The possibilities for thinking beyond proceduralism: A post-phenomenological account of walking as a diffractive practice

Abstract

Turning to the possibilities of a posthumanist phenomenology, this autoethnography explores the “wandering” of the immigrant self, navigating between performance and concepts. Shifting away from proceduralism toward performative alternatives to analysis, I consider walking as a diffractive practice that encourages critical awareness and deep engagement with one’s surroundings. Toward the affectivity of post-phenomenological life worlds, the concept of “becoming possible” emerges as a central theme in my daily encounters, moving from imagining alternative ways of being to performing them. In the context of research, this performative event creates a line of flight, in a Deleuzian sense, escaping the established territory of knowing. In doing so, the immigrant self is actualized within a dynamic in-between space of what might be possible. Situated knowledges that are tied with specific contexts are, as a result, produced and reproduced, entangled in non-linear ways that remain resistant to representation, meaning, and understanding. While possibility thinking foregrounds hope, imagination, agency, and creativity, the practice of diffraction provokes an ethics that is accountable to both the social and material world, thereby enabling the envisioning of various possible futures.