Coming Soon: Sensitivity for Solidarity
Solidarity expresses a shared concern or set of concerns held among a group of people; it means that this group of people cares together about something invested with significance. Solidarity is a basis for action, and especially action that seeks just outcomes.
Being in solidarity with others does not require similarity. To be sure, when I am in solidarity with others I am invested in the same cause, but my investment is fundamentally mine. That is, my investment in a particular cause or act of caring together is an expression of my unique way of being in the world, what the philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961) called "a style of life."
While being in solidarity with others does not require similarity, being in solidarity with others does require sensitivity. Jenny Odell describes sensitivity in her 2020 book How to do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy.
Sensitivity is my ability to tolerate the difficult, awkward, ambiguous encounter with others in place and time. And by "tolerate" here, I don't mean a kind of passive allowance, but rather a capacity to be with others and to be changed by others. I see a line from sensitivity through solidarity to a future we work collaboratively and care-fully to build together, and that's the thing motivating a short burst of work to share with you.
Sensitivity for Solidarity
This eight-week offering calls on ideas from contemporary philosophers and theorists to help us prioritize and practice the sensitivity we need to be in solidarity with others. Beginning December 2, I'll send out an idea (on Mondays) and a practice (on Thursdays) designed to activate or amplify our sensitive capacities. The topics on order are:
- Sensitivity and Not Empathy
Why sensitivity is a more apt capacity for connecting with others than empathy is. - Checking Connectivity
Evaluating the ways convenience and speed functions in our lives, and finding reasonable and selective ways to divest. - Sensitivity replacements
Finding ways to re-integrate strategies that amplify the personal. - Dealing with Difference: Me, Myself, and I
Facing solitude with courage and challenging a culture of loneliness. - Loving Oneself, Loving Others
Opening toward self and others with regard to spiritual uplift. - Dealing in Difference: Learning from Lorde
Understanding the real role of difference in communities of shared concern. - Facing the Unknown
Lessons for the future with Octavia Butler. - Sensitivity and Solidarity
Thinking about shapes of common concern and possibilities for action in your communities.
The last idea post will arrive to your inbox on January 20. I'll host a Zoom Room that week to talk about the work and be in conversation together.
If you are already subscribe to my letter, Sensitivity for Solidarity will come your way as my other letters (like this one) have in the past. If there's someone in your life who is looking at the future with some mixture of care, concern, trepidation, anger, despair, hope, or possibility, please consider sharing this project with them.
Thank you! More to come on December 2.