Listening Alone Together. Political Subjectivation in the Time of Pandemic

Abstract

This short piece reflects on the challenges of poltical subjectivation at a time when organising largely had to move online. It also explores the play of liveness and mediation in mediatised street actions that have erupted in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd. The sense of isolation in both contexts stems not only from being physically apart from other activists but also from the loss of a common world. Following Derrida, it proposes that listening, as a form of carrying by ear in solitude after the end of the world, represents a way to interpellate caring subjects whose ecological attunement offers a possibility for repairing and recreating the world.