Monster in the Archive

“Monster in the Archive” asks what the presence of a figure with a massive archival presence like James Baldwin does to our understanding of the presumed “absence” or “lack” of Black subjects in American archives. Paying careful attention to Michel Foucault’s observations about archives in “Lives of Infamous Men” as well as Baldwin’s correspondence with his friend, Mary Painter, this article argues that Baldwin’s “exceptionality” forces scholars and archivists to treat his archival presence as monstrous. Moreover, it argues that we need to develop new methods to approach Black archives. Again, following Foucault, the article proposes that we imagine approaching archives through the lens of friendship suggested by Foucault shortly before his death.