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- Complaint by Sara Ahmed
I’m cordially inviting you to join me in reading Part I (“Institutional Mechanics”) of Sara Ahmed’s “Complaint!”. From the publisher:
In Complaint! Sara Ahmed examines what we can learn about power from those who complain about abuses of power. Drawing on oral and written testimonies from academics and students who have made complaints about harassment, bullying and unequal working conditions at universities, Ahmed explores the gap between what is supposed to happen when complaints are made and what does happen.
To make complaints within institutions is to learn how they work and for whom they work: complaint as feminist pedagogy. Ahmed explores how complaints are made behind closed doors and how doors are often closed upon those who complain. To open these doors, to get complaints through, keep them going, or keep them alive, Ahmed emphasizes, requires forming new kinds of collectives.
The book offers a systematic analysis of the methods used to stop complaints and a powerful and poetic meditation on what complaints can be used to do. Following a long lineage of Black feminist and feminist of color critiques of the university, Ahmed delivers a timely consideration of how institutional change becomes possible and why it is necessary.
If you are interested in joining me, subscribe and I’ll send you an email in mid-August, with details about a meet-up in early September. Depending on numbers and where folks are located, I am tentatively looking at the week starting 08 September, for:
a weeknight discussion in Naarm (CBD and surrounds), over drinks, and/or
a weekend Zoom, for those who can’t make in-person or are interstate!
You can access this book via:
JSTOR, if you have an institutional login (you are welcome to contact me if you need assistance)
A local / university library (City of Melbourne has one copy — apologies if you have to fight to the death for it)
A local, independent bookstore, though it will likely be pricey (I’m sorry) (I can’t, in good conscience, encourage you to purchase it from from Am*zon)
You may also be interested in the following resources, to get a sense of the contents of the entire book (and in case you don’t get through all of Part I — no judgment!).
Blog posts from Sara Ahmed, about the book:
A lecture from Sara Ahmed, if you prefer listening.
Feel free to message or email me with any questions, wherever you are used to contacting me. If you are reading this from your inbox, you can hit reply and it will still reach me!
Jane xxx