The Radical Politics of Possibility: Towards a Queer Existential Phenomenology Through Chantal Akerman’s Je tu il elle (1975)

TY - JOUR

T1 - The Radical Politics of Possibility: Towards a Queer Existential Phenomenology Through Chantal Akerman’s Je tu il elle (1975)

AU - Murray, Rosamund Jean

PY - 2016/6/14

Y1 - 2016/6/14

N2 - This article explores the temporalities at work in Chantal Akerman’s Je tu il elle (1975) using the prism of a Beauvoirian existential and phenomenological approach to queer embodiment. It argues that an existentialist approach to the queer focuses on doing rather than being. Through a comparison of Beauvoir’s existentialist ethics with Halberstam’s analysis of queer failure, the essay explores how Je tu il elle stages the tension between two differing versions of failure: one emerging from the anti-social thesis, resting on negativity, refusal, and passivity; the other from an existentialist ethics, engaging in a more positive politics of phenomenological generosity.

AB - This article explores the temporalities at work in Chantal Akerman’s Je tu il elle (1975) using the prism of a Beauvoirian existential and phenomenological approach to queer embodiment. It argues that an existentialist approach to the queer focuses on doing rather than being. Through a comparison of Beauvoir’s existentialist ethics with Halberstam’s analysis of queer failure, the essay explores how Je tu il elle stages the tension between two differing versions of failure: one emerging from the anti-social thesis, resting on negativity, refusal, and passivity; the other from an existentialist ethics, engaging in a more positive politics of phenomenological generosity.

M3 - Article

SN - 2292-146X

SP - 44

EP - 55

JO - Feral Feminisms

JF - Feral Feminisms

IS - 5

ER -