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Interrogeant la figure de la « féministe rabat-joie », cet article propose d’en explorer la négativité, aussi bien que la capacité d’agir dont elle est la promesse. Il s’agit ainsi, en repositionnant la pensée féministe comme critique de l’injonction au bonheur, de comprendre le sujet féministe en tant que sujet obstiné. L’obstination féministe est alors appréhendée comme le socle incertain d’une politique collective traduisant les émotions individuelles, la douleur ou la colère ressentie face aux injustices. Au-delà, la figure du sujet obstiné permet de saisir la façon dont, au sein des espaces féministes, les femmes noires ont pu être réduites à leur colère et désignées comme cause des divisions engendrées par le racisme. La position de sujet obstiné constituerait ainsi autant un lieu de tensions que de revendications politiques. https://www.saranahmed.com/

In Epistemic injustice, Miranda Fricker makes a tremendous contribution to theorizing the intersection of social epistemology with theories of justice. Theories of justice often take as their object of assessment either interpersonal transactions (specific exchanges between persons) or particular institutions. They may also take a more comprehensive perspective in assessing systems of institutions. This systemic perspective may enable control of the cumulative effects of millions of individual transactions that cannot be controlled at the individual or institutional levels. This is true not only with respect to the overall distribution of such goods as income and wealth, but also with respect to the goods of testimonial and hermeneutical justice. Cognitive biases that may be difficult for even epistemically virtuous individuals to correct on their own may be more susceptible to correction if we focus on the principles that should govern our systems of testimonial gathering and assessment. Hence, while Fricker’s focus on individual epistemic virtue is important, we also need to consider what epistemic justice as a virtue of social systems would require. My paper will indicate some directions forward on this front, focusing on the need for integration of diverse institutions and persons engaged in inquiry.

"Faire" son genre implique parfois de défaire les normes dominantes de l'existence sociale. La politique de subversion qu'esquisse Judith Butler ouvre moins la perspective d'une abolition du genre que celle d'un monde dans lequel le genre serait "défait", dans lequel les normes du genre joueraient autrement, tout autrement. ... Ce livre, qui constitue un retour critique sur les analyses développées par l'auteure dans "Trouble dans le genre", s'inscrit dans une démarche indissociablement théorique et pratique : il s'agit, en s'appuyant sur les théories féministe et queer, de faire la genèse de la production du genre et de travailler à défaire l'emprise des formes de normalisation qui rendent certaines vies invivables, ou difficilement vivables, en les excluant du domaine du possible et du pensable. ... Judith Butler s'attache notamment dans les présents essais - ancrés dans l'actualité des politiques et des savoirs du genre, de la sexualité et de la parenté -, à mettre en évidence les contradictions auxquelles sont confrontés ceux et celles qui s'efforcent de penser et transformer le genre."

The life story of Mrs. Daisy Sweeney, an African Canadian native of Montreal, Quebec, helps fill a void in the historical documentation of Montreal Blacks (especially female elders). Of particular significance is her prominence as a music educator and othermother during her life. The current literature on African Canadian othermothering experiences is not synonymous with both White or African American females and inclusion of their voices in academic, as well as mainstream spaces, is virtually non-existent. This dissertation asks: What did it mean to be a first generation 'Negro' working class bilingual female in a largely hostile White francophone Quebec metropolis in the early 20th Century? How can her narratives help shape and inform life history and African Canadian othermothering research? My sojourn with Mrs. Daisy Sweeney referenced African centered epistemology in my conceptual understanding of herself and community mothering. Capturing her conversations meant engaging with multiple methodologies articulated through African oral traditions, life history, archival canons and interdisciplinary inquiries. It is striking to note that there were not only certain tensions associated with memory loss and physical limitations (prompted by the aging process) that destabilized and enriched our 'interactive' communication, but also revealed a rupture and reversal of the participant/researcher dynamic. In spite of blatant racial discrimination that plagued Montreal's Black communities during that time, Daisy Sweeney fulfilled a life-long dream and taught hundreds of children the canon of classical piano for over 50 years. She lived her voice through her music, finding ways to validate her own identity and empowering others in the process. She used the musical stage as her platform to draw invaluable connections between race, gender, language and social class. Daisy Sweeney's generation of othermothers is dying out and, as the carriers of culture, the urgency to tell their stories must be emphasized. The account respects, reclaims and reflects those voices. It is time to write in African Canadian female elders and diversify the exclusionary genre of life history and archival research.

Après en avoir retracé rapidement la genèse, cet article rapporte les principales critiques adressées au concept d’homophobie, notamment son réductionnisme qui tend vers des explications de nature psychologique ainsi que l’éviction de la hiérarchie des sexes/genres. Nous discutons ensuite deux pistes théoriques permettant de contourner les limites précédemment identifiées. La première examine le potentiel de l’approche intersectionnelle. La seconde voie invite à une redéfinition du concept d’homophobie, lui reconnaissant une portée exclusivement descriptive, et non plus en tant que concept explicatif, justifiant ainsi sa subordination au concept d’hétérosexisme qui offre une perspective systémique. Nous examinons ces concepts en fonction de leur capacité à rendre compte de l’oppression des lesbiennes.

I distinguish between two senses in which feminists have argued that the knower is social: 1. situated or socially positioned and 2. interdependent. I argue that these two aspects of the knower work in cooperation with each other in a way that can produce willful hermeneutical ignorance, a type of epistemic injustice absent from Miranda Fricker's Epistemic Injustice. Analyzing the limitations of Fricker's analysis of the trial of Tom Robinson in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird with attention to the way in which situatedness and interdependence work in tandem, I develop an understanding of willful hermeneutical ignorance, which occurs when dominantly situated knowers refuse to acknowledge epistemic tools developed from the experienced world of those situated marginally. Such refusals allow dominantly situated knowers to misunderstand, misinterpret, and/or ignore whole parts of the world.

From popular culture to academia, there is national panic about the dismal life trajectories of Black males. This "Black male crisis" has contributed to emergent all-Black, all-male schools. Racial identity is commonly used to explain underperformance among Blacks, yet within-group gender disparity signifies the importance of gender relative to race. Minimal research exists on Black males' gender identities, and less on the intersections of gender and race. This longitudinal dissertation used quantitative and qualitative data to examine the development and intersections of racial and gender identity among Black adolescent males transitioning from co-educational grammar schools and entering the ninth grade at an all-Black, all-male high school. Findings are presented in two empirical papers. Paper 1 examined survey data collected from Black males (N = 183) to explain how boys' racial and gender identities were interrelated, changed over time, and influenced their psychological and academic adjustment. Results from the growth curve analysis revealed that boys' racial and gender identities were interrelated with each other and that higher levels of identity attachment were associated with better psychological and academic adjustment. Moreover, the strength of the relationship between gender identity and psychological adjustment increased over time, indicating that gender identity became increasingly important for boys' wellbeing. Paper 2 analyzed interview data with a subsample of Black males (n = 21) to examine how they resisted and accommodated racial and gender stereotypes. Results from the qualitative analysis revealed that boys were aware of the ways that racial and gender stereotypes overlap, but they responded to these stereotypes in different ways. Although some boys accommodated to both racial and gender stereotypes and others resisted these stereotypes, the majority of the boys responded by accommodating to gender stereotypes and resisting racial stereotypes. That is, they tended to perpetuate cultural stereotypes that require males to be the leader, emotionally stoic, and not to be feminine (i.e., gay) while challenging beliefs about the intellectual inferiority and incompetence of Black people. Findings are interpreted within the macro-context of cultural stereotypes and the micro-context of an all-Black male school. Implications for the study of identity, Black males, and single-sex education are discussed.

This dissertation examines African and African Diaspora concert dance in Montreal in relation to Canadian multicultural policies and Québec nationalism. The multiple layers of colonization and various waves of immigration to Québec have made the province a unique nation with its own complex history of racial construction, quite unlike the racial histories of the U.S. or the rest of Canada (though still greatly informed by these racial paradigms). In the debates that arise in Québec over multiculturalism, language is often seen as the main cultural component in need of preservation. However, this focus on language often masks other elements at play in these cultural debates, in particular, how "race" informs notions of cultural belonging in Québec. A focus on African Diaspora dance in Montreal (Québec's largest and most demographically varied city) helps bring racial construction to the fore for two reasons. First, language differences do not distinguish Québec's Black community from the white French-Canadian majority as Québec's Black population is comprised mainly of French-speakers, and accordingly, studying Montreal's African Diaspora reduces the significance of linguistic difference. Second, concentrating on dance practices helps identify how the Montreal public interprets bodies and their cultural meanings. By analyzing the public support and critical reception of African Diaspora dance practices in Montreal, this dissertation examines how racial difference is constructed through multicultural rhetoric, policies, and debates about dance; it also suggests that dance practitioners have the ability to change and inform these constructed identities and the social landscape that frames them. To conduct this research, I use archival material along with personal interviews and participant-observer ethnography to examine: the early visits of Les Ballets Africains to North America (with a particular focus on Montreal); the Montreal-based company Les Ballets Jazz; the 1999 Montreal festival Afrique: Aller/Retour; and the work of Contemporary African dance choreographer Zab Maboungou. With these subjects, my projects contributes a partial history of African Diaspora dance in Montreal and analyzes the effectiveness and the shortcomings of Canadian Multiculturalism on this community.