Kopit- The Feeling of Kinship

Alison Kopit

David Eng—The Feeling of Kinship reflection

In The Feeling of Kinship (2010), David Eng examines the discourse of recognition and citizenship in the 2003 legal case Lawrence v. Texas, which has been lauded as a victory for queer citizenship and rights. He presents an intersectional reading of this case that illuminates the ways that the racialization of the case was case separated out from queerness, presenting the case as simply a queer rights case. In addition to the strategic simplification through racial erasure, the rhetoric of this case also shifted the focus away from queer sexual acts, sanitizing it into the rhetoric of kinship, domesticity, and family. Through this case, Eng explores the ways that the discourse of queer liberalism persistently domesticates the queer subject, normalizing them into a heteronormative narrative which becomes more palatable to the heterosexual mainstream. This is, in large part, dependent upon presuming whiteness as well as normative family values.

Eng explores the ways that the discourse of queer liberalism works in tandem with the discourse of a “colorblind age” (43), and the reworking of queer kinship into a heteronormative model. The rhetoric around a colorblind society produces illusions of equality and inclusion, and absolves society of recognizing the ways that racism and white supremacy are alive and active in neoliberal society. Eng uses the Lawrence v. Texas case to demonstrate also the way that analogies to race come at the cost of an intersectional analysis that recognizes the interconnectedness of race and sexuality, and the way they are bound up in “liberal narratives of freedom and progress” (25). Thus, the rhetoric of colorblindness and queer liberalism erase of the racialization of the case.

The Implications of Inclusion

In my own work, I think about the way that liberal inclusion and the rhetoric around it get reproduced in the disability community. The normalizing language of “equality,” and insistence that disabled people are just like everyone else, (Eng calls this “sameness” (43)) depoliticizes the condition of disability and inserts us into a static narrative where it is a compliment and honor to be just like the non-disabled mainstream—and where this “sameness” (43) is what grants us rights and citizenship.

Integrated arts, also called inclusive arts, are the most visible and common form of art that disabled people participate in, and in my work, I examine the ways that integrated art operates in a model of liberal inclusion. I’ve focused on integrated dance and the discourse around it that depoliticizes and normalizes the disabled artist, while trapping them (us) into a narrative about timelessness, togetherness, and unity. I have found myself increasingly frustrated (read: enraged) about the way that this rhetoric seeks to make our identities clean, legible, and apolitical. I have recognized the ways that this comes at the cost of more radical disability representation that could generate pride, community identity, and coalition. I have moved away from participating in integrated dance because I consistently noticed that it coded me as both non-disabled (because integrated dance focuses on physical integration, my particular disability embodiment is not legible as disabled) and heterosexual (because integrated dance relies on heterosexual norms to reclaim sexuality and masculinity, representation is extremely heteronormative). I’ve turned instead to focusing on crip aesthetics, which, I argue, are queer and do not seek to sanitize or domesticate the aspects of us that are uniquely disabled about us.

Both this piece and Simpson’s book last week have been a good opportunity to reflect on the way that the rhetoric of inclusion also catalyzes a citizen-based and rights-based discourse. This is pervasive in disability rights. The focus of the disability rights movement was, in many ways, integration and inclusion, but what are the limits of this? What might refusal, or resisting recognition through citizenship-based rhetoric do for disability culture or the Disability Rights Movement? And what would our elders, who fought for our inclusion, have to say about it?

More general discussion questions:

I’m interested in subjectless critique and the way that it illuminates structural oppression. It reminds me of the ways that the social model of disability—focusing on the ableism of society, instead of the individual disabled body—created opportunities for disabled people to build group identity and pride. In what contexts is it most useful to use a subjectless critique? Are there situations in which a subjectless critique might be harmful or ineffective?

ALSO, how do we work against queer liberalism? Are we perpetually in an age of settling, where we, in Gayatri Spivak's words "'cannot not want'" (Qtd. in Eng, 25) the legal victories and citizenship rights, even if they come with serious implications? How can we counter an argument advocating for queer liberalism and all of the "positive" things that come out of it even in a time when queer people are experiencing the precariousness of their own citizenship? What does a more radical queer politic even look like in these times? I'm always changing my mind. This article left me with so many questions, but I'll stop here.

Note: If I was writing this on my blog, and not our academic class blog, I would probably have started by saying that I have a million intense queer feelings about The Feeling of Kinship and if anyone wants to process it, I’m really here for that. Because there’s a hell of a lot in here.