Identity politics deployed by lesbian feminists of color challenges the philosophy of the subject and white feminisms based on sisterhood, and in so doing opens a space where feminist coalition building is possible. I articulate connections between Gloria Anzaldúa's epistemological-political action tools of complex identity narration and mestiza form of intersubject, Nancy Hartsock's feminist materialist standpoint, and Seyla Benhabib's standpoint of intersubjectivity in relation to using feminist identity politics for feminist coalition (...) politics. (shrink)

In this paper, I explain Black feminist identity politics as a practice that is ‘on the way’ to settler decolonization in a US context for the fact that it makes demands that we attend to our “originating” stories and, in doing so, 1) generate potential for difficult coalitions for decolonization in settler colonial USA and 2) promoting a range of refusals (Simpson 2014) that aid in resisting the completion of settler colonialism in North America, which is still (...) an uncompleted project. Ultimately, I claim Black feminist identity politics, properly understood, is a practice that aids in retaining the possibility of decolonization in a settler colonial state by resisting the historical unknowing that facilitates settler futurity. It is not itself settler decolonization, but rather it is “on the way” to such decolonization as it keeps open the need for decolonial futurity. (shrink)

Recent debates in contemporary feminist theory have been dominated by the relation between identity and politics. Beyond Identity Politics examines the implications of recent theorizing on difference, identity and subjectivity for theories of patriarchy and feminist politics. Organised around the three central themes of subjectivity, power and politics, this book focuses on a question which feminists struggled with and were divided by throughout the last decade, that is: how to theorize the (...) relation between the subject and politics. In this thoughtful engagement with these debates Moya Lloyd argues that the turn to the subject in process does not entail the demise of feminist politics as many feminists have argued. She demonstrates how key ideas such as agency, power and domination take on a new shape as a consequence of this radical rethinking of the subject-politics relation and how the role of feminist political theory becomes centred upon critique. A resource for feminist theorists, women's and gender studies students, as well as political and social theorists, this is a carefully composed and wide-ranging text, which provides important insights into one of contemporary feminism's most central concerns. (shrink)

COVID-19 has been called “a disaster for feminism” for numerous reasons. In this short piece, we make sense of this claim, drawing on intersectional feminism to understand why an analysis that considers gender alone is inadequate to address both the risks and consequences of COVID-19.

"Lesbian feminism began and has fueled itself with the rejection of liberalism.... In this rejection, lesbian feminists were not alone. They were joined by the New Left, by many blacks in the civil rights movement, by male academic theorists.... What all these groups shared was an intense awareness of the ways in which liberalism fails to account for the social reality of the world, through a reliance upon law and legal structure to define membership, through individualism, through its basis in (...) a particular conception of rationality." In tracing how lesbian feminism came to be defined in uneasy relationships with the Women’s Movement and gay rights groups, Shane Phelan explores the tension between liberal ideals of individual rights and tolerance and communitarian ideals of solidarity. The debate over lesbian sado-masochism—an expression of individual choice or pornographic, anti-feminist behavior?—is considered as a test case. Phelan addresses the problems faced by "the woman-identified woman" in a liberal society that presumes heterosexuality as the biological, psychological, and moral standard. Often silenced by laws defining their sexual behavior as criminal and censured by a medical establishment that persists in defining homosexuality as perversion, lesbians, like blacks and other groups, have fought to have the same rights as others in their communities and even in their own homes. Lesbian feminists have also sought to define themselves as a community that would be distinctly different, a community that would disavow the traditional American obsession with individual advancement in the world as it is. In this controversial study of political philosophy and the women’s movement, Phelan argues that "the failure to date to produce a satisfying theory and program for lesbian action is reflective of the failure of modern political thinking to produce a compelling, nonsuspect alternative to liberalism." In the series Women in the Political Economy, edited by Ronnie J. Steinberg. (shrink)

This paper argues that Hannah Arendt's political theory offers key insights into the power that binds together the feminist movement - the power of solidarity. Second-wave feminist notions of solidarity were grounded in notions of shared identity; in recent years, as such conceptions of shared identity have come under attack for being exclusionary and repressive, feminists have been urged to give up the idea of solidarity altogether. However, the choice between (repressive) identity and (fragmented) non- (...) class='Hi'>identity is a false opposition, and the Arendtian account of solidarity developed here allows us to move beyond this opposition. Thus, Arendt provides us with a model of solidarity that can stand a post-identity politics feminist theory in good stead. (shrink)

In this essay, I argue that recent leftist criticisms of "identity politics" do not address problems of inequality and interaction that are central in thinking about contemporary democratic politics. I turn instead to a set of feminist thinkers who share these critics' vision of politics, but who critically mobilize identity in a way that provides a conception of democratic citizenship for our inegalitarian and diverse polity.

In this paper, Weir reconsiders identity politics and their relation to feminist solidarity. She argues that the dimension of identity as “identification-with” has been the liberatory dimension of identity politics, and that this dimension has been overshadowed and displaced by a focus on identity as category. Weir addresses critiques of identification as a ground of solidarity, and sketches a model of identity and identity politics based not in sameness, but in (...) transformative historical process. (shrink)

This article is a critique, first, of the theory of identity advanced by Judith Butler and many of the feminist critics of identity politics, and, second, of identity politics itself. I argue that Butler's rejection of the modernist subject for its opposite, the fictional, substanceless subject, is untenable. Looking to object relations theory, I argue instead for a concept of the subject as an ungrounded ground, occupying a middle ground between the postmodern and the (...) modern subject. With regard to identity politics I argue that instead of populating the political realm with multiple identities, we should instead remove identity entirely from the political realm. (shrink)

In this paper, Weir reconsiders identity politics and their relation to feminist solidarity. She argues that the dimension of identity as “identification-with” has been the liberatory dimension of identity politics, and that this dimension has been overshadowed and displaced by a focus on identity as category. Weir addresses critiques of identification as a ground of solidarity, and sketches a model of identity and identity politics based not in sameness, but in (...) transformative historical process. (shrink)

An encyclopedia entry providing an overview of the philosophical issues entailed in the theory and practice of "identity politics." Open access and online. Regularly updated.

Identity politics is important within feminism. However, it often presupposes an overly subjectivist theory of knowledge that I term an epistemology of provenance. I explore some works of feminist standpoint theory that begin to address the difficulties of such an epistemology. I then bring Sartre's account of knowledge in the Critique of Dialectical Reason to bear on these difficulties, arguing that his work offers tools for addressing them more adequately.

Turkey has been experiencing an evolutionary feminist movement within the modernization project since 1923. This paper explores the relationship between politics, religion and feminism in the context of Turkish cultural identity and women's experience of the evolution of modernization evolution. Commencing with a discussion of the Time magazine cover-the Mona Lisa in veils-the paper gives examples of women's experiences of the divine and shifts in patriarchal culture. It also provides an overview of the history of feminism in (...) Turkey, which offers the opportunity to explore, articulate and share the experiences and reflections on the change in women's circumstances in Turkey. The paper will argue that Turkey is one of the most important success stories of women's empowerment; not only because it is an Islamic country; but also because the empowerment of women began in the early twentieth century. Indeed, it is worth identifying what is of crucial importance for the success of both Turkish women and wider feminist movements in Turkey: it is making change real: a 'realization' from theory to political and social practice. (shrink)

This volume is an act of talking back, of talking heresy. To reclaim the term “realism,” to maintain the epistemic significance of identity, to defend any version of identity politics today is to swim upstream of strong academic currents in feminist theory, literary theory, and cultural studies. It is to risk, even to invite, a dismissal as naive, uninformed, theoretically unsophisticated. And it is a risk taken here by people already at risk in the academy, already (...) assumed more often than not to be uninformed and undereducated precisely because of their real identities. Of course, identity is today a growth industry in the academy, across the humanities and social sciences, influencing even law and communication studies. The constitutive power of gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality and other forms of identity has, finally, suddenly, been recognized as a relevant aspect of almost all projects of inquiry. However, as I shall discuss in this essay, simultaneous to this academic commodification of identity is an increasing tendency to view identity as politically and metaphysically problematic, some have even said pathological. So on the one hand the theoretical relevance of identities has become visible, while on the other hand many theorists are troubled by the implications of the claim that identity makes a difference. Increasingly, then, the attachment to identity has become suspect. If identity has become suspect, identity politics has been prosecuted, tried, and sentenced to death. To espouse identity politics in the academy today risks being viewed as a member of the Flat-Earth Society. Like “essentialism,” identity politics has become the shibboleth of cultural studies and social theory, and denouncing it has become the litmus test of academic respectability, political acceptability, and even a necessity for the very right to be heard. In contrast, there has been a noticeable thaw regarding the term essentialism. What was once perfunctorily denounced at the start of every paper in feminist theory has recently been tentatively examined by a few theorists for possible signs of validity.. (shrink)

‘Intersectionality’ has taken on a complex position in the field of feminist scholarship over the last decade. Debate on the concept has swung back and forth, from buzzword to harsh critique. Amid these discussions, many feminist scholars have thought about Audre Lorde and the role of her writings in the debates over intersectionality. Lorde’s radical literary feminism has often been seen both as reflecting a politics of identity, on the one hand, and as shifting and situational, (...) on the other. Intersectionality has also been claimed either to be recycling the ideas of identity politics or to be forging new ways to grasp decentered identity positions and power structures. This article aims to tell a story about the roots of intersectionality through – and alongside – the legacy of Lorde’s feminism, by revisiting certain identity-political ideas. The radical nature of Lorde’s thinking is in many ways connected to politicized writing styles and rebellious literary forms. The main focus in this article is therefore extended to cover the role and implications of radical writing styles for intersectionality. The article argues that the oeuvre of telling the story of intersectionality through Lorde’s feminism opens up a new perspective on the genealogy of intersectionality. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:206 Feminist Studies 46, no. 1. © 2020 by Feminist Studies, Inc. Pang Laikwan Identity Politics and Democracy in Hong Kong’s Social Unrest Hong Kong’s anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill (anti-ELAB) movement began with legislation proposed in February 2019 to allow the transfer of fugitives to jurisdictions with which the city lacks formal extradition treaties. The law quickly attracted a tremendous amount of criticism and generated (...) enormous anxiety because mainland China was one of those jurisdictions.1 In fact, many believe that this bill was proposed to allow the government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to transfer wanted persons of any nationality from Hong Kong to China, subject to a legal process that many view as highly dubious. A large-scale anti-government movement exploded in June 2019 when pro-establishment legislators in Hong Kong insisted on passing it, and millions of people took to the streets. The government waited three months to withdraw the bill, only doing so after some of the most violent confrontations between civilians and the police in Hong Kong’s history. With Beijing’s 1. The law was originally proposed after a Hong Kong man, who killed his pregnant girlfriend in Taiwan, could not be extradited back to Taiwan to stand trial for the murder due to the lack of formal extradition laws. The proposed law, which would be applied to Hong Kong citizens, foreign residents, and even people passing through on business or as tourists, is being opposed due to the fear that it would be used to extradite Hong Kong political/civil rights activists and dissidents to China, where they would be harshly punished. Pang Laikwan 207 support, the Hong Kong government has doggedly resisted negotiating with the protestors over other demands, such as setting up an independent inquiry into police misconduct. As people have become completely disillusioned with the government and their own futures, tensions have increased. Collapsing many of the city’s socioeconomic problems into one cause, the anti-ELAB movement is primarily an anti-authoritarian impulse motivated by the unifying power of the term “Hongkongers.” As the movement unfolds, one of the most popular slogans, “Add Oil, Hongkongers!” (meaning “Keep going, Hongkongers!”) gradually transformed into “Rebel, Hongkongers!” and “Revenge, Hongkongers!” showing the protestors ’ anger about unrestrained police violence and the Beijing regime behind it. The militarization associated with these protests is both worrisome and symptomatic. This short essay analyzes this movement and uses it as a vehicle to disentangle social and political identity. My concern is about how a large-scale political movement can realign identities to generate power from the bottom. I use an Arendtian approach to ground my theoretical orientation, asking: How can political actions be understood as the pursuit of freedom to transcend one’s biological and social identity? From an intersectional feminist angle, if we are aware that social discrimination operates within a complex network of simultaneous discriminations, real social change can only be envisioned using a broad political canvas. Hong Kong’s anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill movement provides such a setting. Division and Inclusion “The people” might be the emptiest, but also the most powerful, phrase in the modern political lexicon. It can be used by politicians to justify groundless proposals or criticisms, but it is also the foundation and source of legitimacy for all modern political institutions. Indeed, the most basic meaning of democracy is “rule of the people,” which is impossible to avoid in any democratic imagination. As has been widely seen throughout the world, however, “the people” is often attached to various degrees of xenophobia—hatred of outsiders in the name of in-group solidarity. While the Hong Kong protestors’ courageous demands for the PRC to honor its promise to grant the city a high degree of autonomy have gained widespread international sympathy, thorny social divisions persist within the movement. 208 Pang Laikwan While Hong Kong has never been a united society, the anti-ELAB protests—like most social movements—have been highly divisive, splitting Hong Kong people apart. Most obviously, “the people” are divided by their political identifications, forming a primary antagonism between those who support the protests and those who do not, usually described... (shrink)

Social Postmodernism offers a transformative political vision and addresses the live questions in identity politics. The postmodern focus on race, sexuality and gender is sharpened by integrating the micro-social concerns of the social movements associated with these issues and macro-institutional and cultural analysis. Social Postmodernism brings together leading theorists to explore further the implications for the discourses of feminism, post-Marxian cultural studies, African-American, Gay, Latino/a and postcolonial studies.

The authors examine the claim that the most recent cohort of U.S. women is reluctant to identify as feminist although it has egalitarian gender attitudes. Using two national surveys, they show that the most recent generation is no less likely than prior cohorts to identify as feminist. However, Baby Bust women are less apt to identify as feminist than are older women, once background characteristics and attitudes related to feminist identification are controlled. Analyses suggest this reluctance (...) is not due to an aversion to feminism but reflects the “off” timing of the feminist movement in the lives of Baby Bust women. The authors also find important differences among cohorts in the correlates of feminist identity. Most notably, the relationships of political ideology and gender attitudes to feminist identity are stronger among Baby Boom women, who came of age during the feminist movement’s second wave, than among older and younger women. (shrink)

Sara Ruddick's Maternal Thinking: Towards a Politics of Peace is both an anomaly and a product of the tradition associating maternal activities with peace. Ruddick argues that maternal work gives mothers distinct motives for rejecting war, unique abilities for nonviolent conflict resolution, and a critical perspective on military thinking. If she is correct, maternal thinking may provide the foundation for a feminist peace politics. My project is a critical account of maternal thinking as Ruddick unfolds it in (...) her book. Ruddick's argument has two central components: The theoretical development of maternal thinking, which she explains in terms of a "practicalist conception of truth" , and The case that maternal thinking can ground a feminist peace politics, based on Nancy Hartsock's version of feminist standpoint theory. ;Ruddick constructs mothering as a genderfree practice under the PCT to distinguish from earlier accounts of mothering. This is problematic for three reasons. First, it portrays mothers as autonomous, ahistorical, and acultural caretakers and ignores how other practices shape and contribute to maternal practice's definition. Second, Ruddick does not say enough about the identity of her mothers. She acknowledges racial and cultural differences, but does not explore the implications of her pluralism. Also, her genderfree account excludes any discussion of masculine and feminine styles of mothering. Third, the cross-practice critical power of MT is restricted by the practicalist view that "there is no truth by which all truths can be judged." I suggest Ruddick can overcome this confusion by distinguishing between internal and external goals of practices. I argue that a holistic view, which places maternal practice within a complex web of related practices, helps to eliminate the remaining problems with mothering under the PCT. ;Ruddick's move from a practicalist to a standpoint version of MT solves a critical problem for her. Feminist standpoint theorists typically argue that distinctions between men's and women's understandings of the world are rooted in the sexual division of labor; they maintain that "thinking from women's lives" makes available a privileged view on male supremacy. Ruddick draws on Hartsock's radical version of a feminist standpoint, which holds that both the sexual division of labor in women's subsistence activities and the intimate involvement of their bodies in "menstruation, coitus, pregnancy, childbirth, and lactation" have epistemological consequences. To show the superiority of feminist standpoint, she compares maternal and military "histories of the human flesh." The central role of this comparison in Ruddick's argument makes her position dangerously close to the essentialist arguments she desires to avoid. (shrink)

Through an analysis of two National Organization for Women chapters, the author finds that members construct multiple feminist identities that vary in collective definitions of feminism, the overall strategies adopted, and organizational culture. To explain these variations, the author analyzes meso-level relations between the organization and the environment, issues of diversity, and leadership continuity. This study illustrates how organizational factors intertwine to shape how participants come to view themselves and the political and cultural environment surrounding them. With the current (...) research focus either on the larger political environment or individual characteristics, meso-level factors are often overlooked in examinations of social movement dynamics. (shrink)

With the rise of ‘globesity’, fat activism and Fat Studies have become political players in countering negative stereotypes and the devaluation of fat bodies. Both groups are diverse, yet share a common goal to celebrate and/or accept fatness, and challenge practices and discourses that reinforce ‘normal’ bodies (such as diets, ‘fat talk’ and medicalisation). In this article, we reflect on our engagement with a Fat Studies conference, and critically interrogate the assumptions that underlie this particular space. It is not surprising (...) that fat activists and Fat Studies scholars bring different ideologies to the table, yet the differences between them have not been adequately scrutinised or theorised. Drawing upon Linda Alcoff’s feminist philosophy, we examine how identity politics and intersectional perspectives are both used in fat activism, yet have the effect of creating unresolved tensions between singular and multiple embodied identities. We argue that an identity politics approach (exemplified through embodied visibility and declarations of ‘thin privilege’) has the potential to create boundaries for policing and exclusion, and is thus at odds with the much broader axes identified by intersectorial approaches. Rather than dismiss the power of identity politics, we argue for a careful reframing of the relationship between identity politics and intersectionality in fat activism and Fat Studies. We suggest that unexamined contradictions that arise from this mismatch may be counterproductive to the important subversive aims of the movement. (shrink)

The special issue Doing Memory, Doing Identity: Politics of the Everyday in Contemporary Global Communities draws on anthropological theory, performance studies, feminism, post-colonial studies and other theoretical traditions for an insightful examination of the everyday practices of doing memory. A series of ethnographies and qualitative studies from locations as diverse as Italy, Norway, Greece, France, Brazil and China complement profound theoretical analyses to investigate the multiple links between individual and collective pasts, futures and identities, especially focusing on emotions, (...) embodiment, the senses, difference and power relations. Taking a critical stance in regard to current social-scientific and socio-political debates, this special issue reflects on the political and ethical aspects of day-to-day memory practices and examines issues related to identity, imagination and otherness. (shrink)

Psychoanalysis, race, and racism -- From psychoanalysis to political theory -- Reparative group leadership -- Conflict and authenticity -- Bonding and solidarity -- Coalitions and reparative politics.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Inheriting Identity and Practicing TransformationThe Time of Feminist PoliticsShannon HoffA human life unfolds over time. No moment of it can be considered apart from the others, independently of the fact that the human being was and will be, and so no moment is sufficient on its own to tell us of the nature of that identity. Each moment is insufficient as an expression of who we (...) are, as an answer to the question of what we want to be, or as a point at which a full account of our identity could be given. And we live each moment as if afflicted by a dual blindness with regard to the past and future that lend it significance; while exercising pervasive influence in the present, this past and future are relatively inaccessible to our reflective insight. We are always “growing up,” so to speak, from out of a childhood that can never be the purely transparent object of reflection, to an adulthood or “accomplishment” of identity that is always in the mysterious future, unimaginable in the terms of the adolescence in which we find ourselves.My purpose here is to show how this issue resonates in the context of feminist philosophy, feminist critique, and feminist practice—that is, how a consideration of time and its impact on human experience allows us to highlight the accomplishments of various avenues of feminist thought, to elaborate their shortcomings in relation to each other, to perceive the reasons behind the tensions among them, and to understand the way in which they are (and should [End Page 167] be understood as) connected. I will work through the issue of what it means to live in the temporal dimensions of past, present, and future—what it means to inherit an already meaningful world, to be an individual in the present, and to be propelled into an uncertain future—so as to provide a general framework by which to interpret the history of feminist thought. I will explain these different temporal dimensions in terms of the (respective) ideas of cultivation, universality, and transformation, identifying the positive and negative significance of each and also the demand that the tensions among them be negotiated. Finally, I will show that feminist justice is in fact found here, as answerability to all three—to communities of cultivation, to the demands of universality, and to the inconclusiveness and transformability of human identity. While much feminist thinking has been committed to exploring these elements singly, in abstraction from the others, and while such work is important, it is also valuable to explicitly explore the relationships and tensions among these different aspects, to articulate how to act and think in light of this underlying conceptual context, and to do so in a more explicit and self-conscious way.There is, of course, a disadvantage to not exploring these elements on their own terms: namely, that one handles their subtleties roughly. A further and related danger is that involved in trying to draw a broad picture of a tradition with complex and conflicting elements, one that does not count itself as a tradition at times—as a “we,” a feminism, or a feminist thought.1 While I will talk about “feminism” or “feminist thought,” I do not presume that these differences do not exist; my goal is simply to explore what is involved in an elaboration of a critical interpretation of society, when the society one critically interprets is an agent in one’s formation. The description of the dynamics of human becoming, agency, and critique I develop below has the purpose of showing that it is possible to understand differences between feminist positions as complementary, a process that will lead me to underemphasize stringent divisions and charged oppositions and to focus on drawing connections. Let us turn now to a preliminary description of the conceptual framework I seek to construct.Feminism and TimeTo advance feminist purposes is, one might presume, to hope for and work toward a new and transformed reality in the future. It would seem, however, that this reality cannot be clearly envisioned in the present, since that would require the transformation of the very people envisioning it. In... (shrink)

How can we think about identities in the wake of feminist critiques of identity and identity politics? Allison Weir rethinks conceptions of individual and collective identities in relation to freedom.

In Political Theory and Feminist Social Criticism, Brooke Ackerly demonstrates the shortcomings of contemporary deliberative democratic theory, relativism and essentialism for guiding the practice of social criticism in the real, imperfect world. Drawing theoretical implications from the activism of Third World feminists who help bring to public audiences the voices of women silenced by coercion, Brooke Ackerly provides a practicable model of social criticism. She argues that feminist critics have managed to achieve in practice what other theorists do (...) only incompletely in theory. Complemented by Third World feminist social criticism, deliberative democratic theory becomes critical theory - actionable, coherent, and self-reflective. While a complement to democratic theory, Third World feminist social criticism also addresses the problem in feminist theory associated with attempts to deal with identity politics. Third World feminist social criticism thus takes feminist theory beyond the critical impasse of the tension between anti-relativist and anti-essentialist feminist theory. (shrink)

This anthology of articles provides contemporary international feminist perspectives on issues of identity, agency, and difference as they pertain to both feminist politics in particular, and contemporary western politics more generally.

In Humanitarian Identity and the Political Sublime, Ashmita Khasnabish unites Amartya Sen's concept of pluralistic identity with Sri Aurobindo's philosophy of the "religion of human unity," where the European and Western philosophy of Enlightenment meets the East/India/Bengali intellectual and spiritual thought. The resulting neo-Enlightenment philosophy of identity incorporates Teresa Brennan's theory of the "transmission of affect" and the Relational Cultural Theory, culminating in a discussion of the postcolonial literary texts of Rushdie and Kincaid.

This anthology of articles provides contemporary international feminist perspectives on issues of identity, agency, and difference as they pertain to both feminist politics in particular, and contemporary western politics more generally.

The postmodern rejection of essentialism does not mean that feminist theorists must abandon all categorizations of women. Indeed, while it is important to deconstruct identities and highlight the differences among women, we need to arrive at some notion of gender identity for political purposes. In paying careful attention to the distinction between nominal essences and real essences, the author shows that the category of women can be maintained without resorting to the problems of traditional essentialism. The author argues (...) that the marginalization of women is a product of culturally determined identities rather than ontological differences between men and women.Le refus postmoderne de l’essentialisme ne signifie pas que la théorie féministe doive abandonner toutes catégorisations de femmes. En effet, bien qu’il soit important de déconstruire les identités et mettre en valeur les différences parmi les femmes, il faut en arriver à une certaine notion d’identité sexuelle pour des raisons politiques. Se laissant guider par la distinction entre essences nominale et réelle,l’auteure montre que la catégorie de femme peut être maintenue tout en éludant les problèmes de l’essentialisme traditionnel. L’auteure soutient que la marginalisation des femmes est le produit d’identites determinées culturellement plutôt que de différences ontologiques entre hommes et femmes. (shrink)

The concept of essence is thought by many political theorists to be a residue of the patriarchal onto-theological tradition of metaphysics that needs to be (or has been) overcome by more progressive aims. The purpose of this paper is to examine the concept of essentialism in light of the treatment of the concept of essence in Hegel’s Science of Logic, and within the context of recent issues in critical race theory and feminism. I will argue that the role of an (...) essence underlying appearance is a valuable one within a Hegelian framework, and that it is politically important to reassess it. There are reasons that we should want to uphold the distinction between essence and an inessential appearance. We should want to uphold the irreducibility of essence to the Hegelian self-determining concept, and I argue in this paper that there is a basis for doing so in Hegel’s own text. Despite the well established impossibility of claiming that there is a property or set of properties that all women share, to dissolve essence as an illusory side-effect of the show of appearance is both to misunderstand essence, and to relinquish a tool needed in the struggle for justice. Essence cannot be dismissed by claiming that it is an illusory side-effect of the show of appearance because essence and the inessential do not exhibit the characteristic of reciprocity. (shrink)

This essay engages in a debate with Nancy Fraser and Dorothy Leland concerning the contribution of Lacanian-inspired psychoanalytic feminism to feminist theory and practice. Teresa Brennan's analysis of the impasse in psychoanalysis and feminism and Judith Butler's proposal for a radically democratic feminism are employed in examining the issues at stake. I argue, with Brennan, that the impasse confronting psychoanalysis and feminism is the result of different conceptions of the relationship between the psychical and the social. I suggest Lacanian-inspired (...) feminist conceptions are useful and deserve our consideration. (shrink)

Amartya Sen argues that sectarian discord and violence are fueled by confusion about the nature of identity, including the pervasive tendency to see ourselves as members of singular social groups standing in opposition to other groups (e.g. Democrat vs. Republican, Muslim vs. Christian, etc.). Sen defends an alternative model of identity, according to which we all inevitably belong to a plurality of discrete identity groups (including ethnicities, classes, genders, races, religions, careers, hobbies, etc.) and are obligated to (...) choose, in any given context, which among our multiple affiliations to prioritize. While Sen’s model of discrete identity prioritization is a clear advance over single-factor accounts, it overlooks significant lessons about identity from over 150 years of scholarship by feminists of color. In ignoring the experiences of women of color, Sen’s model falsely assumes that identities are in-principle separable for the purposes of practical deliberation; and, in obligating individuals to make such identity-based “reasoned choices,” Sen’s model forces those with multiply marginalized identities to choose from a set of externally defined identity options, none of which sufficiently captures their experiences. (shrink)

Christine Battersby rethinks questions of embodiment, essence, sameness and difference, self and "other", patriarchy and power. Using analyses of Kant, Adorno, Irigaray, Butler, Kierkegaard and Deleuze, she challenges those who argue that a feminist metaphysics is a a contradiction in terms. This book explores place for a metaphysics of fluidity in the current debates concerning postmodernism, feminism and identity politics.