Jesse Havinga

Édouard Glissant argues that writing occurs ‘in the presence of all the languages of the world,’ in which languages resonate through echoes, opaque residues, and silences, allowing literature to register the world’s relational complexity. Yet his thought remains grounded in Martinique and the Antillean archipelago, a ‘laboratory’ whose interruptions, passages, and entanglements exemplify his ‘pensée archipélique’: the local place in direct relation to the unfinished complexity of the Tout-monde. Against the historical background of a 17th-century plantation society marked by the slave trade and its aftermath, this framework challenges philosophies of fixed identity and treats fragmentation and uncertainty as constitutive, increasingly resonant with contemporary human conditions. This special issue aims to demonstrate the relevance of Glissant for European philosophy by tracing how insights arise from situated, incomplete and shifting perspectives that move from place (lieu) to connection (lien). The four contributions to this special issue explore different dimensions of Édouard Glissant’s thought and poetics. Martijn Boven examines Glissant’s poetics of mutual opacity as an alternative to traditional hermeneutics focused on forced transparency, illustrating this through William Faulkner’s ambiguous work. Divya Nadkarni analyzes the sea in Glissant’s thinking as a paradoxical archive (fluid, fragmented, and resistant to conventional historiography) and connects this to Glissant’s concept of non-history, critiquing contemporary oceanic logistics as a continuation of imperialist violence concealed by opacity. Birgit Kaiser and Tom van Bunnik offer an ecocritical reading of Glissant’s poetry, showing how the geography of Martinique shapes the lyrical subject and emphasizing that Glissant’s rootedness in place transcends local limitations, resonating globally. Jesse Havinga engages Glissant in dialogue with psychoanalyst Tobie Nathan, comparing their shared focus on ‘dwelling’ (errance) as a form of resistance and highlighting Nathan’s concept of ‘ain’, which underscores the cultural ties endangered by forced migration.

This article explores the concept of ‘wandering’ (errance) in the works of Édouard Glissant and Tobie Nathan, focusing on its philosophical, poetic, and political dimensions. Using Glissant’s encounter with a silent, wandering man on a Martinique beach as a starting point, the essay examines the dual nature of wandering as both a disoriented, lost state and a deliberate, exploratory journey toward new identities and relationships. Glissant’s notion of wandering resists fixed, territorial identities imposed by colonial legacies, emphasizing relational being and dynamic return via detours rather than direct routes. In contrast, Nathan investigates the vulnerable ‘wandering souls’ of marginalized youth in France, whose loss of cultural belonging risks slipping into aimless wandering, often linked to radicalization. Both authors highlight the importance of enabling wandering as a form of resistance and identity formation, rather than enforcing static identities. The article situates wandering as a critical response to disorientation caused by forced migration, colonial history, and cultural alienation, advocating for a ‘wandering thought’ that embraces uncertainty and relationality as paths toward new forms of belonging and autonomy.