Social Work: Transforming Rage & Grief

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SPMSW Students Only, Synchronous Online

In this course, we will treat rage, and the expression of rage, as intricately tied with grief as outlined by Judith Butler in her now iconic speeches and writings on the subject (see 2014 and 2023). More so, we will explore grief in relation to rage, complicating understandings of rage and the typification of subjects and their behavior. The purpose for this is twofold. First, we are interested in understanding people as they understand themselves, that is, less in terms of some extra-local sense-making ordered way and more in terms of how people experience themselves (commonly, in more complex, less objectifying ways). Second, by refusing to speak categorically or in simple prescribed ways, we make divisions between people less clear, the methods of power less efficient, and the targeting of others more difficult. In all, these more complex ways of making sense of rage disrupt the inevitable conclusion of rage and violence (to power and dominance). Instead, there may be a reckoning with and acceptance of one’s vulnerability in context and a commitment to more compassionate ways of responding to yet inevitable, common human suffering. Finally, we will explore Butler's assertion that rageful acts are the sanctioned practices of one group forcing on another what they cannot bear themselves. The course will consist of a review of Butler's writing, speeches, and interviews on the subject of rage and grief with the intention of taking a relational, profound and generative stance to knowledge.