Intimate Borders and the Sense of Never-Quite-Being: A Dystopic (Non-)Fiction

Abstract

Today’s academy is a dystopia. Many scholars of color and international scholars face the daunting challenge of navigating neoliberal state institutions that are often built on legacies of racism, colonialism, and classism. This essay brings attention to the feelings of despair, anxiety, and paranoia felt by many scholars of color in the fields of humanities and social sciences, but whose narratives too often become ones of abrupt exit from the Ministry of Knowledge (and) Entrepreneurship (MKE). The essay relies on a discussion of Anzaldúa’s intimate terrorism, the composition of today’s academy, and the sense of never-quite-being. These themes emerge out of a dialogue with Anzaldúa, Deleuze, and Harney and Moten, who each have something to say about navigating institutions of power from a position of in-betweenness. Then, I assemble themes from contemporary popular dystopia films to develop a performative fiction—a narrative of never-quite-being that embodies the critical theory and dystopic themes woven through the experiences of a border-body in the academy. The essay ends with a discussion of what being intimate looks like for someone that never-quite-is, informed by Anzaldúa’s concept of mestizaje and Deleuze’s nomad thought.

Keywords

dystopia Anzaldúa Deleuze never-quite-being border intimacies

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Anzaldúa

(1987). Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. Aunt Lute.

Anzaldúa

(2009). The Gloria Anzaldúa reader. Duke University Press.

Arnett

A. A.

(2017, December 19). Mental health is a growing challenge on campus, and people of color are most negatively affected. Education Dive. https://www.educationdive.com/news/mental-health-is-a-growing-challenge-on-campus-and-people-of-color-are-mos/513473/

Babaee

Singh

H. K.

Zhang

(2015). Critical review on the idea of dystopia. Review of European Studies, 7(11), 64–76.

Barla

Hubatschke

(2017) Technoecologies of borders: Thinking with borders as multispecies matters of care. Australian Feminist Studies, 32(94), 395–410.

Braidotti

(2003). Becoming woman: Or sexual difference revisited. Theory, Culture & Society, 20(3), 43–64.

Deeley

(Producer), & Smith

(Director). (1982). Blade runner [Motion picture]. United States: Warner Bros.

Deleuze

(2004). Desert islands and other texts (1953–1974) ( Lapoujade

, Ed., Taormina

, Trans.). Semiotext(e).

Deleuze

Guattari

(1987). A thousand plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia ( Massumi

, Trans.). University of Minnesota Press.

10.

Dovey

(2010). Becoming places: Urbanism/architecture/identity/power. Routledge.

11.

Flaherty

(2018, March 6). Mental health crisis for grad students. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/03/06/new-study-says-graduate-students-mental-health-crisis

12.

Green

(2016, January 21). The cost of balancing academia and racism. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2016/01/balancing-academia-racism/424887/

13.

Griggers

(1996). Becoming-woman. University of Minnesota Press.

14.

Heaney

(2017). The new woman: Literary modernism, queer theory, and the trans feminine allegory. Northwestern University Press.

15.

Henríquez-Betancor

(2012). Anzaldúa and ‘the new mestiza’: A Chicana dives into collective identity. Language Value, 4(2), 38–55.

16.

Imarisha

Brown

A. M.

(2015). Octavia’s Brood: Science fiction stories from social justice movements. AK Press.

17.

Lechuga

Avant-Mier

Ramírez

K. A.

(2018). Chicanx “monsters and Chicanx/Latinx “futures” in film (or, searching for Latinxs in sci-fi movies). The Popular Culture Studies Journal, 6(2&3), 239–262.

18.

Madison

D. S.

(1999). Performing theory/embodied writing. Text and Performance Quarterly, 19(2), 107–124.

19.

Manning

(2012). Always more than one: Individuation’s dance. Duke University Press.

20.

Massumi

(1996). Becoming Deleuzian. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 14(4), 395–406.

21.

Massumi

(2011). Semblance and event: Activist philosophy and occurrent arts. MIT Press.

22.

May

(2003). When is Deleuzian becoming? Continental Philosophy Review, 36(2), 139–153.

23.

McCallum

E. L.

Tuhkanen

(Eds.). (2011). Queer times, queer becomings. State University of New York Press.

24.

Merla-Watson

C. J.

Olguín

B. V.

(2017). Altermundos: Latin@ Speculative Literature, Film, and Popular Culture. UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center Press.

25.

Milchan

(Producer), & Gilliam

(Director). (1985). Brazil [Motion picture]. United States: 20th Century Fox.

26.

Moten

Harney

(2013). The undercommons: Fugitive planning & black study. Minor Compositions.

27.

Nigianni

Storr

(Eds.). (2005). Deleuze and queer theory. Edinburgh University Press.

28.

Paperson

(2017). Third university is possible. University of Minnesota Press.

29.

Pollock

(1998). Performative writing. In Phelan

Lane

(Eds.), The ends of performance (pp. 73–103). New York University Press.

30.

Portanova

(2014). Wonder, movement and becoming: Response to Erin Manning. Body & Society, 20(3&4), 189–197.

31.

Riddle

Bright

Honan

(Eds.). (2018). Writing with Deleuze in the academy: Creating monsters. Springer.

32.

Shor

Smith

Abraham

Newman

(Producers), & Cuarón

(Director). (2006). Children of Men [Motion picture]. United States: Universal Studios.

33.

Siu

O. M.

(2015, October 13). On the colonial legacy of US universities and the transcendence of your resistance. Mujeres Talk. https://library.osu.edu/blogs/mujerestalk/2015/10/13/on-the-colonial-legacy-of-u-s-universities-and-the-transcendence-of-your-resistance/

34.

Stein

(2016, October 26). Facing up to the colonial present of U.S. higher education. Medium. https://medium.com/@educationotherwise/facing-up-to-the-colonial-present-of-u-s-higher-education-62f6a16428ec

35.

Thorne

(2018, February 21). We need to address the mental-health-care imbalance for students of color. The Nation. https://www.thenation.com/article/we-need-to-address-the-mental-healthcare-imbalance-for-students-of-color/

36.

Williams

(2000). Deleuze’s ontology and creativity: Becoming in architecture. Pli: The Warwick Journal of Philosophy, 9(1), 200–219.

37.

Woodward

Jones

J. P.

III . (2005). On the border with Deleuze and Guattari. In van Houtum

Kramsch

Zierhofer

(Eds.), B/ordering space (pp. 235–248). Ashgate Publishing.