Abstract Critical Race Theory generally and intersectionality theory in particular have provided ... more Abstract Critical Race Theory generally and intersectionality theory in particular have provided scholars and activists with clear accounts of how the legal approaches to oppression that have been taken up through the anti-discrimination principle have failed ...
Some Very Basic Tips for Making Higher Education More Accessible to Trans Students and Rethinking How We Talk about Gendered Bodies
The Radical Teacher, 2012
+ Set a tone of respect. At the beginning of each semester when establishing the guidelines for c... more + Set a tone of respect. At the beginning of each semester when establishing the guidelines for class (do not surf the internet while in class, do the reading, be punctual) include something like:It is important that this classroom be a respectful environment where ...
We occasionally publish “Currents” in American Quarterly, which are intended as timely forms of w... more We occasionally publish “Currents” in American Quarterly, which are intended as timely forms of writing that contribute and intervene in contemporary issues of importance to scholars in American studies. It is our hope that “Currents” will provide a forum for debates over the directions of the field and how the interdisciplinary field of American studies defines itself and is defined by others. The following is a conversation among the intellectuals and activists Eric A. Stanley, Dean Spade, Andrea J. Ritchie, Joey L. Mogul, and Kay Whitlock, about queer abolitionist politics. The scholars and organizers involved wanted to mark this particular moment as a coalescence of years of organizing, struggling, and building a radically queer abolitionist politics. The piece is written jointly, to highlight how this analysis, and abolition in general, is a collective endeavor. The following conversation was conducted by e-mail in November 2011.
In the current political moment in the United States, defined by climate crisis, increased border... more In the current political moment in the United States, defined by climate crisis, increased border enforcement, attacks on public benefits, expansive carceral control, rising housing costs, and growing white right-wing populism, leftist social movement activists and organizations face two particular challenges that, though not new, are urgent. The first is how to address the actual changing conditions that are increasing precarity and shortening lives. The second is how to mobilize people for resistance. In the face of these conditions, movements might strengthen, mobilizing tens of millions of new people to directly fight back against cops, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), welfare authorities, landlords, budget cuts, polluters, the defense industry, prison profiteers, and right-wing organizations. Or, movement organizations could fail to provide any real relief for those whose lives are most endangered and leave newly scared and angry people to the most passive and ineffective forms of expressing their opinions. This article argues that, in the face of these conditions, expanding use of mutual aid strategies will be the most effective way to support vulnerable populations to survive, mobilize significant resistance, and build the infrastructure we need for the coming disasters. Based on my observations participating in policy reform work, public education efforts, and mutual aid projects in movements for queer and trans liberation and prison and border abolition and my study of related and overlapping efforts, I argue that mutual aid is an often devalued iteration of radical collective care that provides a transformative alternative to the demobilizing frameworks for understanding social change and expressing dissent that dominate the popular imagination. I examine the benefits of mutual aid, its challenges, and how those are being addressed by contemporary organizations mobilizing through mutual aid.
This keyword essay from the Oxford Handbook on Feminist Theory examines the concepts of norms and... more This keyword essay from the Oxford Handbook on Feminist Theory examines the concepts of norms and normalization.
This article looks at the recent proliferation of statistics about LGBT populations and examines ... more This article looks at the recent proliferation of statistics about LGBT populations and examines how these statistics are used by legal advocates. It puts that use in the context of critiques of LGBT equality strategies and the eugenics origins of statistical methods to ask what is at stake when portraying LGBT people as "rights-deserving."
This essay examines the case of Chelsea Manning in the larger context of both U.S. imperial war a... more This essay examines the case of Chelsea Manning in the larger context of both U.S. imperial war and the ways in which gender and sexuality are deployed in service of colonialism, racism, and militarism. Situating the Manning case alongside two contemporaneous events, the attempted prosecution of Julian Assange on rape charges and Hillary Clinton's much-lauded " gay rights are human rights " speech, we argue that Manning's trans identity has challenged both right and left commentators to absorb her into projects of pinkwashing and homonationalism. We conclude with a consideration about what anti-war, anti-imperial, anti-carceral LGBT politics and organizing around this case might look like.
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