Uploaded April 2025 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
In an interview of 1958, Paul Robeson suggested that the fusion of class and ethnic identities in his thought was a result of his experiences in Wales: “[T]oday I feel as much at home in the Welsh valley[s] as I would in my own Negro section in any city in the United States. I just did a broadcast by transatlantic cable to the Welsh valley[s], a few weeks ago, and here was the first understanding that the struggle of the Negro people, or of any people, cannot be by itself – that is, the human struggle…That defines my philosophy. It’s a joining one. We are a working people, a laboring people – the Negro people.” This passage is striking due to the apparent tension between the declaration of ethnic particularity – ‘the Negro people’ – and an internationalist, universalist commitment to ‘the human struggle’. My paper will consider Wales a space where the tensions between universalist internationalism and ethnic particularism in Robeson’s thought were played out, both during his life and posthumously.
In an interview of 1958, Paul Robeson suggested that the fusion of class and ethnic identities in his thought was a result of his experiences in Wales: “[T]oday I feel as much at home in the Welsh valley[s] as I would in my own Negro section in any city in the United States. I just did a broadcast by transatlantic cable to the Welsh valley[s], a few weeks ago, and here was the first understanding that the struggle of the Negro people, or of any people, cannot be by itself – that is, the human struggle…That defines my philosophy. It’s a joining one. We are a working people, a laboring people – the Negro people.” This passage is striking due to the apparent tension between the declaration of ethnic particularity – ‘the Negro people’ – and an internationalist, universalist commitment to ‘the human struggle’. My paper will consider Wales a space where the tensions between universalist internationalism and ethnic particularism in Robeson’s thought were played out, both during his life and posthumously.
