A Field in Formation: Intersectionality Is/As Social Justice

Criticism 63.4_06_Weeks.indd Page 441 17/11/21 12:28 pm Criticism Fall 2021, Vol. 63, No. 4, pp. 441–444. ISSN 0011-1589. doi: 10.13110/criticism.63.4.0441 © 2021 by Wayne State University Press, Detroit, Michigan 48201-1309 Social theory in and of itself can be a daunting scholarly enterprise— not least when framed within and through critical positionalities. While intersectionality at first glance may seem to be a relatively approachable social theory, especially given its increasing popularity in scholarly and popular modalities, it has proven to be substantively rich, complex, and consequential. In Intersectionality as Critical Social Theory, Patricia Hill Collins, preeminent scholar of intersectionality, takes on the ambitious project of positioning intersectionality as a critical social theory and illuminating the productive possibilities for intersectionality both epistemologically and methodologically, especially as a social justice project. By positioning intersectionality, Collins simultaneously contextualizes critical social theory and charts critical social theory’s potential for scholars invested in activism and social justice who might otherwise be located in fields that self-identify and/or are identified as critical. Collins politically situates and consequently politicizes intersectionality. Rather than catering to the academy’s impetus to privilege so-called objective knowledge, Collins argues that critical social theory and concurrently intersectionality can only be critical insofar as their ethical commitments to social justice. Knowledge operating under the guise of neutral objectivity not only gets conferred A FIELD IN FORMATION: INTERSECTIONALITY IS/AS SOCIAL JUSTICE Lee Y. Weeks Jr.