The Physiology of Sexist and Racist Oppression

225 Pages·2015·1.755 MB·English

by  Sullivan, Shannon

The Physiology of Sexist and Racist Oppression
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The Physiology of Sexist and Racist Oppression
Anita L. Allen
Shannon Sullivan
The Physiology of Sexist
and Racist Oppression
Shannon Sullivan
1
3
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Sullivan, Shannon, 1967–
The physiology of sexist and racist oppression / Shannon Sullivan.
pages cm. — (Studies in feminist philosophy)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978–0–19–025060–7 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978–0–19–025061–4 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Human body (Philosophy) 2. Human physiology—Philosophy. 3. Sexism—Philosophy.
4. Racism—Philosophy. 5. Feminist theory. I. Title.
B105.B64S853 2015
305.8001—dc23
2014046159
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
For Samantha, Sophia, and Phillip

{ Contents }
Acknowledgments  ix
Introduction: Physiological Habits  1
1. The Hips: On the Physiology of Affect and Emotion  28
2. The Gut and Pelvic Floor: On Cloacal Thinking  66
3. The Epigenome: On the Transgenerational Effects of Racism  99
4. The Stomach and the Heart: On the Physiology of White Ignorance  128
Conclusion: Social-Political Change and
Physiological Transformation  162
Bibliography 185
Index 197

{ Acknowledgments }
I would like to thank a number of people for their help as I wrote this book.
Cameron O’Mara and Cori Wong provided valuable research assistance
on the gut in the early stages of the project. Members of the Rock Ethics
Institute’s Critical Philosophy of Race initiative at Penn State, especially
Camisha Russell, Paul Taylor, and Nancy Tuana, gave me useful feedback on
my initial ideas about epigenetics and race. Erin Tarver helped me polish a
version of the material on William James and emotion. Cheshire Calhoun
and three anonymous reviewers for Oxford University Press provided a great
number of insightful suggestions and comments that improved the final ver-
sion of the manuscript. Above all, in addition to giving me valuable feedback
on specific parts of this book, Phillip McReynolds has supported my work as
a whole for many years, even when it seems a little crazy. I can’t thank him
enough for sticking by me both professionally and personally.
I began this book while at Penn State University and finished it after mov-
ing to the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. I thank Dean Susan
Welch at Penn State and Dean Nancy Gutierrez at UNC Charlotte for their
support of my research.
Portions of this book have appeared elsewhere in different forms, and
I am grateful for permission to reprint them here. Sections of “Oppression
in the Gut: The Biological Dimensions of Deweyan Habit” (in A History of
Habit: From Aristotle to Bourdieu, eds. Tom Sparrow and Adam Hutchinson
[Lanham, MD: Lexington Press, 2013], 251–270) have been reworked and
included in Chapter 2 and, to a lesser extent, the Introduction. “Inheriting
Racist Disparities in Health: Epigenetics and the Transgenerational Effects
of White Racism” (Critical Philosophy of Race, Fall 2013, 1[2] : 190–218) has
been revised, expanded, and broken up to become part of Chapter 3 and the
Introduction. That article is copyrighted © 2013 by The Pennsylvania State
University and is used by permission of The Pennsylvania State University
Press. Finally, a modified version of the material in “The Hearts and Guts
of White People: Ethics, Ignorance, and the Physiology of White Racism”
(Journal of Religious Ethics, 2014, 42[4]: 591–611) is included primarily in
Chapter 4 but also in the Introduction.