I chose to focus on chapter 19 due to its intriguing title, Conundrums of Solidarity. Anthanasiou poses the question, "How are we to struggle for a desire to
exist and to be free, when this desire is not exactly "ours," in fact
can never be exclusively ours". Today's current events such as the Ferguson, Israel & Palestine Conflicts, as well as other racial and gender biased incidents there is always a call for some form of solidarity with the victims. While at first glance solidarity is a noble and just cause, Anthanasiou implies that solidarity is an, "injurious yet enabling mode of concerted action in conditions of dispossession". She backs up her argument by citing the Israeli Palestine conflict. Anthanasiou looks at the many forms of solidarity among Palestinian locals, Palestinian Israelis, Israeli dissenters, and international activists. While these citizens have similar aims, they also seem to ignore or disregard the contributions of the Palestinian gay community. For example according to Butler, the
Palestinian queer community is against the Israeli occupation,in favor
of giving rights to expelled refugees, discontinuing land confiscation,
and compromising the rights of Palestinians who are partially recognized
as citizens of Israel. However, they are still not recognized alongside their peers in the struggle.
In essence the concept of solidarity is somewhat of a double edged sword. Anthansiou states, "Solidarity is unavoidably interwoven in the normative violence inherent in the ways we come to imagine and recognize a viable life in accordance with given prerequisites of intelligibility. At the same time, though, it somehow offers a space for exposing and perhaps exceeding such prescribed limits". This is an interesting dynamic in that solidarity offers a remedy to dispossession but also provides a foundation for its dis-possessive tendencies. Butler offers a solution to this problem. Solidarity is not simply about being equal or interdependent but it is about "expanding our affective alliances beyond claims of similitude and community".
I thought this article was especially relevant to current movement in the US today. For example although minorities still fight for equality within the United States gay minorities are often asked to stand in solidarity by the very people in these movements who at times seek to ostracize and leave them out.
Jeff,
ReplyDeleteI also enjoyed this chapter and it's discussion of solidarity. On what Butler says about a possible solution "expanding our affective alliances beyond claims of similitude and community" I think that what she means is that solidarity is more easily understood and easily enacted when what is focused on is not characteristics of similarity or difference, but affective understandings and goals. Struggle is an affective experience, and when those experiences are shared and understood as collective in this thing called "struggle" solidarity can become more comprehensive and expansive.