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Feminism and the Abyss of Freedom
In contemporary feminist theory, the problem of feminine subjectivity persistently appears and reappears as the site that grounds all discussion of feminism. In Feminism and the Abyss of Freedom, Linda M. G. Zerilli argues that the persistence of this subject-centered frame severely limits feminists' capacity to think imaginatively about the central problem of feminist theory and a politics concerned with freedom.
Offering both a discussion of feminism in its postmodern context and a critique of contemporary theory, Zerilli here challenges feminists to move away from a theory-based approach, which focuses on securing or contesting "women" as an analytic category of feminism, to one rooted in political action and judgment. She revisits the democratic problem of exclusion from participation in common affairs and elaborates a freedom-centered feminism as the political practice of beginning anew, world-building, and judging.
In a series of case studies, Zerilli draws on the political thought of Hannah Arendt to articulate a nonsovereign conception of political freedom and to explore a variety of feminist understandings of freedom in the twentieth century, including ones proposed by Judith Butler, Monique Wittig, and the Milan Women's Bookstore Collective. In so doing, Zerilli hopes to retrieve what Arendt called feminism's lost the original and radical claim to political freedom.
Offering both a discussion of feminism in its postmodern context and a critique of contemporary theory, Zerilli here challenges feminists to move away from a theory-based approach, which focuses on securing or contesting "women" as an analytic category of feminism, to one rooted in political action and judgment. She revisits the democratic problem of exclusion from participation in common affairs and elaborates a freedom-centered feminism as the political practice of beginning anew, world-building, and judging.
In a series of case studies, Zerilli draws on the political thought of Hannah Arendt to articulate a nonsovereign conception of political freedom and to explore a variety of feminist understandings of freedom in the twentieth century, including ones proposed by Judith Butler, Monique Wittig, and the Milan Women's Bookstore Collective. In so doing, Zerilli hopes to retrieve what Arendt called feminism's lost the original and radical claim to political freedom.
272 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 9, 2017
There is, today, perhaps something odd about framing feminism as a practice of freedom. Freedom, after all, seems like a kind of pan-human value, to be affirmed by all and not only or simply by those united under the banner of feminism. And besides, isn't it equality, that value of values, that more properly defines the end and reach of what it means to be a feminist? By what lights, then, would one conceive of a feminism in which freedom would stand at its heart? And again, why freedom? Such are the questions posed here by Linda Zerilli in this groundbreaking book, which, in her call to affirm a 'freedom-centered' feminism, sheds new and invaluable light on not only the adventure and the trial that is feminism, but also and equally profoundly, on what it means to be free.
Inspired in particular by Hannah Arendt's account of freedom as 'action in concert', and for which "to be free and to act are one and the same", Zerilli develops a vocabulary of freedom-as-practice, as something not simply 'given', but as something delicately forged and precariously maintained. Far, however, from seeking to ameliorate freedom's precarity, its in its 'abyssal' character, its inability to be guaranteed and secured once and for all, in which Zerilli seeks to find feminism's 'lost treasure': its radical claim to a properly political freedom. Political, that is, as distinct from a host of other feminist claims to 'social' and distributive justice, in which not freedom but equal access to social goods and rights instead constitute feminism's twenty-first century vocation.
While not denying the achievements of this 'social-utility' view of feminism - in which, to put it bluntly, feminism is 'good' to the extent that it contributes to the overall well-being of society - Zerilli argues that limiting feminism to this 'means-end' conception of social good threatens to defang it of its most radical political potential: that of enabling women to engage in positive world-building exercises that shape, rather than simply attain, the already-set standards of our societies. Put otherwise, feminism should do more than seek out the 'equality' of women (to who? - to men!), and instead (or rather also) insist upon a politics of freedom in which the power(s) to act, construct and begin anew mark a feminism worthy of the name.
Targeted too are 'epistemological' or 'subject-oriented' feminist theories, which, by locating the transformative power of feminism in either claims to (mere?) knowledge on the one hand, or the agency of individual 'subjects' on the other, miss both the need for action and its exercise in 'concert', burying the properly political element of feminist practice upon which its lifeblood depends - its 'abyssal ground' in which the future is put at stake without guarantee. Making her case through incisive readings of Judith Butler, Monique Wittig, The Milan Woman's Bookstore Collective and, of course, Hannah Arendt, Feminism and the Abyss of Freedom is itself a transformative text of feminist theory, one whose invaluable lessons ought to shape the very world whose development it so brilliantly advocates for.
Inspired in particular by Hannah Arendt's account of freedom as 'action in concert', and for which "to be free and to act are one and the same", Zerilli develops a vocabulary of freedom-as-practice, as something not simply 'given', but as something delicately forged and precariously maintained. Far, however, from seeking to ameliorate freedom's precarity, its in its 'abyssal' character, its inability to be guaranteed and secured once and for all, in which Zerilli seeks to find feminism's 'lost treasure': its radical claim to a properly political freedom. Political, that is, as distinct from a host of other feminist claims to 'social' and distributive justice, in which not freedom but equal access to social goods and rights instead constitute feminism's twenty-first century vocation.
While not denying the achievements of this 'social-utility' view of feminism - in which, to put it bluntly, feminism is 'good' to the extent that it contributes to the overall well-being of society - Zerilli argues that limiting feminism to this 'means-end' conception of social good threatens to defang it of its most radical political potential: that of enabling women to engage in positive world-building exercises that shape, rather than simply attain, the already-set standards of our societies. Put otherwise, feminism should do more than seek out the 'equality' of women (to who? - to men!), and instead (or rather also) insist upon a politics of freedom in which the power(s) to act, construct and begin anew mark a feminism worthy of the name.
Targeted too are 'epistemological' or 'subject-oriented' feminist theories, which, by locating the transformative power of feminism in either claims to (mere?) knowledge on the one hand, or the agency of individual 'subjects' on the other, miss both the need for action and its exercise in 'concert', burying the properly political element of feminist practice upon which its lifeblood depends - its 'abyssal ground' in which the future is put at stake without guarantee. Making her case through incisive readings of Judith Butler, Monique Wittig, The Milan Woman's Bookstore Collective and, of course, Hannah Arendt, Feminism and the Abyss of Freedom is itself a transformative text of feminist theory, one whose invaluable lessons ought to shape the very world whose development it so brilliantly advocates for.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews