Traditio: Feminists of color and the torn virtues of democratic engagement

Political Theory

Volumn 29, Issue 4, 2001, Pages 488-516

  Coles, Romand ^a  

^a DUKE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0035535577     PISSN: 00905917     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0090591701029004002     Document Type: Article

References (93)

1. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 380. J. Donald Moon, Constructing Community: Moral Pluralism and Tragic Conflicts (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993), 219. Key texts by others mentioned in this paragraph include Bruce Ackerman, Social Justice in the Liberal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980); Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson, Democracy and Disagreement (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996); Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977); and Kent Greenawalt, Religious Convictions and Political Choice (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988).
2. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 380. J. Donald Moon, Constructing Community: Moral Pluralism and Tragic Conflicts (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993), 219. Key texts by others mentioned in this paragraph include Bruce Ackerman, Social Justice in the Liberal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980); Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson, Democracy and Disagreement (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996); Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977); and Kent Greenawalt, Religious Convictions and Political Choice (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988).
3. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 380. J. Donald Moon, Constructing Community: Moral Pluralism and Tragic Conflicts (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993), 219. Key texts by others mentioned in this paragraph include Bruce Ackerman, Social Justice in the Liberal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980); Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson, Democracy and Disagreement (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996); Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977); and Kent Greenawalt, Religious Convictions and Political Choice (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988).
4. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 380. J. Donald Moon, Constructing Community: Moral Pluralism and Tragic Conflicts (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993), 219. Key texts by others mentioned in this paragraph include Bruce Ackerman, Social Justice in the Liberal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980); Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson, Democracy and Disagreement (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996); Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977); and Kent Greenawalt, Religious Convictions and Political Choice (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988).
5. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 380. J. Donald Moon, Constructing Community: Moral Pluralism and Tragic Conflicts (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993), 219. Key texts by others mentioned in this paragraph include Bruce Ackerman, Social Justice in the Liberal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980); Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson, Democracy and Disagreement (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996); Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977); and Kent Greenawalt, Religious Convictions and Political Choice (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988).
6. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 380. J. Donald Moon, Constructing Community: Moral Pluralism and Tragic Conflicts (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993), 219. Key texts by others mentioned in this paragraph include Bruce Ackerman, Social Justice in the Liberal State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980); Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson, Democracy and Disagreement (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996); Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977); and Kent Greenawalt, Religious Convictions and Political Choice (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988).
7. In this regard, my approach should be distinguished from those who would continue to follow Allison Jagger's (much more understandable in 1983, when she wrote it) claim that feminists of color work "mainly at the level of description" and have no "distinctive" theory of freedom. See Feminist Politics and Human Nature (Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1983), 11. I write more in the spirit of her later observation (with Paula S. Rothenberg, in Feminist Frameworks, Third Edition [New York: McGraw-Hill, 1993], xii) that feminists of color have been elaborating what amounts to a "radical overhaul of feminist theory." I argue here that they make an important contribution to democratic theory and educational theory.
8. In this regard, my approach should be distinguished from those who would continue to follow Allison Jagger's (much more understandable in 1983, when she wrote it) claim that feminists of color work "mainly at the level of description" and have no "distinctive" theory of freedom. See Feminist Politics and Human Nature (Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1983), 11. I write more in the spirit of her later observation (with Paula S. Rothenberg, in Feminist Frameworks, Third Edition [New York: McGraw-Hill, 1993], xii) that feminists of color have been elaborating what amounts to a "radical overhaul of feminist theory." I argue here that they make an important contribution to democratic theory and educational theory.
9. (San Francisco: Aunt Lute, 1987).
10. Ibid., 78.
11. (New York: Norton, 1993).
12. All quotations in the next three paragraphs are from the first chapter in Schlesinger's book, titled, "'A New Race'?"
13. Gutmann and Thomson, in the final chapter of Democracy and Disagreement, provide a more supple reading of liberal principles, arguing that they will develop somewhat in the ongoing process of deliberation. Yet, the development they describe is simply an internally dialectical development that occurs as each liberal principle is read and interpreted through the concerns of the other liberal principles. The possibility - let alone the importance - of an openness to transformations that come from engagements with values and visions beyond their liberal bedrock is not considered. The pressures of their construal of the liberal project leaves little or no space for such considerations.
14. P. 11.
15. Borderlands, 65.
16. Borderlands, 82.
17. Ibid., 78.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid., 48-49.
20. Ibid., 80.
21. In a resonant vein, Maria Lugones writes of how "world-travelling is part and parcel of our experience and our situation, "in "Playfulness, 'World'-Travelling, and Loving Perception" in Making Face, Making Soul/Haciendo Caras: Creative and Critical Perspectives by Feminists of Color, ed., Gloria Anzaldúa (San Francisco: Aunt Lute, 1990), 39, Cultivating a sense of the virtue of (as well as virtues for) this situation, Lugones writes of the ́richness, ́ wisdom, freedom, and solidarity in difference that world travelling makes possible. Integral to this ethic is ́welcominǵ the other and ́witnessinǵ the other within her own world. This involves an ́attitude of playfulness, ́ ́openness to surprise, ́ openness to ́being a fool, ́ and the virtues of a trickster's ambiguous malleability. World travelling is animated by a generous ́lové that largely exceeds any determined principles: ́We may not have rules, and when we do have rules, there are no rules that are to us sacred́ (Ibid., 400). Compared to Anzaldúa, in this particular essay, Lugones exaggerates both the dimension of ́plaý and possibilities for smooth travelling and proximate witness of others. This sometimes leads to a relationship to principles that is more cavalier and less agonal than one finds in Anzaldúa.
22. In a resonant vein, Maria Lugones writes of how "world-travelling is part and parcel of our experience and our situation, "in "Playfulness, 'World'-Travelling, and Loving Perception" in Making Face, Making Soul/Haciendo Caras: Creative and Critical Perspectives by Feminists of Color, ed., Gloria Anzaldúa (San Francisco: Aunt Lute, 1990), 39, Cultivating a sense of the virtue of (as well as virtues for) this situation, Lugones writes of the ́richness, ́ wisdom, freedom, and solidarity in difference that world travelling makes possible. Integral to this ethic is ́welcominǵ the other and ́witnessinǵ the other within her own world. This involves an ́attitude of playfulness, ́ ́openness to surprise, ́ openness to ́being a fool, ́ and the virtues of a trickster's ambiguous malleability. World travelling is animated by a generous ́lové that largely exceeds any determined principles: ́We may not have rules, and when we do have rules, there are no rules that are to us sacred́ (Ibid., 400). Compared to Anzaldúa, in this particular essay, Lugones exaggerates both the dimension of ́plaý and possibilities for smooth travelling and proximate witness of others. This sometimes leads to a relationship to principles that is more cavalier and less agonal than one finds in Anzaldúa.
23. Borderlands, 80-82.
24. Derrida explores these relations in many texts. The most pertinent here might be The Other Heading: Reflections on Today's Europe, but Specters of Marx and The Gift of Death, in which he writes of a "disposition toward a certain principle of heresy, "are also important in this context. See also, Donna Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology, and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s, "in Feminism and Postmodernism, ed., Linda Nicholson (New York: Routledge, 1990), 190.
25. Derrida explores these relations in many texts. The most pertinent here might be The Other Heading: Reflections on Today's Europe, but Specters of Marx and The Gift of Death, in which he writes of a "disposition toward a certain principle of heresy, "are also important in this context. See also, Donna Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology, and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s, "in Feminism and Postmodernism, ed., Linda Nicholson (New York: Routledge, 1990), 190.
26. Derrida explores these relations in many texts. The most pertinent here might be The Other Heading: Reflections on Today's Europe, but Specters of Marx and The Gift of Death, in which he writes of a "disposition toward a certain principle of heresy, "are also important in this context. See also, Donna Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology, and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s, "in Feminism and Postmodernism, ed., Linda Nicholson (New York: Routledge, 1990), 190.
27. Derrida explores these relations in many texts. The most pertinent here might be The Other Heading: Reflections on Today's Europe, but Specters of Marx and The Gift of Death, in which he writes of a "disposition toward a certain principle of heresy, "are also important in this context. See also, Donna Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology, and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s, "in Feminism and Postmodernism, ed., Linda Nicholson (New York: Routledge, 1990), 190.
28. Hence, Nancy Fraser is right to argue in Justice Interrupts: Critical Reflections on the Postsocialist Age (New York: Routledge, 1997) that we must try to "distinguish just from unjust differences, "182. Iris Young, in Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990) sometimes comes up short in this regard. On the other hand, Young has a much more profound awareness of the limits of our efforts and, hence, for the need to make "listening" central to our relations with others. See, for example, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), especially Chapters 2 and 3. I am arguing for simultaneously and robustly pursuing dimensions of both projects, with all the tensions this involves.
29. Hence, Nancy Fraser is right to argue in Justice Interrupts: Critical Reflections on the Postsocialist Age (New York: Routledge, 1997) that we must try to "distinguish just from unjust differences, "182. Iris Young, in Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990) sometimes comes up short in this regard. On the other hand, Young has a much more profound awareness of the limits of our efforts and, hence, for the need to make "listening" central to our relations with others. See, for example, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), especially Chapters 2 and 3. I am arguing for simultaneously and robustly pursuing dimensions of both projects, with all the tensions this involves.
30. Hence, Nancy Fraser is right to argue in Justice Interrupts: Critical Reflections on the Postsocialist Age (New York: Routledge, 1997) that we must try to "distinguish just from unjust differences, "182. Iris Young, in Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990) sometimes comes up short in this regard. On the other hand, Young has a much more profound awareness of the limits of our efforts and, hence, for the need to make "listening" central to our relations with others. See, for example, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), especially Chapters 2 and 3. I am arguing for simultaneously and robustly pursuing dimensions of both projects, with all the tensions this involves.
31. Borderlands, 13.
32. In An Other Tongue: Nation and Ethnicity in the Linguistic Borderland, ed., Alfred Arteaga (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994).
33. Ibid., 115.
34. Ibid., 117.
35. Ibid., 121.
36. Ibid., 122.
37. Ibid., 123.
38. Ibid., 120.
39. Ibid., 119.
40. My discussion of Nancy is indebted to Norma Alarcón's very provocative critique of Nancy's appropriation of the mestiza in ́Conjugating Subjects in the Age of Multiculturalism, ́ in Mapping Multiculturalism, eds., Avery F. Gordon and Christopher Newfield (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996), 132. For a provocative reading of Nancy that elaborates some of the contributions his work can offer to a politics explicitly informed by Anzaldúa, see Shane Phelan, Getting Specific: Postmodern Lesbian Politics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994), chap. 5. Phelan also offers a compelling critique of Nancy in ways that have affinities with my critique here. However, her criticism of him and her alternative suggestions focus primarily on "Spivak's 'strategic essentialism" (p. 86) and the "political necessity of common construction and (limited) identity" (p. 88). While sympathetic to Phelan's position, my criticism here aims more at Nancy's ethico-political rendering of the opening of "being-in - common" as such. If Phelan's work develops more specifically some of the political implications of Anzaldúa's work, my article develops explicitly ethical themes Phelan raises in the last few pages of her book.
41. My discussion of Nancy is indebted to Norma Alarcón's very provocative critique of Nancy's appropriation of the mestiza in ́Conjugating Subjects in the Age of Multiculturalism, ́ in Mapping Multiculturalism, eds., Avery F. Gordon and Christopher Newfield (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996), 132. For a provocative reading of Nancy that elaborates some of the contributions his work can offer to a politics explicitly informed by Anzaldúa, see Shane Phelan, Getting Specific: Postmodern Lesbian Politics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994), chap. 5. Phelan also offers a compelling critique of Nancy in ways that have affinities with my critique here. However, her criticism of him and her alternative suggestions focus primarily on "Spivak's 'strategic essentialism" (p. 86) and the "political necessity of common construction and (limited) identity" (p. 88). While sympathetic to Phelan's position, my criticism here aims more at Nancy's ethico-political rendering of the opening of "being-in -common" as such. If Phelan's work develops more specifically some of the political implications of Anzaldúa's work, my article develops explicitly ethical themes Phelan raises in the last few pages of her book.
42. Ibid., 123.
43. On this point, see, Yvonne Yarbo-Bejarano's incisive essay. "Gloria Anzaldúa's Borderlands/Let Frontera: Cultural Studies, 'Difference, ' and the Non-Unitary Subject, "Culture Critique, fall 1994. Yarbo-Berjarano argues. "Perhaps more productive (and more interesting) than firing off the label 'essentialist' as a 'term of infallible critique' [she draws upon Diana Fuss's analysis here] is to ask what motivates the deployment of essentialism" (p. 12), or how it functions in a text. She offers a compelling case that Anzaldúa deploys identity to ́give voice and substance to subjects rendered mute and invisible" (pp. 12-13). Anzaldúa maintains a vital "tension … between … activity … and crystallized production" and writes with great awareness that naming "both extends the possibilities of 'crossings and mixings' and 'inevitably sels up boundaries'" (p. 17).
44. See Norma Alarcón's provocative analyses of Chicana reinterpretations of Malinche in ́Traddutora, Traditora: A Paradigmatic Figure of Chicana Feminism, ́ Culture Critique, fall 1989 (p. 58), and her "Chicana's Feminist Literature: A Re-Vision through Malintzin/or Malintzin: Putting Flesh Back on the Object, "in This Bridge Called My Back.
45. See Norma Alarcón's provocative analyses of Chicana reinterpretations of Malinche in ́Traddutora, Traditora: A Paradigmatic Figure of Chicana Feminism, ́ Culture Critique, fall 1989 (p. 58), and her "Chicana's Feminist Literature: A Re-Vision through Malintzin/or Malintzin: Putting Flesh Back on the Object, "in This Bridge Called My Back.
46. Ibid., 86.
47. (Boston: South End, 1983).
48. See, for example, Octavio Paz, Labyrinth of Solitude, 86-87; Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America (New York: Harper, 1985), 101; Moraga, Loving in the War Years; Adelaida R. del Castillo, "Malintzin Tenepal: A Preliminary Look Into a New Perspective, "in Essays on La Mujer, eds., Rosaura Sanchez and Rosa Martinez Cruz (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Center Publications, University of California, Los Angeles, 1977); Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs, "217-19.
49. See, for example, Octavio Paz, Labyrinth of Solitude, 86-87; Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America (New York: Harper, 1985), 101; Moraga, Loving in the War Years; Adelaida R. del Castillo, "Malintzin Tenepal: A Preliminary Look Into a New Perspective, "in Essays on La Mujer, eds., Rosaura Sanchez and Rosa Martinez Cruz (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Center Publications, University of California, Los Angeles, 1977); Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs, "217-19.
50. See, for example, Octavio Paz, Labyrinth of Solitude, 86-87; Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America (New York: Harper, 1985), 101; Moraga, Loving in the War Years; Adelaida R. del Castillo, "Malintzin Tenepal: A Preliminary Look Into a New Perspective, "in Essays on La Mujer, eds., Rosaura Sanchez and Rosa Martinez Cruz (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Center Publications, University of California, Los Angeles, 1977); Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs, "217-19.
51. See, for example, Octavio Paz, Labyrinth of Solitude, 86-87; Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America (New York: Harper, 1985), 101; Moraga, Loving in the War Years; Adelaida R. del Castillo, "Malintzin Tenepal: A Preliminary Look Into a New Perspective, "in Essays on La Mujer, eds., Rosaura Sanchez and Rosa Martinez Cruz (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Center Publications, University of California, Los Angeles, 1977); Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs, "217-19.
52. See, for example, Octavio Paz, Labyrinth of Solitude, 86-87; Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America (New York: Harper, 1985), 101; Moraga, Loving in the War Years; Adelaida R. del Castillo, "Malintzin Tenepal: A Preliminary Look Into a New Perspective, "in Essays on La Mujer, eds., Rosaura Sanchez and Rosa Martinez Cruz (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Center Publications, University of California, Los Angeles, 1977); Haraway, "A Manifesto for Cyborgs, "217-19.
53. "Postmodernism, 'Realism, ' and the Politics of Identity, "131.
54. "Traddutora, Traditora, "86.
55. See Paz, Labyrinth of Solitude.
56. Ibid., 82.
57. See Political Liberalism, lecture 4.
58. John Rawls, Political Liberalism, 26.
59. Rawls does seek this in a modest way by means of some structural adjustments such as public campaign finance reforms. See, for example, Political Liberalism, "Introduction to the Paperback Edition."
60. Ibid., 283.
61. Ibid., 269.
62. Rawls is surely right to argue against libertarians that the difference principle does not necessarily imply random state interventions that slide inexorably toward totalitarianism.
63. The phrase and idea "theory in the flesh" is elaborated by numerous authors in This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. It is also extensively articulated by Anzaldúa in Borderlands, Lorde in Sister Outsider
64. The phrase and idea "theory in the flesh" is elaborated by numerous authors in This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. It is also extensively articulated by Anzaldúa in Borderlands, Lorde in Sister Outsider
65. The phrase and idea "theory in the flesh" is elaborated by numerous authors in This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. It is also extensively articulated by Anzaldúa in Borderlands, Lorde in Sister Outsider
66. Moraga in Loving in the War Years, and numerous other works.
67. Connections between "abjection" and justice are explored in Iris Young's Justice and the Politics of Difference
68. and William Connolly's Why I Am Net a Secularist (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999) contains extensive discussions of "affect" in relation to the issues at hand. On "flesh" and "intercorporeality, "
69. see also Romand Coles Self/Power/Other: Political Theory and Dialogicul Ethics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992).
70. Political Liberalism, 205.
71. Ibid., 206.
72. The right not to participate in such politics should not be confused as a principled banning of this vision.
73. But as Chela Sandoval, in "U.S. Third World Feminism: The Theory and Method of Oppositional Consciousness in the Postmodern World." Genders 10 (spring 1991), the periods of conflict around essentialist reductions tend to be significantly shorter in movements among women of color.
74. Bernice Johnson Reagon, "Coalition Politics: Turning the Century, "in Homegirls: A Black Feminist Anthology, ed. Barbara Smith (New York: Kitchen Table/Woman of Color Press, 1983).
75. See Sandoval, "U.S. Third World Feminism."
76. On receptive generosity, see Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997).
77. Sister Outsider, 111.
78. Ibid.
79. Ibid., 147.
80. bell hooks and Cornell West, Breaking Bread: Insurgent Black Intellectual Life (Boston: South End, 1991).
81. For an interesting discussion of neopopulist coalition politics in the U.S. southwest that cuts across and transfigures lines of class, religion, race, and gender, see Mary Beth Rogers, Cold Anger: A Story of Faith and Power Politics.
82. "Interview with Gloria Anzaldúa, "232, twelve years after Borderlands was first published. Printed in 2d ed., 1999.
83. Sister Outsider, 132.
84. For example, Wendy Brown, "Injury, Identity, Politics, "in Mapping Multiculturalism. See Susan Bickford's thoughtful critical responses to Brown in "Anti-Anti Identity Politics: Feminism, Democracy and the Complexities of Citizenship, "Hypatia, fall 1997, 111-31.
85. For example, Wendy Brown, "Injury, Identity, Politics, "in Mapping Multiculturalism. See Susan Bickford's thoughtful critical responses to Brown in "Anti-Anti Identity Politics: Feminism, Democracy and the Complexities of Citizenship, "Hypatia, fall 1997, 111-31.
86. Lorde, "The Uses of Anger, "in Sister Outsider, 127-29. See also Mary Beth Rogers, Cold Anger.
87. Lorde, "The Uses of Anger, "in Sister Outsider, 127-29. See also Mary Beth Rogers, Cold Anger.
88. Thus, Anzaldúa writes, "All reaction is limited by, and dependent upon what it is reacting against" (Borderlands, p. 78). Similarly, Lorde writes, "Anger is useful to clarify our differences, but in the long run, strength that is bred by anger alone is a blind force which cannot create the future. It can only demolish the past" (Sister Outsider, p. 152).
89. Thus, Anzaldúa writes, "All reaction is limited by, and dependent upon what it is reacting against" (Borderlands, p. 78). Similarly, Lorde writes, "Anger is useful to clarify our differences, but in the long run, strength that is bred by anger alone is a blind force which cannot create the future. It can only demolish the past" (Sister Outsider, p. 152).
90. Sister Outsider, 127.
91. At this point, Gutman and Thompson get off the boat. See Democracy and Deliberation, 135-37.
92. Sister Outsider, 130. A similar point is made in Cold Anger.
93. Sister Outsider, 130. A similar point is made in Cold Anger.