TheMaterialismofBiologicalEncounters 91
Medical historians have offered the term "geography of blame"
(Farmer 143) to capture the affective dynamics at work here. From the
perspective of a materialist cultural critique, I seek to capture this
pattern of biological encounters by speaking in the following of
precariousness, even of ahemispheric precariousness. While the term
"hemispheric" suggests wide open spaces of shared susceptibilities, I
would also emphasize that "precariousness" registers the differential
material positioning of these encounters on places and people. It is an
impact which registers its presence in Althusserian fashion, in its
effects—through an uneven distribution of life chances (Ahuja,
Esposito). As mentioned in the introductory chapter of this book, the
term "precariousness" (or precarity) has entered the vocabulary of
culturalcritiqueonlyinrecentyears,mostconspicuouslyintheworkof
JudithButlerwhereitdesignatesanexistentialconditionthatremindsus
of the inescapable sociality and connectedness of our existence:
"Precariousness implies living socially, that is, the fact that one's life is
always in somesense in the hands of the other" (Butler,FramesofWar
14). Although the precariousness Butler is having in mind is primarily
inducedsocially,biologicallyinducedprecariousnessworksprettymuch
along the same lines, and can do so on an individual level (caused by
disabilityorage)aswellasacollectiveone(by"natural"catastrophesor
medical emergencies). The latter case includes mass events such as
infectious diseases, which likewise put people into the hands of others,
from whom they contracted the disease.^42 In cases of biologically
induced precariousness, these others remain mostly anonymous but that
does not fundamentally change the precarious status of the people
affected.
What also needs to be added here is that while Butler's argument
respondstoacurrentdomesticproblemintheU.S.,namelythesystemic
productionofprecariousnessbytheneoliberalstate,precariousnessona
hemispheric,ifnotglobalscale,wasthemoreorlessdirectconsequence
of the continuous expansion of EuroAmerican military and settlement
(^42) In her most recent work, she addresses this interactionist perspective more
directlyandwithclearemphasisonhowhumansarethusexposed,subject(ed)to
the will of others: "we make ourselves, if we do with others.. ." (Butler and
Athanasiou,Dispossession67).