Getting to a Baseline on Identity Politics: the Marxist Debate (original) (raw)
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Even before the term identity-politics came into use, there were those who engaged in a political thought process based in identity. These individuals critiqued not only mainstream culture and society, but the ways in which they believed the left had overlooked the significance of race, gender and sexuality in favor of perspectives it deemed more foundational, such as class, economic structure and later philosophical questions of meaning in form. Frantz Fanon, Ralph Ellison and Simone de Beauvoir were but a few writers who directly criticized the left, pointing out perspectives overlooked in the discourse of social equality and fair distribution of resources. Those who took up the cause of critique from the standpoint of identity had a major task. They were charged with informing the world of leftist thoughtboth in the academy and in the arts-of the urgency to address race, gender and sexuality. Moreover, they had to exhibit the ways in which these critical perspectives could illuminate omissions within the accepted discourses of social and political justice and their cultural manifestations.
An Introduction to Identity Politics
Historical Materialism, 2018
This special issue responds to ongoing debates around what has been termed ‘identity politics’. We aim to intervene in what are make-or-break questions for the Left today. Specifically, we wish to provoke further interrogative but comradely conversation that works towards breaking-down the wedge between vulgar economism and vulgar culturalism. Critically, we maintain that just as all identity categories are spatially and temporally contingent – socially constructed, yet naturalised – so too is this current bifurcation between ‘class politics’ and ‘identity politics’. Ultimately, we call for an intellectual and organisational embracing of the complexity of identity as it figures in contemporary conditions; being a core organising-principle of capitalism as it functions today, a paradigm that Leftist struggle can be organised through and around – and yet all with a recognition of the necessity of historicising, and ultimately abolishing, these categories along with capitalism itself.
Aesthetics in Identity Politics: Cumulative Aesthetics, Emplotment, and Empathy
2020
Contemporary identity politics, politics based on affiliation with a particular societal group in contradistinction from one or more others, typically becomes galvanized in response to a sense that those so affiliated have been marginalized or harmed. Art and aesthetic gestures utilized in contexts of identity politics serve a number of roles, among them drawing attention to the marginalization or harm to specific groups, consolidating those who share a particular political identity, and promoting empathy for members of such groups’ members. Another aesthetic strategy frequently utilized in efforts to promote social justice toward particular groups is the use of cumulative aesthetics, in which the amassing of instances is used to achieve an impact. Because so often aimed at rectifying arrangements that are perceived as unjust, groups that advocate on behalf of those who share their political identity tend to be energized in reaction to circumstances. There is a danger of their becom...
Art, Understanding, and Political Change
2015
Feminist artworks can be a resource in our attempt to understand individual identities as neither singular nor fixed, and in our related attempts both to theorize and to practice forms of connection to others that do not depend on shared identities. Engagement with these works has the potential to increase our critical social con-sciousness, making us more aware of oppression and privilege, and more committed to overcoming oppression. In what follows, I argue that feminist artworks can be a resource1 in our attempt to understand individual identities as neither singular nor fixed, and in our related attempts both to theorize and practice forms of connection to others that do not depend on shared identities. Engagement with feminist works of art, particularly those that address multiple dimensions of individual and group identities, has the potential to increase what I will call, following Freire, our critical social consciousness, such that we can increasingly “identi-fy societal po...
LitNet Akademies, 2021
This article focuses on the cultural politics typical of recent, decolonial student protests in South Africa and asks the following questions: How can white artists who are critical of “whiteness” contribute to black liberation politics? What are the main criticisms of black activists against such contributions, and how can we understand and judge such criticisms? And what role do gender issues play in all this? Specifically, the article reflects on the controversial artwork Fuck White People (FWP) by Dean Hutton, a non-gender conforming performance artist, made as part of the aforementioned student protests. The article focuses specifically on the harsh criticism, rejection even, of this work by a black cultural critic (Kwanele Sosibo) and analyses and assesses the arguments, implicit presuppositions and practical implications. The purpose of the article is to qualify, complicate, and question one-dimensional and somewhat formulaic readings in terms of key concepts within decolonial thought, such as white privilege, white guilt, and white tears. For this purpose, various alternative interpretations of FWP are developed on the basis of concepts such as over-identification, race suicide, symbolic politics, intersectionality and the politics of marginality.
Beyond Identity Politics: The New Culture Wars and Art Education
Journal of Cultural Research in Art Education, 2017
With the surprise election of Donald J. Trump as the 45 th president of the United States and the subsequent resurgence of conservative social policies, this article situates the culture wars-the mini theme of this issue-within art education's focus on multicultural and social justice initiatives. Harkening back to the battle between conservative republican moralist legislative policy and liberal values, we situate our work in the populist political landscape of Trump's victory, which has re-inscribed difference marked by geography, race, class, gender, and religion while simultaneously engendering hostility towards the liberal values that seek to build inclusiveness and political agency for marginalized and oppressed peoples. Addressing rhetorical pastiche, we focus on how the identity politics of postmodern, multicultural art education have failed to give adequate consideration to the material systems of power and production. We then introduce the idea of new material precarity as a way to think about the entanglements of discourse and matter to suggest a more inclusive and intersectional approach to art education.