Abstract

This paper explores the connection between Søren Kierkegaard’s concept of despair and W.E.B. Du Bois’ concept of double consciousness. The concepts have been separately argued to share a root in Hegel’s “Unhappy Consciousness,” and further, each notion in part explains the interaction of a person with their culture. The paper seeks to highlight the importance of culture in interpreting Kierkegaard’s despair, and to do so by including a critique via Du Bois that a person’s existence in a culture of oppression potentially impacts one’s relation to oneself, whether that person is the oppressor or the oppressed.