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Jun. 14th, 2009
people and persons
Jun. 14th, 2009 04:04 pmReading one of my favorite feminist blogs today, the primary writer off handedly referred to women as "her people", and while it was a nice stylistic flourish, there seemed to be some truth in it for her, as well.
In the past, I suspect I would have railed against the presumptive polarization of everyone into two tribes, men and women, and would have fought even louder and harder in my (again, presumed) assignment into the man camp, all the while feeling alienated and bitterly miserable at the impossibility of my situation. Structurally, I'm still very aware of those forces, and they still feel very much in play, but my thinking feels slightly different. I'm not sure I can explain it, but I'm going to try.
First, I believe in intersectionality. It seems self-evident to me that people have multiple, overlapping identities, and to assume that I might know which of them is primary at a given time for someone else is absurd. It doesn't mean I don't still do it; bad habits are hard to break, and we're encouraged to privilege some identities over others, even when multiples are clearly present.
What's interesting to me, though, is the connection between identities on the individual level and group meaning, connectedness, community, or being a people. I only know my own head, really, and while I carry several identities, I tend to view them as adjectives rather than nouns (zB, reader of academic texts, not an academic). I don't think this is the case for most other people; it doesn't appear to be, and I don't know if I'm getting caught up in semantics, or seeing a difference in language as intentionally marking a difference in meaning. Maybe in part because of adjectives (compounded by low self esteem, bad history, curiously specific social isolation, and who knows what else), I've always felt alienated from groups, community, or peoples. Maybe because no one whines about it as often or as loud as I have/do, I take away the impression that most others do, at least in some areas (gender, sex, nationality, ethnicity tend to be the most popular, and arguably the largest, but I think it goes way beyond that, depending on the person).
It could be that I'm idealizing other people's experiences of connection and community; in part, I feel certain that's the case. But it seems important to say that I don't think really anyone meshes perfectly with their communities; that's not the point I'm trying to make. Even where conflicted, though, I have the idea that many/most find something of value, some sense of belonging and affirmation, from their communities.
For me, it's always felt like I can't get how groups work, at least not as a member. Maybe there's something wrong in my mental development, or maybe I'm a long term experiment in the split consciousness of a participant/observer, (or, as has been suggested, I could just be a picky bitch) but it feels like I only have relations with individuals, never groups or communities. Put in the language of my gut level reaction to the blog post that started this, I don't have a people or peoples, I have persons. I'm wondering if that's as uncommon as it feels. If it's not, I'd really like to connect with people whose experiences overlap mine in this, but of course, as individuals, not as a group.
In the past, I suspect I would have railed against the presumptive polarization of everyone into two tribes, men and women, and would have fought even louder and harder in my (again, presumed) assignment into the man camp, all the while feeling alienated and bitterly miserable at the impossibility of my situation. Structurally, I'm still very aware of those forces, and they still feel very much in play, but my thinking feels slightly different. I'm not sure I can explain it, but I'm going to try.
First, I believe in intersectionality. It seems self-evident to me that people have multiple, overlapping identities, and to assume that I might know which of them is primary at a given time for someone else is absurd. It doesn't mean I don't still do it; bad habits are hard to break, and we're encouraged to privilege some identities over others, even when multiples are clearly present.
What's interesting to me, though, is the connection between identities on the individual level and group meaning, connectedness, community, or being a people. I only know my own head, really, and while I carry several identities, I tend to view them as adjectives rather than nouns (zB, reader of academic texts, not an academic). I don't think this is the case for most other people; it doesn't appear to be, and I don't know if I'm getting caught up in semantics, or seeing a difference in language as intentionally marking a difference in meaning. Maybe in part because of adjectives (compounded by low self esteem, bad history, curiously specific social isolation, and who knows what else), I've always felt alienated from groups, community, or peoples. Maybe because no one whines about it as often or as loud as I have/do, I take away the impression that most others do, at least in some areas (gender, sex, nationality, ethnicity tend to be the most popular, and arguably the largest, but I think it goes way beyond that, depending on the person).
It could be that I'm idealizing other people's experiences of connection and community; in part, I feel certain that's the case. But it seems important to say that I don't think really anyone meshes perfectly with their communities; that's not the point I'm trying to make. Even where conflicted, though, I have the idea that many/most find something of value, some sense of belonging and affirmation, from their communities.
For me, it's always felt like I can't get how groups work, at least not as a member. Maybe there's something wrong in my mental development, or maybe I'm a long term experiment in the split consciousness of a participant/observer, (or, as has been suggested, I could just be a picky bitch) but it feels like I only have relations with individuals, never groups or communities. Put in the language of my gut level reaction to the blog post that started this, I don't have a people or peoples, I have persons. I'm wondering if that's as uncommon as it feels. If it's not, I'd really like to connect with people whose experiences overlap mine in this, but of course, as individuals, not as a group.