^aUniversity of London, London, UK

Correspondence: Lynne Segal, School of English and Humanities, Birkbeck College, University of London, 30 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DP, UK. E-mail: l.segal@bbk.ac.uk

Abstract

After Butler, identities and belongings, whether gendered or of any other hue, can never be securely pinned down. They must be seen as fundamentally contingent, stabilized only through the performative acts that attempt, unsteadily, to fix them as integral markings of our existence. Nevertheless, identity concepts remain pivotal to our ways of perceiving the world, positioning ourselves and asserting differing forms of agency within it. In this article, I discuss the ways in which Butler has herself shifted her analysis of subjectivities, even coming to embrace forms of identity for political ends, although, of course, never less than critically.