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B2 W4: Somatechnics - Seminar

Politics of Vulnerability

 (De)colonisation and (un)veiling - War of Independence, 'bodies in question', burqa law

"Who [can] occupy and who must be occupied" (perera & Pugliese 2011, p.5)

The Algerian War of Independence (1954-1962)

"If we want to destroy the structure of Algerian society, its capacity for resistance, we must first of all conquer the women; we must go and find them behind the veil where they hide themselves and in the houses where the men keep them out of sight." (Fanon 1965, p.37/38)

Women become a symbol of the oppressed. Perpetuates the idea that Algeria need France to become better - however it is a sign of colonial oppression rather than liberation.

 Burqa law in NL

- 26th June 2018 - Burqa law proposed
- Femke Halsema (mayor of Amsterdam): 'freedom to unveil' and 'protecting those who choose to veil'
- Creation of false safety and limiting freedom

How capitalism feels: depression and anxiety

- Gorska's text on ethics and politics of matterwork and Cvetkovich's introduction of Depression: A public feeling
- Feeling bad might be the ground for political transformation
- How to live a better life by embracing rather than neglecting bad feelings

- How do you feel? How does capitalism feel? Professional obligations causing exhaustion. Neo-liberalism desires productivity and dismisses failure

"Depression is another manifestation of forms of biopower that produce life and death not only targeting populations for overt destruction, whether through incarceration, war, or poverty, but also more insidiously by making people feel small, worthless, hopeless." (Cvetokvich, 2012, p.13)

The provision of grades within a gender studies department goes agains the ideas we talk about today - surely feedback is a better response to essay submissions than a number, followed by a statistic that ranks students against each other, encouraging a feeling of competition and invalidating individual success. Showing rankings turns us into human capital that privileges success and productivity and fosters an unhealthy power dynamic between us and our lecturers rather than an equal level of respect.
The Gender Studies department preaches equality but does not live up to it's practices

Queer existence and depression - Similar to other groups who might feel vulenerable, queer existence should embrace feeling of hope. "If queer politics is about freedom, it might simply mean the freedom to breathe." (Ahmed, 2010 in Gorska 2016)

Heather Love on feeling backward

"The history of Western representation is littered with the corpses of gender and sexual deviants" (Love, 2007, p.1)

"These texts do have a lot to tell us, though: they describe what it is like to bear a "disqualified" identity, which at times can simply mean living with injury - not fixing it" (Love, 2007, p.4)

Visibility of wealthy, White gays who celebrate gay marriage but don't lift up other gays, cause a feeling of shame and isolation.

Docile Agency -

Subaltern - can the person who kills themselves speak for themselves?

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