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A Politics of Location

Positionality and Ethical Analytical Frameworks

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Gender, Race,

Globalization

Race and gender both “render the body into a text upon which histories of [(racial)] differentiation, exclusion and violence are inscribed” (Ferguson 192)

Biological inheritance vs social construction naturalization of subjugation vs analyses of freedom & power

Globalization the feminization of transnational labor Globalization versus

transnationalism

Globalization = breaking down of borders, exponential enhancement of mobility and interconnectedness because of expansion of global capital

+Cycle of Globalization

Survival Circuit:• Previously

colonized countries• Debt burdens• Structural

adjustment • Foreign investment• Austerity measures

Global cities• Directs

movements of global capital

• Depends on low-skilled, invisible, informal & service labor

+How NOT to do it…

“oppression olympics” vs “oppression uniformity”

“feminist-as-tourist” Add brown women and stir White women saving brown women from brown men “The effects of this strategy are that students and teachers

are left with a clear sense of difference and the distance between the local (defined as self, nation, and Western) and the global (defined as other, non-western, transnational” ie. the US is always the norm

“feminist-as-explorer” The orientalist mode of seeing the world “Distance from

‘home’ is fundamental to the definition of the international” Cultural relativism makes impossible studies of

interconnections and analyses of power

+(Re-)Considering Terms First world – capitalized, industrialized nations of

the West (primarily US and Western Europe)

Second world – socialist, communist, industrializing nations of the USSR-PRC bloc

Third world – recently de-colonized nations forced to choose between 1st and 2nd world alliances/subordinations (Asia, Africa, Latin America, Oceania)

Global North/South “a metaphorical rather than geographical

distinction, where North refers to the pathways of transnational capital and South to the marginalized poor of the world regardless of geographical distinction”

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End of Cold War and entry of PRC into global capitalism calls into question 3-world system

Global North and South

+1/3 versus 2/3 of the world 1/3 of the world = social minority

“the haves” anywhere in the world Enjoy modern Western life and high standard of living Employed in formal sector Beneficiaries of globalization Citizens of the global city

2/3 of the world = social majority “the have nots” anywhere in the world No regular access to to the goods/services that define

average standard of living Employed in informal and service sectors Necessary to but marginalized by globalization Invisible workers of the global city

+politics of location“I am clearly located within the One-Third World… I straddle both categories. I am of the Two-Thirds World in the One-Third World. I am clearly a part of the social minority now, with all its privileges; however, my political choices, struggles, and vision for change place me alongside the Two-Thirds World. Thus, I am for the Two-Thirds World, but with the privileges of the One-Third World. I speak as person situated in the One-Third World, but from the space and vision of, and in solidarity with, communities in struggle in the Two-Thirds World.”

+Questions to consider

What does it mean according to Mohanty to engage in anticapitalist transnational feminist practice?

What does it mean to possess “place consciousness” and why is it so important to Mohanty? Do Rosa Linda Fregoso and Norma Alarcon demonstrate “place consciousness”? Why or why not?

What does it mean to recognize “common differences”? And how does it become the basis of feminist solidarity?