Cosmopolitan Vision of Home, Subjectivity 33Nonetheless, Phillips succeeds in conveying the vulnerability
of the character. Indeed, we come to see his political myopia and
self-righteousness as tragic flaws that serve to highlight the hope-
lessness of the character’s situation. For all his ridiculous delusions,
Williams’s characteristics and life choices are clearly tied to the socio-
political situation peculiar to his historical moment. Now nothing
more than a fringe movement, far removed from mainstream poli-
tics, Black Nationalism achieved a considerable level of popularity
among African Americans in the 1960s and 1970s.^22 The ideas of
Malcolm X, the Black Panthers, and others, of promoting a politi-
cal force in the United States to empower African Americans, were
widespread and gaining significant support among the black popula-
tion.^23 These developments were, of course, symptomatic of the dis-
criminatory and segregationist policies that existed in the country at
the time, with blacks being excluded from the political process and
denied equal access to education and employment opportunities—a
situation not unlike Apartheid in South Africa.
Appreciating this historical context thus helps us understand,
although not necessarily excuse, Williams’s anger and political
extremism. Indeed, one could argue that each of the characters in
Higher Ground is similarly a victim of the repressive historical cir-
cumstances in which they find themselves. Williams is a man phys-
ically confined within the iron bars of an American prison system
that disproportionately incarcerates African American criminals (he
was effectively handed a life sentence for committing armed rob-
bery). But he is also confined by his own deluded political ideals.
The challenge Phillips therefore appears to be laying down for us is
to try to empathize with the man who is caught up in such a situa-
tion. This is not only a task that demands that the reader recognize
the strong connections between historical circumstance and subjec-
tivity, but also one that encourages us to look toward a common
humanity—to see at once the effects of history and to look beyond
it so as to cultivate a critical cosmopolitan vision of the individual
struggling beneath.
This analysis appears to share some parallels with the argument put
forward by Bewes about the important role shame plays in Phillips’s
work. For Bewes, Phillips prompts us somewhat paradoxically to