Ticktin’s analysis of
“regimes of care” is an investigation of the ways the apolitical is implicated
in the political. Focusing on the body
as both a discursive and material political object is key to the development of
this analysis. In chapter 4 “In the Name
of Violence Against Women,” Ticktin shows how immigrant bodies are made to
account for themselves as suffering and oppressed in very particular ways that
help to shore up political interests of the French state. Not only is there a hierarchy of suffering,
where sexual and gender violence carry more affective weight with the Refugee
Appeals Board, but the designation of suffering as exceptional is based on
understandings of what is normal, what is Other, and the French state stands
for.
In my own research on Grindr, attention to the
politics of the apolitical is an excellent way of thinking about how to
approach the role of technology in the story I’m trying to tell. In tracing the connections between Grindr and
the current politics of queer liberalism, I have been describing how the
structure of the app creates opportunities to maintaining private sexual lives
and managing public sexual identities.
However, I have not known how to really talk about, or think about, the
role of technology in a more abstract way in my project. Ticktin’s approach helps me do this. Focusing on the body, and how ostensibly apolitical
technology such dating apps acts on and through it, may be especially
productive way of thinking through the political implications of privacy and
sexuality. For example, it may be helpful to ask How are gay identified bodies made to account for themselves in order make rights-based claims to the State?
Question for class: How did Ticktin's choice of field sites, and decision to use two very different groups of field sites, contribute to her analysis? What are the differences in positionality of the researcher in these different sites?
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