeming hopelessness.