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Vulnerability and the Human in Judith Butler’s and Adriana Cavarero’s Feminist Thought

A Politics of Philosophy Point of View

Bibliographic Data

ID13079522
AuthorsTuija Pulkkinen (0000-0003-0825-3259, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume23
Issue2
Publication date2020-12-15
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueRedescriptions Political Thought Conceptual History and Feminist Theory (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2308-0906 • E-ISSN: 2308-0914
PublisherHelsinki University Press (PUBLISHER • FI)
DOI10.33134/rds.342
OpenAlexW3113300199
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited7

In this article I explore the use of the term vulnerability in the work of two leading feminist theorists, Adriana Cavarero and Judith Butler. Approaching their work with the ‘politics of philosophy’ method I show how Cavarero’s and Butler’s usage of the term vulnerability in relation to other terms in their texts testifies for differences in their relation to the academic tradition of philosophy. I argue that Cavarero’s usage of the term shows that she engages with the basic questions of the phenomenological-existential tradition of Husserl and Heidegger through the notion of the human, while arguing for the view of singular human existent as vulnerable and relational. In contrast, Butler’s usage of the term vulnerability expresses distancing from the basic questions of the same tradition of the abstracted and transcendentalized human. Instead, Butler’s systematic connecting of vulnerability to social norms and infrastructures which are contingent and historically changing points towards the antifoundational challenge that she presents in relation to this particular tradition of philosophy

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19 · Distancing · Epistemology · Existentialism · Political philosophy · Political science · Politics · Relation (database · Sociology · Vulnerability (computing · Feminism, Gender, and Sexuality Studies · Hannah Arendt's Political Philosophy · Law · Philosophy · Philosophy, Ethics, and Existentialism

  • Singular Vulnerability

    Open Access•Timothy J Huzar•Global Studies Quarterly•2025

  • Broken Passages

    Open Access•Ritu Vij•Global Studies Quarterly•2025

  • Vulnerability, Disability, and Agency

    Open Access•Maija Mustaniemi-Laakso, Hisayo Katsui et al.•International Journal for the…•2023

  • ‘I played very nervously today’

    Open Access•Wojciech Klimczyk•Deleuze and Guattari Studies•2026

  • Gendered vulnerabilities and the blind spots of the 2030 Agenda’s ‘leave no one behind’ pledge

    Open Access•Hilde Ousland Vandeskog, Kristin Heggen et al.•Critical Policy Studies•2021

  • Rethinking Vulnerability and Resistance

    Open Access•Judith Butler•Vulnerability in Resistance•2016

  • Judith Butler’s Politics of Philosophy in Notes Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly – Arendt, Cavarero, and Human “Appearing” and “Plurality”

    Open Access•Tuija Pulkkinen•Redescriptions Political Thought…•2018

  • The Role of Darwin in Elizabeth Grosz's Deleuzian Feminist Theory

    Open Access•Tuija Pulkkinen•Hypatia•2017

  • Natality or Birth? Arendt and Cavarero on the Human Condition of Being Born

    Open Access•Fanny Söderbäck•Hypatia•2018

  • Normative Violence, Vulnerability, and Responsibility

    Catherine Mills•differences•2007

  • Feelings of Injustice

    Tuija Pulkkinen•differences•2016

  • Beyond Ontology and Sexual Difference

    Adriana Cavarero, Elisabetta Bertolino et al.•differences•2008

Citations per year1
Citation span2021 - 2026 (6)
Highly citedNo

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