Sixty years ago, the political theorist Hannah Arendt, an exiled Jew deprived of her German citizenship, observed that before people can enjoy any of the "inalienable" Rights of Man-before there can be any specific rights to education, work, voting, and so on-there must first be such a thing as "the right to have rights". The concept received little attention at the time, but in our age of mass deportations, Muslim bans, refugee crises, and extra-state war, the phrase has become the centre of a crucial and lively debate. Here five leading thinkers from varied disciplines-including history, law, politics, and literary studies-discuss the critical basis of rights and the meaning of radical democratic politics today.
The story of how a much-contested legal category—statelessness—transformed the international legal order and redefined the relationship between states and their citizens. Two world wars left millions stranded in Europe. The collapse of empires and the rise of independent states in the twentieth century produced an unprecedented number of people without national belonging and with nowhere to go. Mira Siegelberg’s innovative history weaves together ideas about law and politics, rights and citizenship, with the intimate plight of stateless persons, to explore how and why the problem of statelessness compelled a new understanding of the international order in the twentieth century and beyond. In the years following the First World War, the legal category of statelessness generated novel visions of cosmopolitan political and legal organization and challenged efforts to limit the boundaries of national membership and international authority. Yet, as Siegelberg shows, the emergence of mass statelessness ultimately gave rise to the rights regime created after World War II, which empowered the territorial state as the fundamental source of protection and rights, against alternative political configurations. Today we live with the results: more than twelve million people are stateless and millions more belong to categories of recent invention, including refugees and asylum seekers. By uncovering the ideological origins of the international agreements that define categories of citizenship and non-citizenship, Statelessness better equips us to confront current dilemmas of political organization and authority at the global level.
"Belonging has been a formative struggle for me. Like most people with marginalized identities, my experience has taught me that it's hard to be yourself and feel like you belong in a culture that is hostile to your existence. That's why my body of work as a scientist, author, professor, speaker, and advocate for body liberation always comes back to the impact of belonging or not belonging. Radical Belonging is my manifesto, helping us heal from the individual and collective trauma of injustice and support our transition from a culture of othering to one of belonging." —Lindo Bacon Too many of us feel alienated from our bodies. This isn't your personal failing; it means that our culture is failing you. We are in the midst of a cultural moment. #MeToo. #BlackLivesMatter. #TransIsBeautiful. #AbleismExists. #EffYourBeautyStandards. Those of us who don't fit into the "mythical norm" (white, male, cisgender, able-bodied, slender, Christian, etc.)—which is to say, most of us—are demanding our basic right: To know that who we are matters. To belong. Being "othered" and the body shame it spurs is not "just" a feeling. Being erased and devalued impacts our ability to regulate our emotions, our relationships with others, our health and longevity, our finances, our ability to realize dreams, and whether we will be accepted, loved, or even safe. Radical Belonging is not a simple self-love treatise. Focusing only on self-love ignores the important fact that we have negative experiences because our culture has targeted certain bodies and people for abuse or alienation. For marginalized people, a focus on self-love can be a spoonful of sugar that makes the oppression go down. This groundbreaking book goes further, helping us to manage the challenges that stem from oppression and moving beyond self-love and into belonging. With Lindo Bacon's signature blend of science and storytelling, Radical Belonging addresses the political, sociological, psychological and biological underpinnings of your experiences, helping you understand that the alienation and pain you are experiencing is not personal, but human. The problem is in injustice, not you as an individual. So many of us feel wounded by a culture that has alienated us from our bodies and divided us from each other. Radical Belonging provides strategies to reckon with the trauma of injustice; reclaim yourself, body and soul; and rewire your nervous system to better cope within an unjust world. It also provides strategies to help us all provide refuge for one another and create a culture of equity and empathy, one that respects, includes, and benefits from all its diverse peoples. Whether you are transgender, queer, Black, Indigenous or a Person of Color, disabled, old, or fat—or your more closely resemble the "mythical norm"—Radical Belonging is your guidebook for creating a world where all bodies are valued and all of us belong—and for coping with this one, until we make that new world a reality.
"A POWERFUL WORK OF SPIRITUALITY AND ANTI-RACISM"—Publishers Weekly "IF YOU READ ONE BOOK IN 2020, MAKE IT THIS ONE."—Tricycle From much-admired meditation expert Sebene Selassie, You Belong is a call to action, exploring our tangled relationship with belonging, connection, and each other You are not separate. You never were. You never will be. We are not separate from each other. But we don’t always believe it, and we certainly don’t always practice it. In fact, we often practice the opposite—disconnection and domination. From unconscious bias to “cancel culture,” denial of our inherent interconnection limits our own freedom. In You Belong, much-admired meditation expert Sebene Selassie reveals that accepting our belonging is the key to facing the many challenges currently impacting our world. Using ancient philosophy, multidisciplinary research, exquisite storytelling, and razor-sharp wit, Selassie leads us in an exploration of all the ways we separate (and thus suffer) and offers a map back to belonging. To belong is to experience joy in any moment: to feel pleasure, dance in public, accept death, forgive what seems unforgivable, and extend kindness to yourself and others. To belong is also to acknowledge injustice, reckon with history, and face our own shadows. Full of practical advice and profound revelations, You Belong makes a winning case for resisting the forces that demand separation and reclaiming the connection—and belonging—that have been ours all along.
Despite being told that we now live in a cosmopolitan world, more and more people have begun to assert their identities in ways that are deeply rooted in the local. These claims of autochthony—meaning “born from the soil”—seek to establish an irrefutable, primordial right to belong and are often employed in politically charged attempts to exclude outsiders. In The Perils of Belonging, Peter Geschiere traces the concept of autochthony back to the classical period and incisively explores the idea in two very different contexts: Cameroon and the Netherlands. In both countries, the momentous economic and political changes following the end of the cold war fostered anxiety over migration. For Cameroonians, the question of who belongs where rises to the fore in political struggles between different tribes, while the Dutch invoke autochthony in fierce debates over the integration of immigrants. This fascinating comparative perspective allows Geschiere to examine the emotional appeal of autochthony—as well as its dubious historical basis—and to shed light on a range of important issues, such as multiculturalism, national citizenship, and migration.
A leading expert shows how, by learning from refugee teachers and students, we can create for displaced childrenÑand indeed all childrenÑbetter schooling and brighter futures. Half of the worldÕs 26 million refugees are children. Their formal education is disrupted, and their lives are too often dominated by exclusion and uncertainty about what the future holds. Even kids who have the opportunity to attend school face enormous challenges, as they struggle to integrate into unfamiliar societies and educational environments. In Right Where We Belong, Sarah Dryden-Peterson discovers that, where governments and international agencies have been stymied, refugee teachers and students themselves are leading. From open-air classrooms in Uganda to the hallways of high schools in Maine, new visions for refugee education are emerging. Dryden-Peterson introduces us to people like JacquesÑa teacher who created a school for his fellow Congolese refugees in defiance of local lawsÑand Hassan, a Somali refugee navigating the social world of the American teenager. Drawing on more than 600 interviews in twenty-three countries, Dryden-Peterson shows how teachers and students are experimenting with flexible forms of learning. Rather than adopt the unrealistic notion that all will soon return to Ònormal,Ó these schools embrace unfamiliarity, develop studentsÕ adaptiveness, and demonstrate how children, teachers, and community members can build supportive relationships across lines of difference. It turns out that policymakers, activists, and educators have a lot to learn from displaced children and teachers. Their stories point the way to better futures for refugee students and inspire us to reimagine education broadly, so that children everywhere are better prepared to thrive in a diverse and unpredictable world.
A Kirkus Reviews Best Middle Grade Book of 2019 A Japanese-American family, reeling from their ill treatment in the Japanese internment camps, gives up their American citizenship to move back to Hiroshima, unaware of the devastation wreaked by the atomic bomb in this piercing look at the aftermath of World War II by Newbery Medalist Cynthia Kadohata. World War II has ended, but while America has won the war, twelve-year-old Hanako feels lost. To her, the world, and her world, seems irrevocably broken. America, the only home she’s ever known, imprisoned then rejected her and her family—and thousands of other innocent Americans—because of their Japanese heritage, because Japan had bombed Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Japan, the country they’ve been forced to move to, the country they hope will be the family’s saving grace, where they were supposed to start new and better lives, is in shambles because America dropped bombs of their own—one on Hiroshima unlike any other in history. And Hanako’s grandparents live in a small village just outside the ravaged city. The country is starving, the black markets run rampant, and countless orphans beg for food on the streets, but how can Hanako help them when there is not even enough food for her own brother? Hanako feels she could crack under the pressure, but just because something is broken doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed. Cracks can make room for gold, her grandfather explains when he tells her about the tradition of kintsukuroi—fixing broken objects with gold lacquer, making them stronger and more beautiful than ever. As she struggles to adjust to find her place in a new world, Hanako will find that the gold can come in many forms, and family may be hers.
This fresh, inspiring call to community and connection from an entrepreneur and leader is perfect for anyone feeling alone and ready to set off on a journey to true belonging. Many of us feel more alone than ever despite living in the most connected society in human history. We need to belong in the same way that we need oxygen–our physical bodies require it. We perform better and have greater successes as individuals when we are connected to the collective. Join author Natalie Franke as she shares her story of longing for connection in the chaos and lessons learned on her journey to true belonging. Together we’ll uncover how to: Kick scroll-induced jealousy to the curb and transform the way that social media makes you feel about yourself and others Overcome loneliness by finding your people and cultivating true community in your personal and professional world Strike the balance between camaraderie and competition so that you can live a deeply fulfilled and joyful life Human beings are not highlight reels—we’re done fanning the flames of comparison, drowning in our insecurities, and being pitted against one another. We’re saying no to the endless rat race of getting ahead and goodbye to the narratives that leave us feeling left out and alone. We are destined for something better. We’re made for so much more. Because knit into the fabric of our DNA, we were Built to Belong.
