Embodying Vulnerability: A Feminist Theory of the Person

Fokus i denna avhandling utgör läkares och civilingenjörers kunskaps- och identifikationsprocesser under utbildning och arbete – vilka studeras som utsnitt ur levnadsbanor. Syftet är att beskriva och tolka relationen mellan högre utbildning och arbete, dels utifrån föreställningar i forskning och policy, dels utifrån människors subjektivitet, vardagserfarenheter och liv. Studien baseras på textanalys och intervjuer med läkare och IT-ingenjörer under de första åren i arbetslivet och yrket. Kännetecknande är att processer följs över tid genom en longitudinell design. Den teoretiska ramen struktureras runt tre länkade teman: Kunskap och dynamiker i det samtida samhället; Högre utbildning och arbete; Människors formbarhet. Reflexiv tolkning utgör metodologisk ansats. Begreppen flexibilitet, stabilitet och ambivalens används dialektiskt vid analys av empiriska data. Avhandlingen visar att människors subjektivitet och vardagserfarenheter samspelar med generella föreställningar och sammanhangens reella förhållanden. Utbildnings- och yrkesval kan förstås som uttryck för såväl reflexiva livsprojekt som subjektiva dynamiker. Att formas till civilingenjör och läkare ter sig på vitt skilda sätt. Ingenjörerna formas till generalister och ”spelar med säkra kort” medan läkarna bygger en karaktär och ”spelar med sig själva som insats”. I arbetet använder civilingenjörerna titeln som en flexibel strategi – identifikation är främst bunden till plats, funktion och arbetstid. Läkarnas identifikation med yrket utgör ett konstant tillstånd – läkare är något de alltid är, också på fritiden – yrket är starkt bundet till person. Resultaten indikerar att både ingenjörs- och läkaryrket kännetecknas av livslånga kvalificeringsprocesser. De visar sig stark exkluderande över tid. Relationen mellan högre utbildning och arbetet diskuteras vidare i avhandlingen genom människors levnadsbanor och i termer av såväl formbara som hållbara liv.The focus of this thesis is the formation of knowledge and professional identification through physicians’ and engineers’ education and work – life-trajectories are the frame of interpretation. The aim is to describe and interpret the relationship between higher education and work, partly by studying ideas in research and educational policy, partly by people’s subjectivity, experiences and everyday life. This study is based on text analysis and interviews with physicians and engineers. The characteristic of this study is that processes are described and interpreted through a longitudinal design. The theoretical framework is built up by three interrelated themes: knowledge and dynamics in contemporary society; higher education and work; the reflexivity of the individuals. An overarching interpretive approach is applied, and the concepts of flexibility, stability and ambivalence are used dialectically in the analysis of empirical data. The study indicates interplay between subjectivity, everyday life experiences and conditions in different practices. The informants’ educational and career choice can be understood as expressions of reflexive life-projects or as subjective dynamics. Becoming an engineer or physician stand out as substantially different processes. The engineers in information technology are becoming generalists and are “playing the game with a safe hand”, while the physicians becoming characters and are “playing the game with oneself as stake”. At work the engineers are using their title as a flexible strategy – identification is confined to place of work, occupation and working hours. The physicians’ identification with their profession is a fixed state of mind – they are always physicians, even in their leisure time – the profession is associated with their personality. The results indicate that both engineers and physicians careers can be characterised by life-long qualification. It appears as a strongly excluding factor. The relationship between higher education and work is discussed as life-trajectories and in terms of formable and sustainable life

The Fourth Trimester

This Article introduces a new conceptual framework to the legal literature on pregnancy and pregnancy discrimination: the fourth trimester. The concept of a fourth trimester, drawn from maternal nursing and midwifery, refers to the crucial three to six month period after birth when many of the physical, psychological, emotional, and social effects of pregnancy continue. Giving this concept legal relevance extends the scope of pregnancy beyond the narrow period defined by conception, gestation, and birth and acknowledges that pregnancy is a relational process, not an individual event. In the United States, however, antidiscrimination law has failed to acknowledge the demands of the fourth trimester; it operates from the presumption that pregnancy begins at conception and ends at birth. Without employing a fourth trimester framework, the current federal antidiscrimination regime will continue to permit pregnancy discrimination against women because employers can discriminate on the basis of activities that typify the fourth trimester of the pregnancy. Judges, administrative actors, movement lawyers, and other policy makers should recognize that the law should prohibit discrimination on the basis of fourth trimester activities like breastfeeding, caring for newborn infants, or recovery. As a matter of law and policy, discrimination arising from these activities during the fourth trimester should be regarded as pregnancy discrimination

The Fourth Trimester

This Article introduces a new conceptual framework to the legal literature on pregnancy and pregnancy discrimination: the fourth trimester. The concept of a fourth trimester, drawn from maternal nursing and midwifery, refers to the crucial three to six month period after birth when many of the physical, psychological, emotional, and social effects of pregnancy continue. Giving this concept legal relevance extends the scope of pregnancy beyond the narrow period defined by conception, gestation, and birth and acknowledges that pregnancy is a relational process, not an individual event. In the United States, however, antidiscrimination law has failed to acknowledge the demands of the fourth trimester; it operates from the presumption that pregnancy begins at conception and ends at birth. Without employing a fourth trimester framework, the current federal antidiscrimination regime will continue to permit pregnancy discrimination against women because employers can discriminate on the basis of activities that typify the fourth trimester of the pregnancy. Judges, administrative actors, movement lawyers, and other policy makers should recognize that the law should prohibit discrimination on the basis of fourth trimester activities like breastfeeding, caring for newborn infants, or recovery. As a matter of law and policy, discrimination arising from these activities during the fourth trimester should be regarded as pregnancy discrimination

Afterword: What\u27s Next? Into a Third Decade of Latcrit Theory, Community, and Praxis

In this multi-vocal Afterword, we reflect-personally and collectively to help chart renewed agendas toward and through a third decade of LatCrit theory, community, and praxis. This personal collective exercise illustrates and reconsiders the functions, guideposts, values, and postulates for our shared programmatic work a framework for our daily work as individuals and teams through our portfolio of projects, which in turn emerged as a reflection and projection of LatCrit theory, community and praxis. These early anchors expressly encompassed (1) a call to recognize and accept the inevitable political nature of U.S. legal scholarship; (2) a concomitant call toward anti-subordination praxis to connect theory to action; (3) a commitment to build both intra-Latinx communities and inter-group coalitions; (4) a commitment to find commonalities while respecting difference; (5) a recognition of past critical outsider scholarship in new applications; (6) a commitment to ongoing self-critique, individually and collectively; and (7) a recognition of specificity and diversity in constructing LatCrit theory, praxis, and community. These early guiding commitments were rooted in substantive values, and accompanied by working postulates, that we likewise made explicit to help anchor our programmatic initiatives, and our mutual aspirations, over time and its exigencies

What\u27s Next: Into a Third Decade of LatCrit Theory, Community, and Praxis

In this multi-vocal Afterword, we reflect-personally and collectively to help chart renewed agendas toward and through a third decade of LatCrit theory, community, and praxis. This personal collective exercise illustrates and reconsiders the functions, guideposts, values, and postulates for our shared programmatic work a framework for our daily work as individuals and teams through our portfolio of projects, which in turn emerged as a reflection and projection of LatCrit theory, community and praxis. These early anchors expressly encompassed (1) a call to recognize and accept the inevitable political nature of U.S. legal scholarship; (2) a concomitant call toward anti-subordination praxis to connect theory to action; (3) a commitment to build both intra-Latinx communities and inter-group coalitions; (4) a commitment to find commonalities while respecting difference; (5) a recognition of past critical outsider scholarship in new applications; (6) a commitment to ongoing self-critique, individually and collectively; and (7) a recognition of specificity and diversity in constructing LatCrit theory, praxis, and community. These early guiding commitments were rooted in substantive values, and accompanied by working postulates, that we likewise made explicit to help anchor our programmatic initiatives, and our mutual aspirations, over time and its exigencies

Afterword: What\u27s Next? Into a Third Decade of Latcrit Theory, Community, and Praxis

In this multi-vocal Afterword, we reflect-personally and collectively to help chart renewed agendas toward and through a third decade of LatCrit theory, community, and praxis. This personal collective exercise illustrates and reconsiders the functions, guideposts, values, and postulates for our shared programmatic work a framework for our daily work as individuals and teams through our portfolio of projects, which in turn emerged as a reflection and projection of LatCrit theory, community and praxis. These early anchors expressly encompassed (1) a call to recognize and accept the inevitable political nature of U.S. legal scholarship; (2) a concomitant call toward anti-subordination praxis to connect theory to action; (3) a commitment to build both intra-Latinx communities and inter-group coalitions; (4) a commitment to find commonalities while respecting difference; (5) a recognition of past critical outsider scholarship in new applications; (6) a commitment to ongoing self-critique, individually and collectively; and (7) a recognition of specificity and diversity in constructing LatCrit theory, praxis, and community. These early guiding commitments were rooted in substantive values, and accompanied by working postulates, that we likewise made explicit to help anchor our programmatic initiatives, and our mutual aspirations, over time and its exigencies

Gender, Expulsion, and Law Under Racial Capitalism

This essay examines how the operation of background rules and institutions provided by law leads to the expulsion of individuals under racial capitalism based upon gender. Aligning itself with anti-capitalist work by critical theorists of social reproduction and intersectionality, it contributes to perspectives on racial capitalism that regard gender, in the way it creates subjects and differentiates between workers, as a co-constituting force with race under racial capitalism. Women and transgender persons, because of gender, are precariously situated on the edge of exile from the economic order. It makes this argument by weaving feminist insights – particularly those articulated in scholarship on social reproduction and intersectionality – with perspectives on racial capitalism