The use of "theory" in feminist analysis has been said to threaten feminism as a political force. This collection of work by leading feminist scholars engages with the question of the political status of poststructuralism theory within feminism. Against the view that the use of post-structuralism necessarily weakens feminism, 'Feminists Theorize the Political' affirms the contemporary debate over theory as politically rich and consequential. In laying the theoretical groundwork for the volume, Butler and Scott posed a number of questions to (...) prominent legal scholars, literary critics, philosophers, political theorists, historians, and cultural theorists. The essays do not settle the questions but generate new and productive directions for them. The volume as a whole valorizes the unsettling power and politics of theory. The essays in 'Feminists Theorize the Political' speak to the questions that emerge from the convergence of feminism and poststructuralism: What happens to feminist critique when traditional foundations--experience, history, universal norms--are called into question? Can feminist theory problematize the notion of the subject without losing its political effectivity? Which version of the subject is to questioned, and how does that questioning open up possibilities for reformulating agency, power, and sites of political resistance? What are the consequences of a specifically feminist reformulation of difference? What are the uses and limits of a poststructuralist critique of binary logic for the theorization of racial and class differences, the position of the subaltern? This anthology represents a diverse array of theoretical work within feminist theory with strong political stakes. Although not all of the authors subscribe to poststructuralism, (and few would concede post-structuralism is a monolithic enterprise), each offers an innovative feminist analysis that is in some way motivated in and by the poststructuralist challenge. 'Feminists Theorize The Political' addresses a range of feminist concerns, including productive freedom, anti-discrimination law, rape, and formulating power in terms of exclusion, difference and hierarchy. (shrink)

Revisiting Edward Said's late proposals for a one-state solution, Butler has come to a startling suggestion: Jewish ethics not only demand a critique of Zionism, but must transcend its exclusive Jewishness in order to realize the ethical ...

The celebrated author of _Gender Trouble_ here redefines Antigone's legacy, recovering her revolutionary significance and liberating it for a progressive feminism and sexual politics. Butler's new interpretation does nothing less than reconceptualize the incest taboo in relation to kinship -- and open up the concept of kinship to cultural change. Antigone, the renowned insurgent from Sophocles's _Oedipus,_ has long been a feminist icon of defiance. But what has remained unclear is whether she escapes from the forms of power that she (...) opposes. Antigone proves to be a more ambivalent figure for feminism than has been acknowledged, since the form of defiance she exemplifies also leads to her death. Butler argues that Antigone represents a form of feminist and sexual agency that is fraught with risk. Moreover, Antigone shows how the constraints of normative kinship unfairly decide what will and will not be a livable life. Butler explores the meaning of Antigone, wondering what forms of kinship might have allowed her to live. Along the way, she considers the works of such philosophers as Hegel, Lacan, and Irigaray. How, she asks, would psychoanalysis have been different if it had taken Antigone -- the "postoedipal" subject -- rather than Oedipus as its point of departure? If the incest taboo is reconceived so that it does not mandate heterosexuality as its solution, what forms of sexual alliance and new kinship might be acknowledged as a result? The book relates the courageous deeds of Antigone to the claims made by those whose relations are still not honored as those of proper kinship, showing how a culture of normative heterosexuality obstructs our capacity to see what sexual freedom and political agency could be. (shrink)

It has been claimed that a sense of us is presupposed for shared intentions to be possible. Searle introduced this notion together with the notion of the sense of the other. in joint action. It argues that the sense of the other is a necessary condition for a sense of us. Whereas thisarticle distinguishes between the “sense of the other” and the “sense of us” and elaborates on their role the sense of the other is immediate and automatic, the sense (...) of us can (but need not) arise between people and can (a) develop over time, (b) depend on the situation, and (c) involves several sufficient but not necessary processes. The article relies on research on core knowledge to better understand the sense of the other. It elaborates the sense of us using insights from cognitive science and social psychology. The article shows that the sense of the other and the sense of us can contribute to our understanding of the perception of possibilities for joint action and how individuals can come to experience actions and intentions as shared, even if the participants lack common knowledge. This leads to the conclusion that people are ordinarily socially oriented rather than individually. (shrink)

In everyday contexts we do numerous things together. Philosophers of collective intentionality have wondered how we can distinguish parallel cases from cases where we act together. Often their theories argue in favor of one characteristic, feature, or function, that differentiates the two. This feature then distinguishes parallel actions from joint action. The approach in this book is different. Three claims are developed: (1) There are several functions that help human agents coordinate and act together. (2) This entails that joint action (...) should be understood through these different, interrelated, types of coordination. (3) A multidimensional conceptual space, with three levels of control and coordination, will allow us to connect these different forms of coordination and their interdependencies. This allows us to understand the jointness of an action in a more differentiated and encompassing way. This approach has ramifications for several distinctions that are typically understood to be binary, including those between action and mere bodily movement, joint action and parallel action, and action together and not together. (shrink)

Wittgenstein is widely recognised as a philosopher with a markedly ethical character to his thought. This paper seeks to highlight the dimension of selflessness and renunciation in this ethical character. It also seeks to show that there are distinct differences in Wittgenstein's implicit conception of what an ethical selflessness amounts to in the early and the later periods. The concept of absolute safety enables us to appreciate the connections between the early Wittgenstein and a particular type of nineteenth‐century obsession with (...) a selflessness that combines with a self‐sufficient capacity to stand aloof from anxiety in the face of the human condition involving meaninglessness and death. In the early Wittgenstein that aloofness came close to a solipsistic and, in some ways, self‐affirming apartness from everything other than the self. In contrast, the ethical spirit that permeates Wittgenstein's later thought is imbued with a sense of the immersion of the self ultimately and absolutely ‘in the world’. The sense in which this latter phrase is used is defined further in the paper. (shrink)

Dichotomous thinking about mental phenomena is abundant in philosophy. One particularly tenacious dichotomy is between “automatic” and “controlled” processes. In this characterization automatic and unintelligent go hand in hand, as do non-automatic and intelligent. Accounts of skillful action have problematized this dichotomous conceptualization and moved towards a more nuanced understanding of human agency. This binary thinking is, however, still abundant in the philosophy of joint action. Habits and skills allow us agentic ways of guiding complex action routines that would otherwise (...) overwhelm our reflective capacities. In this paper, I look at how theories of skill, habit, and know-how in individual action can inform a non-dichotomous account of joint action. I argue that a fuller understanding of joint agency has to understand not only group know-how, but also the role of attention and the highly integrated types of control that allow agents to act together. (shrink)

Dichotomous thinking about mental phenomena is abundant in philosophy. One particularly tenacious dichotomy is between “automatic” and “controlled” processes. In this characterization automatic and unintelligent go hand in hand, as do non-automatic and intelligent. Accounts of skillful action have problematized this dichotomous conceptualization and moved towards a more nuanced understanding of human agency. This binary thinking is, however, still abundant in the philosophy of joint action. Habits and skills allow us agentic ways of guiding complex action routines that would otherwise (...) overwhelm our reflective capacities. In this paper, I look at how theories of skill, habit, and know-how in individual action can inform a non-dichotomous account of joint action. I argue that a fuller understanding of joint agency has to understand not only group know-how, but also the role of attention and the highly integrated types of control that allow agents to act together. (shrink)

Foucault proposes at the end of the first volume of The History of Sexuality to shift the focus of sexual studies from sex-desire to bodies and pleasures. This article seeks to establish what he means by this shift, how he proposes it be made, and what the consequences are for thinking about sexuality together with `sex'. Foucault's shift involves a historiographical claim about the superability of the recent past, and can be read as an effort to relegate the concerns about (...) sexual difference and kinship to the past, and to establish a contemporary field for sexuality that involves bodies without history, pleasures without sex. The article suggests a way around this questionable historiographical assumption and marks a different departure for a Foucauldian study of sexuality. It also seeks to highlight some of the contemporary tensions between feminist and lesbian and gay studies, especially queer studies, in light of this reading of Foucault. (shrink)

Moral theory -- Abortion -- Genetic engineering, cloning, and stem cell research -- Euthanasia and assisted suicide -- The death penalty -- Drug and alcohol use -- Sexual intimacy and marriage -- Feminism, motherhood, and the workplace -- Freedom of speech -- Racial discrimination and global justice.

The notion that all the world's peoples constitute a "brotherhood of man" is not a given among all human beings -- it is rather the product of history. So suggests acclaimed philosopher Alain Finkielkraut in _In the Name of Humanity,_ an unsettling reflection on the twentieth century in its twilight hours in which he asks us to rethink our assumptions about universalism and humanism. While many people look to humanist ideals as a deterrent to nationalist chauvinism, Finkielkraut challenges the abstract (...) idea of universalism by describing the terrible crimes "civilized" Europe has committed in its name. At the same time as it challenges the inhumanity of our century's great universalistic solutions, _In the Name of Humanity_ also confronts the more onerous elements of unreflective nationalism -- clearly condemning the dangerous use of claims for ethnic purity. However, the book does not put forth a standard-issue polemic against the multitude of nationalistic currents that continue to plague the international arena. Indeed, even as he deplores the violence that seems to go hand in hand with nationalism, Finkielkraut defends its underlying cause -- the need to belong. Eloquently quoting the experiences of refugees from Hitler's Germany, he shows the reader why we must heed the call of this irreducible need. Finkielkraut reminds us that the concept of cultural relativism -- indeed, the very idea of tolerating other cultures -- is a relatively recent development in Western history. As he looks for answers he interrogates the differences between historical racism and the racism embedded in the philosophies of this century's genocidal movements, showing how modern racist ideologies like National Socialism look not to sin within the self as the stumbling block of human advancement but to a clandestine conspiracy by a particular, identifiable element of human society. What this form of radical racist thought eliminates is the notion of personal responsibility -- instead of finding the answers to misfortune within the self, modern racism suggests that evil can be identified in others and summarily eliminated. Lucidly connected to the ideas of past thinkers, from Plato to Levinas to Hannah Arendt, Finkielkraut's latest work is a troubling indictment of our century that refuses to back away from the "messiness" of human life and culture. In his willingness to abjure simple solutions, he offers a glimmer of hope. (shrink)

A passionate critique of Enlightenment--both in its contemporary invocation and its historical and cultural use--and a call to arms to rethink human equality and liberty without the sacrifice of individual rights and ethnicities.

Julia Kristeva attempts to expose the limits of Lacan's theory of language by revealing the semiotic dimension of language that it excludes. She argues that the semiotic potential of language is subversive, and describes the semiotic as a poeticmaternal linguistic practice that disrupts the symbolic, understood as culturally intelligible rule-governed speech. In the course of arguing that the semiotic contests the universality of the Symbolic, Kristeva makes several theoretical moves which end up consolidating the power of the Symbolic and paternal (...) authority generally. She defends a maternal instinct as a pre-discursive biological necessity, thereby naturalizing a specific cultural configuration of maternity. In her use of psychoanalytic theory, she ends up claiming the cultural unintelligibility of lesbianism. Her distinction between the semiotic and the Symbolic operates to foreclose a cultural investigation into the genesis of precisely those feminine principles for which she claims a pre-discursive, naturalistic ontology. Although she claims that the maternal aspects of language are repressed in Symbolic speech and provide a critical possibility of displacing the hegemony of the paternal/symbolic, her very descriptions of the maternal appear to accept rather than contest the inevitable hegemony of the Symbolic. In conclusion, this essay offers a genealogical critique of the maternal discourse in Kristeva and suggests that recourse to the maternal does not constitute a subversive strategy as Kristeva appears to assume. (shrink)