Agenda

CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ANIMALS AND COLONIALISM

Virtual lecture series organized and moderated by Alexandra Isfahani-Hammond (University of California, San Diego) and Federica Timeto (Ca’Foscari University, Venice), in collaboration with the Environmental Humanities Degree at Ca’ Foscari University. 

Intersectionality in Conflict: Reflecting on the Affective Geographies, Politics and Practices of Shared Struggles Across Difference

Esther Tordjmann (Alloun), University of New South Wales

Political frameworks of intersectionality have inspired calls for activism that move beyond single issue struggles and engage with diverse, multispecies social justice agendas. Calls to diversify activism reflect growing recognition that progressive causes are enlisted in a range of violent nationalist and state projects, reinforcing cultural imperialism and racialized or colonial hierarchies. Progressive scholars and activists have therefore been at the forefront of calls to expand activism and used intersectionality as a platform for inclusion, or ‘mutual avowal’ (Kim 2015) between diverse human and non-human groups and their respective interests. Challenging these understandings of multi-optic vision and avowal, I contend that the experiences of activists attempting to build coalitions across difference offer a crucial – yet overlooked resource – in showing us what intersectionality can and cannot do politically, ethically and affectively. I reflect on two examples from my ethnographic research in Israel and Palestine to develop this point. 

Esther Tordjmann (Alloun) is a research fellow at the University of New South Wales, Sidney AUS. She works as an applied social researcher in a local health authority to support health systems and tackle health inequalities. In another strand of her research, she used ethnographies of activism to explore the possibilities of coalition across difference in Israel/Palestine. Her research has recently been published in the Journal of Intercultural Studies and Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space.

May 8 @ 10:30 CET 
6.30 p.m. AEST; 5.30 p.m. JST; 1.30 a.m. PT.

Registration link

Image credits: Ilya Varlamov