A Du Boisian Theory of Memory: Truth‐Telling Legacies of Du Bois's <i>Black Reconstruction</i> as Decolonized Theory, Method, and Praxis

ABSTRACT In Black Reconstruction (1935), Du Bois developed a framework conceptualizing collective memory as a political project of knowledge construction where revisionist history served as the political propaganda of the colonizer. The mechanisms of historical distortion have long been built into our colonial epistemological fabric, reproduced through academic knowledge production. To examine these dynamics and their legacies today, this paper shows how Du Bois's Black Reconstruction provides a framework for both studying and challenging the politics of revisionist memory through three interconnected domains: theory, method, and praxis. The Du Boisian theory of memory shows that truth‐telling not only helps us better reexamine the contingencies that lead to collective memory in the present. Truth‐telling is a guiding force shaping the creative ways we collectively imagine and embark on the future.