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The Politics of Mourning in the Neoliberal State

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2018

LISSA SKITOLSKY
LISSA SKITOLSKY*
Affiliation:
Susquehanna University
*
*<skitolsky@susqu.edu>
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Abstract

Recently American scholars have examined the politics of mourning in relation to anti-black racism in the United States. Drawing on the work of queer theorist Maggie Nelson, I will illustrate that a political sense of mourning is also relevant to queer theory and life as a way to bear witness to the violence of the sex-gender system even as we find ways of navigating through it. Lastly, I will defend the claim that a sense of mourning-without-end is political for any marginalized population that suffers from social death and from the disavowal of its suffering through the normalization of violence against them.

Récemment, des chercheurs américains ont examiné la politique du deuil dans le contexte du racisme contre les noirs aux États-Unis. En utilisant le travail de la théoricienne d’études «queer» Maggie Nelson, j’illustrerai qu’un sentiment politique de deuil est aussi pertinent pour la manière de vivre et la théorie «queer», comme moyen de témoigner de la violence du système basé sur le sexe et le genre. Enfin, je défendrai l’affirmation selon laquelle un sentiment de deuil sans fin est politique pour n’importe quelle population marginalisée qui souffre de la mort sociale et du désaveu de sa souffrance par la normalisation de la violence à son égard.

Keywords

anti-black racismmourningqueer theoryheterosexismresistanceprisonpost-racial discourse
Type
Special Issue: Philosophy and its Borders
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 57 , Issue 2 , June 2018 , pp. 367 - 382
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 2018 

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