Queere Bündnisse und Antikriegspolitik (Queer Lectures 9)

by Judith Butler

Welches Profil muss eine queere Politik haben, die sich als Teil einer Politik gegen den Krieg versteht? Ausgehend von dieser Leitfrage behandelt die amerikanische Philosophin Judith Butler Aspekte einer queeren Friedenspolitik, die "queer" nicht als Identitätskonzept, sondern als Bündnisform zu thematisieren sucht. Judith Butler diskutiert vor diesem Hintergrund folgende Welche politische Rolle spielt queere Politik in einer Welt, in der Krieg alltäglich erscheint und viele Völker einem ständigen Bedrohungszustand hoffnungslos ausgeliefert sind? Wie muss sich queere Politik angesichts der globalen Herausforderungen der zunehmenden Militarisierung und fortgesetzten Kolonialisierung neu definieren und ist eine queere Politik denkbar, die nicht zugleich auch eine anti-rassistische Bewegung ist? Wie können wir Bündnissen gegen nationalistische Abschottungspolitik beitreten, wenn diejenigen, für die und mit denen wir kämpfen, unsere Standpunkte nicht immer teilen?

54 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 1, 2011

About the author

Judith Butler is an American philosopher, feminist, and queer theorist whose work has profoundly shaped gender studies, political philosophy, ethics, psychoanalysis, and literary theory. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, to a Hungarian-Jewish and Russian-Jewish family, Butler was raised in a Jewish cultural and ethical environment that fostered an early engagement with philosophy, ethics, and questions of identity, attending Hebrew school and specialized ethics classes as a teenager. They studied philosophy at Bennington College before transferring to Yale University, where they earned a BA in 1978 and a PhD in 1984, focusing on German idealism, phenomenology, and French theory, including Hegel, Sartre, and Kojève. Butler taught at Wesleyan University, George Washington University, and Johns Hopkins University before joining the University of California, Berkeley in 1993, where they co-founded the Program in Critical Theory, served as Maxine Elliot Professor, directed the International Consortium of Critical Theory, and also hold the Hannah Arendt Chair at the European Graduate School. Butler is best known for Gender Trouble and Bodies That Matter, works in which they introduced the theory of gender performativity, arguing that gender is constituted through repeated social acts rather than a fixed identity, a concept that became foundational in feminist and queer theory. They have also published Excitable Speech, examining hate speech and censorship, Precarious Life, analyzing vulnerability and political violence, Undoing Gender, on the social construction of sexual norms, Giving an Account of Oneself, exploring ethical responsibility and the limits of self-knowledge, and Notes Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly, addressing public protest and collective action, while their 2020 book, The Force of Nonviolence, emphasizes ethical engagement in social and political struggles. Butler has engaged in global activism, supporting LGBTQIA rights, opposing anti-gender ideology, advocating for Palestinian rights, critiquing aspects of contemporary Israeli policy, and participating in movements such as Occupy Wall Street, while navigating controversies including critiques of their comments on Hamas and Hezbollah, debates over TERF ideology, and disputes over the Adorno Prize, illustrating the intersections of their scholarship and public interventions. Their work extends into ethical theory, exploring vulnerability, interdependence, mourning, and the recognition of marginalized lives, as well as the performative dimensions of identity and the social construction of sex and gender. They have influenced contemporary feminist, queer, and critical theory, cultural studies, and continental philosophy, shaping debates on gender, sexuality, power, and social justice, while also participating in public discourse and advocacy around education, political violence, and anti-discrimination. Butler is legally non-binary in California, uses they/them pronouns, identifies as a lesbian, and lives in Berkeley with their partner Wendy Brown and their son.