Identity politics, the ethos of vulnerability, and education

Abstract

In this article, identity politics is understood as a form of politics stressing collective but malleable group identities as the basis of political action. This notion of identity politics also allows thinking of identity as intersectional. The focus of this paper, and a problem related to identity politics, is that when discussed in the context of the neoliberal order, identity politics has a tendency to become harnessed by the ethos of vulnerability. Some implications of the 'vulnerabilizisation' are considered in the field of education, which is a field currently thoroughly affected by neoliberalism.Therefore, it is also important to look closer at the relationship between identity politics and the ethos of vulnerability. In addition, we re-consider poststructuralist thinking as a theoretical and political approach to see what it can offer in terms of re-thinking identity politics and in analyzing the ethos of vulnerability. When categories of vulnerability keep expanding into various psychoemotional vulnerabilities defining subjects that can be known and spoken about, it is crucial to ask whether we regard these changes as educationally and politically progressive. The article discusses some problematic policies in educational environments and the phenomenon of trigger warnings.

How and Why Education Counters Ideological Extremism in Finland

“…However, the ways in which these objectives are met in practice requires careful consideration starting from the fact that the teachers themselves are trained according to educational models that are always socially, politically, and historically grounded (Poulter et al 2015), and this evidently impacts their constructions and perceptions of 'ideal' students (Smith 2003). There is thus always a risk that the national social fabric conditions one to see certain groups as the majority representing 'the normal' and some others as minority as if having 'distinct' identities and values (Poulter et al 2015, see also De Oliveira Andreotti 2012) or as 'vulnerable' (Brunila and Rossi 2018). Bourdieu talks about 'social order', which is 'progressively inscribed in people's minds' through systems like education that lead to an 'unconscious acceptance of social differences and hierarchies' and to 'a sense of one's place' (Bourdieu 1986, p. 141).…”

Guest Editor's Introduction

“…Nature, minds, humans, nonhumans, and the earth are open and exposed to the environment and towards other beings, nonbeings and systems. In addition to vulnerability, other concepts like precariosity, fragility, risk, and resilience are also taken up in the discussions (Butler 2009;Fineman 2008;Sen 1982;Douglas 1966;Evans and Reid 2015;Brunila and Rossi 2018). The concept of resilience has outlined over the past two decades the conceptual background that makes comprehensible the important cluster of their mutual relationships.…”

‘You Can’t Say That!’: Critical Thinking, Identity Politics, and the Social Work Academy

“…Žižek [39], in one of his many critiques of identity politics, notes that for one's voice to gain authority in contemporary culture, one has to legitimize oneself as being some kind of victim of power. However, defining problems in terms of victimhood or vulnerability can act to repackage structural issues as individual ones in need of therapeutic rather than political interventions [40]. For example, Kipnis [16] objects to what has become the dominant feminist position regarding women's vulnerability, especially when applied to female students on university campuses.…”