What Would Mills' New Philosophy Look Like?

I have been wondering for a while about how Mills' theory (at least what theory we have been shown) would be manifested in reality. That is, what the new line of philosophical thought, with race issue at its core, would look like. I'm reminded of a course on Ethics that I took last semester with Professor Shade, in which we studied the standard forms of ethical thought across history (Aristotle through Kant, Hegel, and Mill) but ended with an entirely different type of work, a study of Nel Noddings' "care ethics." Noddings wrote ethical theory that stood out as incredibly different from everything else we had studied up to that point, because it was in line with theory being developed by staunch feminists who had placed "gender" at a focal point in the foundation of their theory and taken off form there- just as Mills states is necessary for a rebirth of the philosophy of race.

So, if female philosophers in the 1970's and 80's focused on "caring" as the basis for their ethical theory, what would black philosophers create, as an ethical system, and how would it differ from those of our famed white philosophers (and now, our feminist ones as well)? As perhaps the least qualified person to make predictions on this topic, I will now try to do just that, briefly.

One topic that would seem to be a likely focus in the *New Racial Philosophy* is Faith. While there has been much philosophical thought about religion over the course of history, "Faith Ethics" would have stood out in the same way as "Care Ethics" in Professor Shade's class. That is, at the halfway point of my time at Rhodes as a Philosophy major, the faith/religious theory that stands out most belongs to Descartes, and surely-as Dr. J pointed out in class- the comfortable, white, warmed-by-the-fire Descartes would raise different questions and answers about faith than a black philosopher might. Faith could be a trope of this new philosophy, for it has strong links to many types of situations, historically, that could shape the questions being asked and answered by black philosophers. In the Bible, the story of Job is pointed to as an explanation for why faith needs to be tested, and how testing one's faith brings out the true nature of their subjective faith, as well as faith as a whole. When looking at two groups of people, one historically the persecutors and one the persecuted, it is obvious which one would have a higher investment in (and, subsequently, the more robust account of) faith.

Another possible philosophical, but perhaps not strictly ethics-focused, topic towards which black philosophers could gravitate and provide a unique account on, is Power. Again, that group that has historically not had "the power," might be more inclined to study the nature of that particular human element. These are just a few of my thoughts on the subject, I would be welcome to any criticism or addition to these hypotheses. Hopefully I have not gone too far- obviously great generalizations have been made in this blog post- in attempting to visualize a new race philosophy from the black perspective.