For professional and personal reasons, this week I've been thinking about what it means to have status within a political community. It just so happens that events in my personal biography have corresponded with two days calling for attention to status in various respects: Wednesday was World Refugee Day, and yesterday was National Indigenous People's Day in Canada. (I'm celebrating the latter belatedly by attending the Faculty Association's Reading Circle on Indigeneity and the University … [Read more...]
Human rights and the family
When people describe their workplace or community group as if they're "like family," my neck hair rises. I am suspicious, and immediately skeptical about the stability of the organization being described. If I were a Kelpien, my threat ganglia would extend whenever someone made this kind of reference. Let me be clear: I am not anti-family. I love families! Yay families! I'm just skeptical that family structures are good models for social or political groups to adopt. Arendt's critique of … [Read more...]