“Illegitimate” Bodies in Legitimate Times: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Movement

ABSTRACT

Drawing on Michel Foucault’s concepts of state racism and biopower, the author of the 26th Delphine Hanna Lecture presents several claims: (a) that the idea of the illegitimate outsider in Western world governments like the United States has largely been influenced by ancient Greek ideals, (b) that a host of policies and intentional actions by power brokers create derision and hierarchies between “old” and “new” immigrant groups, and (c) neoliberal ideology couched in actions that aim “to protect the state” is nothing more than a recoding of traditional racist rhetoric that expands systemic racism. The author identifies the capabilities approach, asset based community development, and framing movement and physical activity as issues of justice as critical strategies to ensure equal rights for all.

KEYWORDS:

• Biopower
• immigration
• neoliberalism
• physical activity
• social justice
• state racism

Notes

1. While these terms are debated and political, I will utilize current terminology provided by the United States Census Bureau.

2. Rates of obesity, hyperlipidemia, hypertension, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.

3. The scope of this paper does not allow for a robust exploration of the history of immigration and policies. For that I refer the reader to Coming to America: A History of Immigration by Roger Daniels (2002) and A Nation By Design: Immigration Policy in the Fashioning of America by Aristide Zolberg (2006).

4. Former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, shortly after the disaster, questioned whether federal funds should pay to rebuild New Orleans at a time when Katrina disproportionally affected African Americans, renters, the elderly, and people with low income status. Giroux also notes that cries of desperation from low-income Blacks in New Orleans were quickly redefined by various media outlets as the pleas of “refugees,” suggesting that victims were aliens lacking citizenship and legal rights. To date, many still believe that the media and United States government were complicit in creating a narrative that demonized victims of Katrina, resulting in the swift militarization of New Orleans by law enforcement in the weeks that followed.

5. Historically, massification has referred strictly to higher education, but I suggest that we are witnessing a “trickle-down effect,” particularly given the rise in charter schools, cyber schools, and various educational programs that seek to prepare youth for transition to the university.

6. The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) gave a formal order to disperse in English to a mostly Spanish speaking crowd of demonstrators who held legal permits to hold a rally at the park. After the crowd failed to move, police commanders declared the gathering an unlawful assembly and used batons and rubber bullets to move demonstrators. The LAPD and the courts deemed these actions excessive, paying more than $13 million in damages to demonstrators injured by police actions.

7. The act of kneeling on one knee in prayer specifically with one’s head bowed and an arm resting on the one bent knee, when kneeling.

8. Delivered at a meeting of the American Physical Education Association by W. W. Hastings, Ph.D.: Indianapolis, 3 March 1910.

9. A newcomer is an immigrant or refugee who has been in Canada for a short time, usually less than 3 or 5 years.

10. Some contemporary examples include, but are not limited to: the reduction of human movement programs on university campuses, inadequate food and water safety measures, consumerism, political actions that undermine health initiatives, the school to prison pipeline, anti-gay bullying, legislation that seeks to control women’s choice, and exploitation of athletes by universities and corporate entities.