The affective-discursive ‘pruning’ of neoliberal selves: introducing the notion of self-othering

Abstract

In this article, I develop the notion of self-othering defined as the affective orchestration of different voices-of-the-self as an important self-constitutive practice of neoliberal subjectivity. I posit that neoliberal subjectification relies on othering those facets—skills, attributes, bodily properties—that do not conform to idealised notions of the self. By applying this conceptual lens to empirical material drawn from a qualitative research project on women’s identity negotiations, my aim is to show that affect, notably what feels right/wrong, plays a crucial role in aligning the body with neoliberal culture. The affective-discursive approach to analysing the dialogical self I propose is based on a problematisation of neoliberal logic and thus draws attention to the normativity of affect. The analysis of practices of self-othering lays bare how certain voices and ways of being become unsayable. However, their presence in people’s self-constructions also suggests that they could be re-articulated to formulate a counter ideal.

Workers’ right to the subject: The social relations of data production

“…The political economy within which data subjects operate is discussed by others who speak of the neoliberal subject (Hardy and Thomas, 2015;Cooper, 2008;Mirowski, 2014;Chowdhury, 2022;Bandinelli, 2019;Chandler and Reid, 2016;Brook, 2013). Chowdhury (2022) argues that externally derived subjection occurs at a personal level via a dualistic gaze, where outlying characteristics which do not fit values of competition and optimisation and other capitalist norms, are 'othered' internally and therefore self-assumed to be part of one's personality and subjectivity. For example, a worker who actively pursues faster performance by pushing herself harder at work would, within this theory of self-formation, correlate her behaviour with her ambitious personality, which she is proud of.…”

“…The political economy within which data subjects operate is discussed by others who speak of the neoliberal subject (Brook, 2013;Bandinelli, 2019;Cooper, 2008;Chandler and Reid, 2016;Chowdhury, 2022;Hardy and Thomas, 2015;Mirowski, 2014). Chowdhury (2022) argues that externally derived subjection occurs at a personal level via a dualistic gaze, where outlying characteristics which do not fit values of competition and optimisation and other capitalist norms, are 'othered' internally and therefore self-assumed to be part of one's personality and subjectivity.…”