Recognition?

In chapter 7, the ideas of person-hood and subjectivity are addressed with regard to the social and cultural foundation of recognition. Who is recognized throughout our society? The concept of "identity", yet again, is drawn to question. Are you an interdependent subject or an independent subject (is it possible to be independent of others, of the society)? It is near impossible to rid oneself of the patriarchal societal norms -- most institution throughout the world are built through these foundations (patriarchal foundations). Thus, how does one attain recognition? By going against the societal norms? This makes me think of Pussy Riot -- attempting to draw attention to the atrocities occurring within their home country. Yes, I do believe that they gained recognition but from who? The Anti-Homosexuality law remains intact (even after the winter Olympics...a rather frightening month for athletes...).

Freedom and the Law

Caleb Parsons

Crucial to understanding the political philosophies posited by Judith Butler and Athena Athanasiou is a recognition of the relationally and performativity of identity. The human subject becomes manifest through an act of differing, which takes place persistently throughout the subjects existence. Butler and Athanasiou point out neoliberal individualism as a drastic departure from their political theory. By ignoring the socialization and indebtedness to others, neoliberalism misses the relationality of the creation of the political subject. For Butler and Athanasiou, political subjects never exist in any pure autonomy since we are reliant upon others in order to be created as thinking-speaking subjects. Similar to points brought up by Linda Zerilli in her work Feminism and the Abyss of Freedom, Zerilli emphasizes the necessity for feminists to engage in a more open, flexible form of democracy. Serial makes it clear that people are intrinsically linked to the social groups that seek to define them. Within these social groups, it is impossible for any individual to speak for the perspectives and experiences held by the group. While this is the case, democratic politics is defined by the act of "speaking for" others within a social group. This dependency on each other for political and social recognition leaves the individual vulnerable to misrepresentation and alienation. What Zerilli later advocates is for a political discourse that takes into consideration the impossibility of speaking for "everybody," and direct the discussion around a looser, more reflective process. Butler and Athanasiou make it clear that bodies do not wholly possess themselves; in reality, the "other" is in possession of our bodies.

How much of the thoughts and ideas experienced by the individual subject are theirs, as opposed to manifestations of socialized modes of thought?

The Role of Ignorance in Identity

 “…you have traced in the very process of giving an account of one’s self, precisely at moments of unknowingness, an affirmative dimension, namely the potentiality of self-poietics—that is, the narration of the self, which assumes the norm and at the same time potentially deconstructs it.” (Butler and Athanasiou 93)

According to the quote above, it almost seems as if ignorance allows an individual the freedom of self-creation. That is, through the act of questioning norms, one can thereby determine the self. According to Tuana’s ideas of ignorance, however, ignorance is always harmful to an individual as it hides truth and disempowers groups on a systematic level. While these two constructs of ignorance seem opposed, they actually share the same end-game: to become open-minded so ignorance can be continually righted as ignorance is continued in new forms.

If it is in the act of erasing ignorance that one can be self-identified, then it is in the same act that one gains knowledge not only in the self, but in the act of “exposure” and “self-othering” (Butler and Athanasiou 106).

Within identity, many types of ignorance can play a role, including they do not want us to know and we do not even know that we do not know, sometimes both at the same time. As one identifies with the other, they ultimately deconstruct the norm which they no longer prescribe to and ultimately their existence questions the very basis of society—it’s social construction. Yet even when we deconstruct them, by identifying as “other” and something different, we give them power to keep others in the dark: “Although we do not own or choose the norms through which we come to exist and connect to others, we bear a responsibility for sustaining them, in a way, even while keeping them open and contestable” (Butler and Athanasiou 104).

Extra Credit: Prof. Linda Alcoff Talk

          Professor Linda Alcoff’s talk on the “Complicated Experience of Rape” analyzed how present-day reactions and interpretations of survivor speech create harmful and deeply nuanced  divisions between rape survivor’s experiences and the interpretations and articulations of these experiences by both the survivor and the respondent. Alcoff primarily focused on the experience of sexual violation as an intangible, yet meaningful event that transcends “fleeting perceptions and subjective sensations.” Alcoff uses this definition in order to further her main argument—because survivor speech is frequently discredited due to the loaded history that governs responses to sexual violations both in the past and present, it is critical to hear and trust survivors ‘experiences in whichever way they choose to articulate it.

Survivor speech is a critical element of resistance in that it allows the survivor to articulate their own perceptions of a particular event to the best of their ability. Alcoff argues that the discrediting of this speech is what contributes to many epistemic issues surrounding the general experience of sexual violation and rape. Though Alcoff acknowledges that the term “experience” is not favored by many philosophers, she notes that while rape survivors may not be able to fully verbalize their experience, it is still meaningful nonetheless. The discrediting of these experiences stems from women’s historically low epistemic status, which manifests itself as ideological socialization that abuse is deserved or imagined. After experiencing a sexual violation, a friend of Alcoff’s coined the term “grey-rape” on account of the disconnect between her experience and the available terms through which she could articulate her experience. “Grey-rape” reflects the problem caused by inadequate descriptions of events.  The perception that they “belie sophistication” is ultimately problematic and further extends the idea that rape survivors’s accounts of their experiences are neither respected nor relevant.

At this point in her speech, Alcoff began to introduce the issue of temporality in regards to survivor speech. Using Foucalt’s theories from the History of Sexuality, Alcoff argues that the manner in which we respond to events is produced in relation to history and time. The given power knowledge regime, or heteronomy, produces the meaning of certain experiences and in turn governs how individuals perceive events that happened to them. Alcoff argues that this idea is seen in “rape scripts,” which she vaguely defines as recognizable patterns of behavior that are in accordance with an individual’s identity. The argument that feminist accounts of rape work to create “rape scripts” is seen in the way rape is portrayed as a “fate worse than death.” This apocalyptic tone reinforces the idea that a woman’s virtue is more important than her life and further victimizes victims.

Alcoff argues that without this popular portrayal of rape in feminist circles, rape survivors are more likely to go “off script,” meaning that they debase themselves from the current power knowledge regime in order to create an account that more adequately describes their experience. The initiation of unwanted and intrusive touch by the other begins the process of first-person subjectivity, and in doing so, allows the victims to become the primary authorities in the process of meaning-making. Because rape survivors are marginalized from the position of “meaning-making,” this cannot truly occur in the current epistemic atmosphere.  Ultimately, Alcoff argues, the existing current language used to discuss rape and other sexual violations are not adequate and are under “long-overdue contestation.” The experiences of survivors are critical because they are not simply fleeting emotions, but rather they are “of and in the social world.” 

Responsiveness as an Ethical Duty in Politics & Society

Like some of the other posts, I also thought Butler and Athanasiou's discussion of responsiveness as almost a moral obligation was very interesting and differed drastically from a lot of the readings we've seen this semester. Most of the authors have worked to address a social issue within the context of what is right or good based on basic human rights and autonomy owed to each individual being. But I never really saw any author argue that those who support or participate (or in some cases choose to shut themselves off) in the capitalist, patriarchal society are immoral as much as Butler and Athanasiou seem to do. They both argue that to remain open and responsive in trying to change the system is a moral obligation and necessity to the constant evolution of politics and society, even if it results in an individual continuing in an uncomfortable situation. This seems perfectly logical in and of itself, but I wonder how many people are actually willing to do so? Obviously those who have martyred themselves for a specific cause or belief, but is it realistic to expect every member of society to always be present and participating? These concepts seem like they would fit better in a more pluralistic society like that which some of the past authors have discussed (Young & Mouffe), but again, I wonder how realistically achievable that type of environment is? To me, it almost seems better to completely dismantle the political and social structures entirely because even if more marginalized voices attempt to participate, would their voices even be heard in the current power structure?

Dispossession: The Performative in the Political

Hande Lara Sever

For this response I’ll be concentrating on chapter 14 as Athanasiou and Butler give very good examples representing how capitalist democracy lacks plurality. Athanasiou says “New political collectives, such as the Indignados of Spain, the Outraged of Greece and Occupy Wall Street in the United States seek to reclaim democracy from capitalism and corporate power.” The protests organized by these collectives faced severe police brutality and crack down, and as a result the homogeneous accumulation of wealth among the very few continues and neoliberal politics continue to disadvantage masses and leave them voiceless. Mouffe states that for an inclusive democracy the legitimation of conflict and division is necessary for the assertion of equal liberty for all.Thus according to Mouffe’s argument these happen because an inclusive democracy is not integrated and rather governments function with corporate interest. “When the Outraged in Athens planned a symbolic encirclement of the Parliament House to stop a five year austerity plan, the police pre-emptively enclosed the parliament in an ironclad fortification in order to thwart the protesters.” This is a very interesting example as it literally shows how the parliament that is supposed to represent people’s will is eliticized and is unable to represent public interest and this failure is protected with police power in order to continue being a functional state according to Rawls. The austerity measures that are imposed on Greece is considered as the universal rational consensus by the European Union and Greek people who revolted against these measures are often represented as “irrational” and “unreasonable”. As a result both the European Parliament and the Greek Parliament fails to overcome the problem because of the elimination of legitimate dissent. As Iris Young stated in Polity and Group Difference “In a society where some groups are privileged while others are oppressed insisting that as citizens persons should leave behind their particular affiliations and experiences to adopt a general point of view serves only to reinforce that privilege; for the perspectives and interests of the privileged will tend to dominate this unified public, marginalizing or silencing those of other groups.” As a result what we see in Europe today is the reinforcement of privilege through austerity measures.

Extra Credit: Linda Alcoff and Sexual Violence

Hande Lara Sever

     Linda Alcoff’s speech was based on how to hear survivor speech. She stated that stories that does not fit the binary categories often get discredited. This is a fact that has always strike me because I think a survivor who goes through this process experiences a double violation: the person or group who violated her personal space and the society who violated her experience. I think questioning the validity of an experience is a very harmful and since according to Alcoff we are socialized in a rape culture the questioning comes from the dominant culture who defines what is rape and what is violation according to their own norms. There are cultures who position women in a way that labels the experience of abuse as deserved which raises the question while such ideas exist how can we define rape and abuse? She also stated that discrediting the experience often happens when the survivor changes claims. This reminded me of the UVA rape case which was brought to attention by the Rolling Stones magazine this year but then the magazine retracted the article saying that the survivor changed her claims.
    Alcoff also introduces a new term called grey rape. I found this term very useful as it broadens the understanding of violation and opens space for discussion. For instance, a person can consent to have sex with another person while being drunk but might feel violated the next day. This is a grey space as the person might consent according to patriarchal norms that does not fit their personal beliefs. I think this experience often happens because we inhibit a dominant culture that does not always define what we truly want or consent to. So I think making these ideas tangible and opening it for discussion is very constructive.
    Lastly the connection she made between touching and objectification was very interesting to me because I was not introduced to such a connection before. I think it is important to
understand its validity as we touch and feel objects. So what happens when we touch a human? This is a topic that needs to be reflected on more.

Responsiveness as Responsibility: Butler, Athanasiou and Young

Sammy Karon

28 March 2015

            In Chapter 10, Butler and Athanasiou discuss responsiveness as responsibility. Butler describes responsiveness as how we offer ourselves to others, and both writers see an ethical component to this (109). Should people remain open if the environment they live in is dangerous? On the one hand, you have to lookout for yourself to survive. But on the other, if you choose to disengage, then the environment around you has one less responsive person in it, making everyone worse off. Athanasiou suggests that it is political to be affected and to be able affect others (118). Thus, much of the time we see a simultaneous need for self-defense and interdependence. The political solution to this, it seems, is structural changes. If political structures were in place to people feel responsible to each other and safe to act on those empathetic tendencies, all would be better off. However, as Butler writes, “It is difficult to stay open when what comes at you is an assault on your being, and this is the risk of remaining an impressionable and receptive being” (110). This issue connects well with Iris Young’s discussion of communicative democracy.

            In “Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy,” Iris Young contrasts communicative democracy with deliberative democracy. In theory, a deliberative democracy solves many collective dilemmas by getting rid of differences and focusing on what unites political voices. However, by devaluing human differences, deliberative democracy makes devalues certain voices as well. Thus, Young advocates for communicative democracy, or a political arena in which citizens are strengthened by engaging with one another’s differences. This argument seems to represent the structural dimensions Butler and Athanasiou see as getting in the way of responsiveness. Without an incentive to engage with people different from themselves, responsiveness is dangerous. However, Young proposes that being open can be a political solution as long as a polity understands that their collective strength requires it. In this way, the desire to influence political outcomes can be seen as an incentive to overcome collective action problems via responsiveness.

Alcoff Extra Credit Response

Lillian Foy

Extra Credit Response

I was somewhat confused by Linda Alcoff’s discussion on grey rape and the significance of redefining it in that way, although after class I think I grasped the concept much better. Grey rape was essentially created to address the difference between verbal consent and actual desire. I think this is very important because socialization and peer pressure often subconsciously forces a “yes” when we genuinely do not want to behave that way. If a girl is interested in a guy but does not sleep with him after a few dates, society would define her as a prude. This carries the implicitly negative connotation of being stuck up and rigid, however, the woman may just want to know the man better or be in a monogamous relationship before intercourse. Society also teaches men that women like a chase, so they should keep asking even when they have already been told no because if they show enough interest or pursuit the woman will give in. Redefining rape in this way helps those who may not normally have a voice or know exactly how to express their feelings of violation or disrespect within the current social context, while also acting to take back some degree of power over the language and institutionalization of abuse.

I do think, however, that there is a problem in transitioning Alcoff’s theory over into practice. Regardless of whether or not the desire is present, under most laws not saying no means giving consent. Even under the new (arguably most advanced) California law, saying yes means giving consent. This is problematic when viewing rape through Alcoff’s definition because if a woman says yes but really means no, how could her partner be guilty of rape? How would that affect the ability to convict or the degree of guilt the defendant actually has? I think Alcoff’s definition would work if both people knew each other well enough to know when a yes was given halfheartedly, but given our current hook up culture of barely knowing sexual partners, this is rather unlikely in most cases. Also, I think there is already enough confusion and backlash against women who accuse men of rape because of those who falsely accuse men of rape or try to exhort things in exchange for silence. This idea of grey rape would only further complicate this aspect of the legality of rape. So while I think theoretically the benefits of grey rape far outweigh the consequences, I think there needs to be far more work done in incorporating the theory into our current legal framework. 

Dispossession of the body

What I found rather intriguing was Athanasiou's comment, made in the beginning, which stated "being dispossessed refers to processes and ideologies by which persons are disowned and abjected by normative and normalizing powers that define cultural intelligibility and that regulate the distribution of vulnerability:....ownership of one's living body by another person, as in histories of slavery". She further states, "language may fail us here insofar as such a formulation contrives to establish a causal link between "being" dispossessed, on the one side, and "becoming" or "being made" dispossessed, on the other. Is it possible to experience both forms of dispossession? I would like to further analyze the idea of "being" and/ or "becoming" dispossessed from one's body through the lens of human trafficking victims. In doing so, I would like to refer back to Young's definition of powerlessness. Women and children are the most affected population in the trafficking of persons in Mexico and are usually trafficked into commercial sex positions. Some of the most common forms of commercial sexual exploitation of children are sex trafficking, child pornography and child sex tourism. There are number of other factors contributing to child sex trafficking. Risley characterizes these factors as “push” factors and “pull” factors” (102). “Push” factors are those that draw women and girls into the hands of traffickers due to economic, social, cultural, and political conditions. Many of the victims of trafficking are poor and uneducated or are living within a society where gender discrimination is prevalent. Traffickers are also known to take advantage of governmental or political unrest, exploiting the weakened rule of law, damaged economy, and loss of community support networks. “Pull” factors are correlated with demand for the sexual bodies of women and girls. The demand tends to be the highest in densely populated areas, near military bases, and regions with skewed sex ratios. However, when it comes to the policy-oriented focus, the “push” factors are more visible and deemed more significant than the “pull” factors (Risley, 102). Although Risley spoke specifically on human trafficking in Mexico, these factors (push and pull factors) are highly relevant towards any country that is involved in human trafficking (especially the United States). It is evident that both the push and pull factors are embedded with notions of powerlessness - powerlessness over one's life, body, etc. This sense of powerlessness encapsulates the notion of "being" dispossessed, specifically by a patriarchal society. However, I would argue that, in the case of human trafficking, the larger percentage of victims are experiencing the act of "becoming" or "being made" dispossessed through their powerlessness (especially those who were taken advantage by unstable governments).
Athanasiou further notates that there is a "very complicated affective, psychic, and political dynamic involved in the multiple nuances of "becoming dispossessed". Many victims of human trafficking experience violence -- sexual violence, physical violence, psychological violence, etc. Victims are unable to escape this reality. They are constantly "being made" dispossessed from their human qualities -- they no longer have control over themselves or their actions.

Risley, A. (2010). Sex Trafficking: The “Other” Crisis in Mexico?. Latin Americanist, 54(1), 99-117. doi:10.1111/j.1557-203X.2010.01060.x

The Logic of Possession & Young/MacKinnon

When reading Butler and Athanasiou's pieces, the phrase  "outside the logic of possession" struck me because it really seemed to connect back to Young and MacKinnon's work on gender binaries and Kant's idea of the original position and veil of ignorance (7). Essentially Butler and Athanasiou are arguing that dispossession shouldn't be thought of as a physical, set in time event that can be marked and measured, but more as a theoretical/ philosophical place that one is often cast to in order to achieve social dominance even if it manifests itself in physical social processes (similarly to cultural imperialism, oppression, etc). Often times, it seems like Athanasiou would argue that one does not even realize that they have been dispossessed. The idea of logic made me think of Young & MacKinnon's work and how, by using specific (almost) coded language, they are again advocating to operate outside of the patriarchically controlled language and information systems. It seems that in order to really equalize society beyond the property as a natural law and right, however, one would have to undergo a similar experiment as described by Kant because no one is willingly going to vote to be dispossessed.  I don't know if I just didn't fully understand, but did Butler or Athanasiou have a similarl solution? It seems that Kant's idea, while hypothetically ideal, isn't very applicable in today's society. 

Dispossession in Relation to Place

In chapter two of Butler’s and Athanasiou’s Dispossession: The Performative in the Political, “The Logic of Dispossession” it becomes clear that dispossession can often be linked to physical place, particularly loss of ownership. “Colonial and racist assumptions have been historically mobilized to justify and naturalize the misrecognition, appropriation, and occupation of indigenous lands in colonial and post-colonial settler contexts” (pg. 10). The example of land disputes between Palestinian and Israeli forces are a clear cut example of Young’s cultural imperialism because the arbitrary law created assumes inequality and natural rights. A parallel example can be made with analysis to the colonization of the Americas because the distinctly Western ideal of property ownership—including fencing and agricultural “improvement”—was imposed on the natives, who had a seasonal and utilitarian view of land ownership (Cronon’s Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonist, and the Ecology of New England).

For “European colonies, property ownership was a prerequisite for proper political subjectivity and citizenship, but also at the same time, attached to race and gender requirements—that is, whiteness and maleness—the signified proper (and propertied) civilized” view of humanity (pg. 27). Essentially, the ownership of property legitimized citizenry and humanity. For the European colonists, however, exploitation didn’t stop at the land resources they depleted, but in people were exploited for labor and methodology to surviving (and even thriving) in various regions. “Colonial violence can work both ways, by depriving an indigenous population of their land, and yet restricting the mobility of that population to the very land they no longer own (pg. 23).

Slavery is perhaps the clearest and most concrete example of a non-being since the slave is perceptually powerless under threat of and the reality of violence, but non-beings exist in those who are marginalized without violence too. In the post-slavery civil rights contexts, this marginalization can be highlighted as “separate but equal.” In the example of Rosa Parks, such as suggested by the text, “self-identity carries the genealogical burden of a metaphysics of presence, but, at the same time, it is not determined by the burden of histories in which it has been entrenched” (pg. 17). In occupying a mental space of stubbornness, “staying in placed [required] movement, or displacement” of the mind from cultural norms (pg. 22). Even some former slaves claimed to have found a sense of free-will in the ownership of their own minds, despite their situational environment; they still were considered non-beings due to the physicality of their slavery, and due to this ever-present relatability to the external world we all maintain a certain level of dispossession. 

Dispossession and Neutrality

In the beginning of Butler and Athanasiou's book on dispossession, the two authors note that they are attempting to think of dispossession "outside the logic of possession," or in other words not as a physical event that is inflicted on an individual or a group but rather as a theoretical trope in which one must call into question the "exclusionary calculus of proprietarianess in late liberal forms of power" (7). I am drawn to this particular passage because it establishes the ultimate goal of Butler and Athanasiou's book, and it calls into question the modes of normalization behind the physical dispossession. In chapter 2, The Logic of Dispossession, Athanasiou determines that the "metaphysics of presence" is mapped onto particular bodies, which results in their objectification and "perenially non-human" status (19).

Though she notes that there are certain"dispossessed subjectivities" of race, gender, sexuality, able-bodiedness, economy, and citizenship that are socially constructed to be less valuable than others, Athanasiou does not explicitly state which of these particular identities are not as frequently demoted to the 'non-human' status. Rather, the reader can infer that just as certain forms of violence are normalized, so are certain identities. Honig's piece, "Difference, Dilemmas, and the Politics," she notes that there are certain identities that considered to be more "neutral" than the rest, which institutionalizes a certain standard without taking into account the varying histories and backgrounds of the population as a whole. I think that in this respect, Athanasiou and Honig would agree that the valorization of particular identities has hazardous effects, but they have their own take on what these effects are.

Dispossession: The Performative within the Political, Cultural Imperialism the US war on "terror"

Hande Lara Sever

           This interview functions as an extension of Butler’s essay Undoing Gender.  In Undoing Gender Butler states that to encounter oppression requires one’s understanding of how lives are supported and maintained differentially. In the book Dispossession: The Performative in the Political Athanasiou extends this argument with the case of Abu-Ghraib “… of those politically reduced to insignificant human matter, or human waste. For instance, the US coverage of the events of Abu-Ghraib, where torture and spectacle converged in an atrocious photographic scene of grotesque degradation, the singularity of the detainees’ faces was intentionally erased- reduced to unilaterally exposed and interchangeably anonymous human matter.” With this example Athanasiou unpacks both Butler’s argument on the difference in maintenance of lives and Iris Young’s cultural imperialism. Young states “ To experience cultural imperialism means to experience how the dominant meaning of a society render the particular perspective of one’s own group invisible at the same time as they stereotype one’s group and mark it as the Other.” As known, the photos released from Abu Ghraib represented Iraqis’ being tortured by American soldiers but another fact about these photos is that the tortured Iraqis’ were photographed while their faces were covered with bags which as Athanasiou states reduced them to anonymous human matter, since they lost their individuality. These photos fuction as a proof of  the vulgar effects of rendering human beings as the Other.

            Young says “… the dominant cultural products of the society, that is, those most widely disseminated, express the experience, values, goals, and achievements of these groups. Often without noticing they do so, the dominant groups project their own experience as representative of humanity as such.” Post 9/11 we only heard the American side of the story. On the other hand, no one even bothered to cover the other side of the story or answer simple questions as “As being an Afghani terrorist organization how is the Taliban linked to Iraq? While Taliban being the main target of the US how did Iraq enter the picture? Does or did Iraq really have/had weapons of mass destruction? Is this a war done for cheap access to oil? How legitimate is Colin Powell’s infamous speech at the UN headquarters? How many lives did Bush destroy while trying to bring ‘democracy’ to Iraq? In the book Athanasiou says “As you have shown, in the post- 9/11 context the role of the “victim” was strategically appropriated on behalf of the United States in order to legitimize its military aggressiveness against Afghanistan and Iraq but also to suppress possibilities for public critical reflection and discourse in the US.” So in this case Iraqis face what Iris Young calls cultural imperialism both on a mental and physical level as they are rendered as invisible within the social sphere and since more than one million Iraqis died during the American invasion of Iraq.

Side Fact:

For many years the American involvement within the Middle East is rendered as invisible which lead to a different narrative about the jihadi groups to be written. In an article published in 2006 the journal Mother Jones chronologically listed the involvement of the US in the region which opens doors for a person to be the judge for themselves on the war on terror.

Mother Jones: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2006/01/americas-devils-game-extremist-islam

Also the American Sniper is another recent example of cultural imperialism. As it renders Arabs as silent objects and initiates muslim hatred.
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/jan/24/american-sniper-anti-muslim-threats-skyrocket

Dispossession and Ignorance

Sammy Karon

22 March 2015

            In Chapter 1 of Dispossesion, Butler and Athanasiou discuss the role of property in dispossession. Butler poses the question, “Was there a property that was first owned and then was stolen? ... What do we make of the idea that we have property in our own persons?” (7). This is a complicated question, which only becomes further complicated after Butler proposes that “the social form of property and the social form of individuality” depend on context (8). In other words, the meaning of internal human value depends on the external conditions it exists in. In this way, Butler advocates for the possibility that human rights are on a spectrum of experiences, not a single human experience. From my own experiences, I understand this to be true. Not all humans rejoice or suffer in the same way, even under the same circumstances. Humanity is complex, diverse and surprising in that way. Yet, in a philosophical sense, I do believe in universal human values. This points to the struggle Athanasiou points out in Butler’s argument, whether or not there is a causal link between “being” and “becoming” dispossessed (5). Reflecting back on Nancy Tuana’s “Epistemologies of Ignorance,” it seems that at least in the case of women, ignorance can be proven to cause dispossession.

            Like Butler, Tuana argues that ignorance is situated. Tuana explains ignorance as the lack of knowledge in certain groups that prevents them from possessing power. While sometimes this lack of knowledge just exists passively, like when We Do Not Even Know That We Do Not Know, other times it is actively created, like when They Do Not Want Us To Know (6, 9). This seems to represent the dynamic that Athanasiou brings up in Dispossessed. In some circumstances, women do not have knowledge about their bodies, but because they do not there is knowledge out there that they are lacking, they would not necessarily identify as dispossessed. Thus, they are “being” dispossessed, but they do not necessarily see that as part of their identity. However, in other circumstances, when men are actively preventing women from getting answers to their questions, women “become” dispossessed. Once someone knows they do not have the power to find out the truth, they lose part of their autonomous identity. In this way, Butler and Athanasiou’s discussion on dispossession connects to Tuana’s discussion of ignorance.