Introduction: The Affective Language of Human Rights’ Activism

The introduction unravels the dynamics carried within and between feminist women inheriting the traditions and passions of the second-wave independent movement; female religious activists posing their rights demands and raising their voices against the conditions that have harmed them in society; and the struggles of an LGBTQI+ movement that has been actively visible although still understudied. More than that, it focuses on their alliances by arguing that activism is a performative and affective language of claiming rights’ demands and desires. In particular, it is explained that the affects of activism that are analysed in this book do not escape the structural imperatives of historicity, language and representation, and for this reason what becomes politically important for the ‘transmission’ of such political affects is incommensurability defined by the knowledge, or rather the acknowledgement, of how hard it is to make affect speak the language of differing political visions and desires. By providing a sound critique of universalistic, humanitarian, (hetero)normative and orientalising approaches to affect and human rights, the introduction analyses how authoritarian regimes and neoliberalism join forces to deprive social movements of a powerful bargaining card they have had until now, i.e. the right to have rights, which means the right to think and produce different forms of affective politics, solidarities and resistance. Moreover, it also suggests a different approach to existing methodologies of studying activism, i.e. approaching the study of activism as ‘fieldwork in philosophy.’