[Linganth] CFP: Evidence and responsibility in Late Capitalist Discourse

[Aurora Donzelli]

Dear all,

We are looking for one more person interested in participating in our panel for the 2021 AAA meeting to be held in Baltimore, MD. This CFP is for an in-person session. Interested persons should send a 250 word abstract to adonzelli at slc.edu 
 
Thanks for your consideration 

Take care

Aurora


ABSTRACT: Evidence and responsibility in Late Capitalist Discourse
Session organized by Aurora Donzelli 
 

Our contemporary moment is often represented as marked by the progressive extension of market logics to every domain of human existence and interaction (Brown 2003, 2006; Cruikshank 1993; Martin 2000; Rose 1990; etc.). Key to this process has been the institution of novel paradigms for determining moral and epistemic standards of conduct. New notions of truth and responsibility are redefining contemporary notions of subjectivity, citizenship, and publics. The political realm is crisscrossed by a rampant rhetoric of transparent accountability, while the public sphere seems marked by constant efforts to arbitrate reality and ascertain real facts from fake news. New protocols of certification and assessment are restructuring production processes while the erosion of the welfare state is giving way to a new ideal of citizenship, which makes individuals maximally responsible for their failures and achievements. Humans are increasingly expected to internalize the models of agency and responsibility inherent to late capitalism’s structures of institutional governance and economic production. The ideal neoliberal subject is imagined to be engaged in the moral project of maximizing the value of one’s human capital, as well as a constant evidencing of one’s engagement with such responsibility of self-development. Institutional, technological, and political economic configurations constantly monitor and assess individuals in these terms, guiding them towards internalization of such discourse through self-modulation. A growing ethnographic literature has thus shown how the contemporary world is characterized by the proliferation of evidentiary regimes based on ideals of transparency and moral standards pivoting on notions of accountability and individual entrepreneurialism (see for, example, Cavanaugh 2016; Gershon 2011, Matza 2009; Shore and Wright 2003; Strathern 2000; Urciuoli 2008; West and Sanders 2003). But we still lack a fuller account of how these larger discursive formations impact the grain of everyday life, structuring our daily encounters and interactions.
Drawing on the seminal volume edited by Hill and Irvine (1993) and extending its insights into contemporary political economic context, this panel explores of how situated language use participates in producing the specific notions of knowledge and agency that characterize the late capitalist present. How do neoliberal models of responsibility and evidence affect contemporary linguistic and semiotic styles of political self-presentation and participation? What do debates on fake news and (un-)accountable political practices reveal about the new moral and epistemic standards of our times? How do neoliberal modes of governance construct different populations as (ir)responsible, (im)moral, (un)truthful, or (un)trustworthy? This panel’s goal is to “turn the tools of linguistic anthropology” to further our understanding of how neoliberal notions of responsibility and evidence are both produced and challenged through actual instances of discursive activity (Hill and Irvine 1993: 3). The papers draw on the ethnographic study of different geographic and social contexts to provide fine-grained analyses of how deontic and epistemic discursive frameworks (of a neoliberal kind) affect contemporary publics and subjectivities.



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Aurora Donzelli 		
Associate Professor 
Sarah Lawrence College		  
1 Mead Way				
Bronxville, NY 10708 USA		
E-mail: adonzelli at sarahlawrence.edu
https://www.auroradonzelli.com/