| Uniform title | Se d̐uefendre. English |
| Contents |
Prologue: what a body can do -- The production of disarmed bodies -- Defense of self, defense of the nation -- Testaments of self-defense -- The state, or the non-monopoly on legitimate defense -- White justice -- Self-defense: power to the people! -- Self-defense and safety -- Reprisals. |
| Abstract |
"Philosopher Elsa Dorlin looks across the global history of the left to trace the politics, philosophy, and ethics of self defense"-- Provided by publisher. |
| Abstract |
Is violent self-defense ethical? In the history of colonialism, racism, sexism, capitalism, there has long been a dividing line between bodies "worthy of defending" and those who have been disarmed and rendered defenseless. That those subject to the most violence--the enslaved, the colonized, the oppressed--have been forcibly made defenseless raises, for any movement of liberation, a question: Can violence be used in the interests of self-defense? Philosopher Elsa Dorlin looks across the global history of the left to trace the politics, philosophy, and ethics of self-defense. With a historical gaze that captures slave revolts, British suffragists' training in jujitsu, and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising to the Black Panther Party, queer neighborhood patrols, and Black Lives Matter, Dorlin discovers a "martial ethics of the self": a practice in which violent self-defense is the only means for the oppressed to ensure survival and to build a livable future--back cover. |
| General note | Translated from the French. |
| General note | Originally published in French as Se defendre: Une philosophie de la violence ̐u Editions LA D̐uECOUVERTE, Paris, France, 2017. |
| Bibliography note | Includes bibliographical references (pages [183]-250). |
| Awards note | Winner of the Prix Frantz Fanon in 2018 and Prix De L'Ecrit Social in 2019. |
| Issued in other form | Online version: Dorlin, Elsa. Self-defense London ; Brooklyn : Verso, 2022 9781839761089 |
| Genre/form | History. |
| LCCN | 2022024363 |
| ISBN | 9781839761058 |
| ISBN | 1839761059 (paperback) |
| ISBN | electronic book |
