Mariana Ortega

Draws from Latina feminism, existential phenomenology, and race theory to explore the concept of selfhood.

This original study intertwining Latina feminism, existential phenomenology, and race theory offers a new philosophical approach to understanding selfhood and identity. Focusing on writings by Gloría Anzaldúa, María Lugones, and Linda Martín Alcoff, Mariana Ortega articulates a phenomenology that introduces a conception of selfhood as both multiple and singular. Her Latina feminist phenomenological approach can account for identities belonging simultaneously to different worlds, including immigrants, exiles, and inhabitants of borderlands. Ortega’s project forges new directions not only in Latina feminist thinking on such issues as borders, mestizaje, marginality, resistance, and identity politics, but also connects this analysis to the existential phenomenology of Martin Heidegger and to such concepts as being-in-the-world, authenticity, and intersubjectivity. The pairing of the personal and the political in Ortega’s work is illustrative of the primacy of lived experience in the development of theoretical understandings of who we are. In addition to bringing to light central metaphysical issues regarding the temporality and continuity of the self, Ortega models a practice of philosophy that draws from work in other disciplines and that recognizes the important contributions of Latina feminists and other theorists of color to philosophical pursuits.

Philosophers and social theorists of color examine how racism can creep into defensive forms of nationalism.

“What does it mean today to be an ‘American’ when one does not represent or embody the norm of ‘Americanness’ because of one’s race, ethnicity, culture of origin, religion, or some combination of these? What is the norm of ‘Americanness’ today, how has it changed, and how pluralistic is it in reality?” — from the Introduction

In this volume philosophers and social theorists of color take up these questions, offering nuanced critiques of race and nationalism in the post-9/11 United States focused around the themes of freedom, unity, and homeland. In particular, the contributors examine how normative concepts of American identity and unity come to be defined and defended along increasingly racialized lines in the face of national trauma, and how nonnormative Americans experience the mistrust that their identities and backgrounds engender in this way. The volume takes an important step in recognizing and challenging the unreflective notions of nationalism that emerge in times of crisis.

“The idealized and abstract nation-state may be a familiar topic for political investigation, but the actual white nation and its racial state are territory far less explored. This stimulating set of essays—ranging from a reading of post-9/11 children’s literature to an analysis of the racialized aesthetic of white nationalism—provides a valuable and eye-opening introduction to the racial construction of the American polity.” — Charles W. Mills, author of The Racial Contract

“A smart and unique set of theoretical reflections on the constitutive role of race and ethnicity in the post-9/11 U.S. American political imaginary, this book should find its place on the bookshelves of everyone interested in questions of citizenship and belonging in a multiracial U.S. polity.” — Chandra Talpade Mohanty, author of Feminism without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity

http://www.sunypress.edu/p-4893-constructing-the-nation.aspx

Mariana Ortega is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Pennsylvania State University and the author of In-Between: Latina Feminist Phenomenology, Multiplicity, and the Self (2016). Ortega brings an original approach to questions of selfhood and identity by intertwining the work of Latina feminists such as Gloria Anzaldua and Maria Lugones with existential phenomenology, in particular the work of Martin Heidegger. Understanding the self as both singular and multiple, Ortega examines accounts of world-traveling and border crossings that illuminatethe everyday experiences of marginality, migration, and exile. With keen attention to the experience of living between worlds and the borders that define—politically and conceptually—current categories of identity, Ortega’s work challenges abstract and general accounts of selfhood that remain central to the academic tradition of philosophy, a tradition that has marginalized and ignored the unique cont...

In this work I discuss what I regard as the current race for critical phenomenology of race  in light of María Lugones’s understanding of the “logic of purity” and her call for impure theorizing,  In so doing, I raise the question of critical criticality—that is, I would like to point to the need of a critical stance toward phenomenology’s very criticality.

"A theory in the flesh means one where the physical realities of our lives all fuse to create a politic born of necessity," writes activist Cherríe L. Moraga. This volume of new essays stages an intergenerational dialogue among philosophers to introduce and deepen engagement with U.S Latinx and Latin American feminist philosophy, and to explore their "theories in the flesh." It explores specific intellectual contributions in various topics in U.S. Latinx and Latin American feminisms that stand alone and are unique and valuable; analyzes critical contributions that U.S. Latinx and Latin American interventions have made in feminist thought more generally over the last several decades; and shows the intellectual and transformative value of reading U.S Latinx and Latin American feminist theorizing. The collection features a series of essays analyzing decolonial approaches within U. S. Latinx and Latin American feminist philosophy, including studies of the functions of gender within feminist theory, everyday modes of resistance, and methodological questions regarding the scope and breadth of decolonization as a critical praxis. Additionally, essays examine theoretical contributions to feminist discussions of selfhood, narrativity, and genealogy, as well as novel epistemic and hermeneutical approaches within the field. A number of contributors in the book address themes of aesthetics and embodiment, including issues of visual representation, queer desire, and disability within U. S. Latinx and Latin American feminisms. Together, the essays in this volume are groundbreaking and powerful contributions in the fields of U.S Latinx and Latin American feminist philosophy.

The aim of this essay is to analyze the notion of “loving, knowing ignorance,” a type of “arrogant perception” that produces ignorance about women of color and their work at the same time that it proclaims to have both knowledge about and loving perception toward them. The first part discusses Marilyn Frye's accounts of “arrogant” as well as of “loving” perception and presents an explanation of “loving, knowing ignorance.” The second part discusses the work of Audre Lorde, Elizabeth Spelman, and María Lugones in their attempts to deal with the issue of arrogant perception within feminism, and examines how Lugones's notion of “‘world’-traveling” may help us deal with “loving, knowing ignorance.” Ultimately, the author suggests that we need to become aware of instances of “loving, knowing ignorance,” especially if we are to stay true to Third Wave feminism's commitment to diversity.

In this chapter I discuss the production of spaces of mourning in connection to memory practices for the living.  In so doing, I wish to explore the question of who deserves to be remembered—or rather, who is not remembered, even when alive, even when there are altars for them?  In the first section, I present photos from Verónica G. Cárdenas’s Traveling Soles series. I analyze the photographs in the series as well as the spatialities Cárdenas creates in order to honor border crossers and highlight Central American children who have been apprehended at the U.S Border and put in detention camps.  I present the photographs and the spaces they were created as instances of spontaneous memorialization and as altars for the living.  The photographs in turn become memento vivere, reminders to live in such a way that we cannot forget the lives of these bordercrossers.  In the second section I discuss the resistant role of the photographs if understood as memento vivere, and as aesthetic memories, thus showing the political possibilities that are mediated by what Ann Cvetkovich calls a sensational archive or an archive of feelings

This article calls for an examination of the spectral operations of the perceptual architecture of colonization in conjunction with the enactment of a decolonial feminism as proposed by María Lugones. The first section discusses both the notion of ghostly subjectivity from Lugones's early work as well as the echoes of this notion in her recent work on the coloniality of gender that emphasizes the gender/race/sex nexus. Subsequently, through a photographic example, the article presents an analysis of the perceptual operations of specter-making in practices of colonization in light of Lugones's understanding of the "light" and "dark" sides of the coloniality of gender. This analysis highlights not only the intricate nexus between racialization and gender and sex norms both in the past and in the present context, but it also points to the necessity for of a decolonial feminism attuned to perceptual practices or a decolonial aesthesis.

The aim of this essay is to analyze the notion of "loving, knowing ignorance," a type of "arrogant perception" that produces ignorance about women of color and their work at the same time that it proclaims to have both knowledge about and loving perception toward them. The first part discusses Marilyn Frye's accounts of "arrogant" as well as of "loving" perception and presents an explanation of "loving, knowing ignorance." The second part discusses the work of Audre Lorde, Elizabeth Spelman, and María Lugones in their attempts to deal with the issue of arrogant perception within feminism, and examines how Lugones's notion of "'world'-traveling" may help us deal with "loving, knowing ignorance." Ultimately, the author suggests that we need to become aware of instances of "loving, knowing ignorance," especially if we are to stay true to Third Wave feminism's commitment to diversity.

The aim of this essay is to carry out an analysis of the multi-voiced, multi-cultural self discussed by Latina feminists in light of a Heideggerian phenomenological account of persons or "Existential Analytic." In so doing, it (a) points out similarities as well as differences between the Heideggerian description of the self and Latina feminists' phenomenological accounts of self, and (b) critically assesses María Lugones's important notion of "world-traveling." In the end, the essay defends the view of a "multiplicitous" self which takes insights from Lugones's view of the self that "travels 'worlds'" and from other Latina feminists' accounts of self as well as from Martin Heidegger's account of Dasein.

Existential space is lived space, space permeated by our raced, gendered selves. It is representative of our very existence. The purpose of this essay is to explore the intersection between this lived space and art by analyzing the work of the Cuban-born artist Ana Mendieta and showing how her Siluetas Series discloses a space of exile. The first section discusses existential spatiality as explained by the phenomenologists Heidegger and Watsuji and as represented in Mendieta's Siluetas. The second section analyzes the space of exile as a space of in-between-ness and borders. Lastly, the third section discusses temporality as it relates to the space of exile. Through the analysis of Mendieta's Siluetas, and in light of phenomenological accounts of space and the works of Anzalda and Mignolo, Ana Mendieta herself is disclosed as well as the space characteristic of those who can no longer be said to have a “home.”

The following paper discusses Latina feminist debates on selfhood and identity. Since work by Latina feminists is not widely recognized or studied within the discipline of philosophy, the aim of the first section of this paper is to provide a brief introduction to Chicana feminism as it has been and continues to be pivotal in the development of Latina feminism. Included in this section is an introduction to the work of celebrated Chicana theorist Gloria Anzaldúa who has played a major inf luence in the theories of selfhood and identity developed by Latina feminists discussed in this paper. The second section analyzes the work of key contemporary Latina philosophers and theorists and shows the manner in which these theorists are reclaiming the notion of experience.

In the following, I would like to consider the notion of assimi- lation in light of a conception of selfhood that I term “multipli- citous subjectivity.” Viewing this notion of assimilation under the new light provided by current accounts of self that reject essentialism and homogenization and do justice to the complexity of the lived experience of human beings will shed light on the relevance of the concept of assimilation for our current climate of both globalization and xenophobia. In the first part of the paper, I discuss a contemporary treatment of the notion of assimilation: Eamonn Callan’s analysis of the ethics of assimi- lation, given the ideas of gratitude and duty.3 My interest in Callan’s discussion lies not merely in his explicit treatment of the ways in which assimilation may be harmful to oneself and to others but also in what is missing from his analysis. In the second part of the paper, I highlight the multiplicitous aspect of the self and develop a conception of assimilation based on the idea that assimilation constitutes neither the erasure of oneself and thus an intrinsically bad experience nor the key to the form- ation of unity in difference and thus the answer to our problems about immigration. Rather, assimilation involves a multidirec- tional social process involving both self and group identity and the negotiation of cultural and political representations of who we are. This notion of assimilation is inextricably tied to a conception of multiplicitous subjectivity.

abstract: Decolonial philosophy aims at destabilizing and critiquing what Walter Mignolo has called Eurocentric macronarratives of coloniality. However, the very practices of decolonial thinkers in the U.S. academy can themselves replicate colonial impulses and erasures. In this article I discuss “decolonial woes,” or a certain af ic- tion that arises when even resistant practices are connected to what I term “practices of un-knowing,” which distort and negate epistemic practices that have been deployed against ignorance about marginalized selves. Importantly, one of the decolonial woes I point to is connected to the work on decoloniality of scholars of color that undermines and makes invisible the decolonial work of Chicanas such as Emma Pérez and Gloria Anzaldúa. Scholars of color are thus also enacting practices of un-knowing.

The following essay examines visual representations of hurricane Katrina in popular media in order to show how photography continues to be enlisted in the production of the racial spectacle, the transformation of the plight of people of color into entertainment. The essay also analyzes how such a use of the visual serves to solidify the understanding of people of color by way of a black-white binary that does not do justice to current U.S. demographics. The essay provides a glimpse into the intertwining between the visual and racial thinking.

An analysis of the notion of "home" in connection to the notions of belonging and location in light of the experience of multiplicitous selves.

A revised version of this chapter appears in Ortega,  In-between, Latina Feminist Phenomenology, Multiplicity, and the Self.

Photography, famously described as the “pencil of nature” and the “writing with light,” is a particularly important visual technology and art for understanding how visuality—the complexes of information, images and ideas employed for social ordering—serves to undermine those considered “other” given their social location, be it race, sex, class gender, sexuality, ability, or nationality. Photographic technologies and images are thus inextricably tied to practices of “othering.” From its inception when photographic techniques were used for the purposes of “scientifically” indexing and classifying racial and so-called deviant “others” to contemporary understandings of photography as art, photographic practices remain tied to forms of violence against subjects deemed different.
The overall aim of this project is consequently to help teachers, students and lovers of photography, to engage with the various ways in which photography and photographic technologies are complicit with practices of “othering.” An attunement to the essential link between photography and these practices allows for a complex reading of photographic techniques, art, and criticism that not only discloses the collusion of photography with violence against those deemed different, but that also provides possibilities for “countervisuality” or practices that resist dominant, violent photographic technologies and representation.