{"title":"What Is Performative Activism?","authors":"A. F. Thimsen","doi":"10.5325/philrhet.55.1.0083","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"abstract:Performative activism is a critical label that is applied to instances of shallow or self-serving support for social justice causes. The accusation rests on a distinction between what is said by supposed supporters and what they actually do. One of the challenges of understanding the rhetoricity of the phrase \"performative activism\" is that its definition seems to place it at odds with the most common scholarly definitions of \"performative,\" in which there is little or no difference between saying and doing. Nonetheless, making a distinction between what is said and done is rhetorically effective in itself. By understanding the accusation of performative activism as a type of critique, we can begin to see how such critical gestures are better understood as demands rather than condemnations.","PeriodicalId":46176,"journal":{"name":"PHILOSOPHY AND RHETORIC","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3000,"publicationDate":"2022-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"5","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"PHILOSOPHY AND RHETORIC","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.5325/philrhet.55.1.0083","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LITERATURE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 5
Abstract
abstract:Performative activism is a critical label that is applied to instances of shallow or self-serving support for social justice causes. The accusation rests on a distinction between what is said by supposed supporters and what they actually do. One of the challenges of understanding the rhetoricity of the phrase "performative activism" is that its definition seems to place it at odds with the most common scholarly definitions of "performative," in which there is little or no difference between saying and doing. Nonetheless, making a distinction between what is said and done is rhetorically effective in itself. By understanding the accusation of performative activism as a type of critique, we can begin to see how such critical gestures are better understood as demands rather than condemnations.
期刊介绍:
Philosophy and Rhetoric is dedicated to publication of high-quality articles involving the relationship between philosophy and rhetoric. It has a longstanding commitment to interdisciplinary scholarship and welcomes all theoretical and methodological perspectives that advance the journal"s mission. Philosophy and Rhetoric invites articles on such topics as the relationship between logic and rhetoric, the philosophical aspects of argumentation, philosophical views on the nature of rhetoric held by historical figures and during historical periods, psychological and sociological studies of rhetoric with a strong philosophical emphasis, and philosophical analyses of the relationship to rhetoric of other areas of human culture and thought, political theory and law.