Strangers

Most people, if pressed, would probably acknowledge that

language matters. That is to say, it is generally recognized that in a
certain situation it will be better to say one thing rather than another,
that to a certain extent we present ourselves to one another through
language, that this is one of the ways we illustrate friendship, perform
practical tasks (could you hand me that jarthe third one on the left?),
initiate conflict, and, remarkably, one of the best ways humankind has
developed to reconcile that conflict. But in all of these examples, we
are actors using language in ways that are to us predictable and
familiar. Other people might surprise us with their actions or word
choice, but language itself does not act on us, does not surprise us,
does not control the choices we make. Simply put, we define words;
they do not define us.
This, I believe, is the common conservative definition of
language. And while it is often a good idea to be conservative in our
definitions, lest the main principle (it is this and not this) becomes
muddled, language seems to defy these common defining acts of
inclusion (what it is) and exclusion (what it is not). Language simply
wont sit still, and so its range and boundary is always blurred.
One reason for this is that humans and language are engaged in
co-evolution, a process wherein no individual can witness the

beginning or end.1 There is, with life as with language, a mystery of

origin (past) and a mystery of demise (future), leaving the
person/speaker in a constant and irrevocable state of now.2
It is here that I would like to introduce Kristevas idea of the
Stranger. As we have seen, language eludes most attempts at
definition, and seems to be moving with us through time, alongside the
biological dialogue that is evolution.

One thing that we can say about

language is that its skeleton is comprised of objects, subjects, direct

objects, and action. The Stranger, Kristeva would say, is someone (a
member of an outside group) who is by language and other acts,
forced to live as object or direct object in a society run by subjects.
The life of an object/direct object is a life without agency, a life of being
spoken to, a life without self-definition (autonomy), a life wherein one is
constantly acted upon. While Kristeva focuses much of her writing on
women and foreigners as radical Strangers, her work is very much
open to wider extrapolation. Clearly, the Stranger in society is anyone
who is systematically objectified by the ruling order of subjects and
their language: women, people of different races, ethnic traditions or

Here, it seems, we are socially and biologically intertextual. This is

also reminiscent of Burkes Parlor Metaphor.
2
I think it is interesting that just as Christian fundamentalisms
obsession with eschatology reaches a fever pitch, we are also hearing
doomsday predictions from scholars fearing the end of proper
language use.
3
I am trying here to remark on the evolution of language, which is
not biological but does find expression through the biological (the
evolving mind).

religions, incarcerated individuals, homosexuals, immigrants, the

physically and developmentally disabled, etc. These are groups who
are all, to a certain extent, disowned by the larger subject society.
Kristevas notion of the Stranger in society is founded on the
much more metaphysical idea of the Stranger inside. Influenced by
Freuds idea of the unconscious and Lacans mirror-stage4, Kristeva
suggests that our reaction to the Stranger is in part due to an
unrecognized Stranger residing deep in the subconscious. This internal
Stranger is carried over from childhood, and is a part of oneself that
was never reconciled to the transitions of the Oedipal stage, and exists
and is defined by anxiety and confusion about its selfhood. Upon
leaving the chora stage and entering the abject/Oedipal stage, Kristeva
explains: I expel myself, I spit myself out. I abject myself within the
same motion through which I claim to establish myself (McAfee, pg.
118). But this act does not extend to the depths of the subconscious.
From Kristevas perspective, one can work with the subconscious
through psychotherapy (which she advocates), but the subconscious is
a mystery that will never be fully unraveled. To develop an ethic of
respect toward this Stranger inside could be a first step to extending
that ethic to Strangers outside of oneself.

Kristeva, while influenced by Lacans sequence of development,

moves the mirror stage forward a bit. For her, it follows the allimportant chora stage. (McAfee, pg. 116-119)

Now that weve touched on Kristevas notions of both the

Stranger inside and the Stranger outside, let us move on to a
treatment of language and being from the Strangers perspective.
There are many cruelties perpetuated on the Other in societies.
Among these are imprisonment, rape, slavery, segregation, torture, excommunication, exile, deportation, and execution (lynching). These
are among the most extreme examples of punishment of the other,
and certainly deserve the greater part of the academic and historical
treatment. In this paper, however, I would like to turn our attention to
the more subtle (but by no means soft) forms of violence that
Strangers endure, particularly as that violence relates to language.
To be exiled from ones own homeland (or what one has come to call
homeland) is surely a wrenching pain to endure. But what about
those exiled through language and social norms, who must go on living
day to day within the society that has cast them out? We know that
language can promote violence and that it can itself be violent. But
cannot language also signify or perpetuate an already existing quiet
violence? And is this quiet violence to some extent as insidious as
outward projections of violence because the quiet is not recognized,
addressed, or recorded? For example, if an adult black man is walking
down the street and told by a white man to step aside, boy, is that
not an act of quiet violence? There is no recourse for the man to take,
because the burden would fall too heavily on him to prove the

motivations of the other person. Without recourse, there is no

interruption of the behavior, no report is ever taken, and so the
experience is never recorded. This is an example of an invisible
experience.
Strangers are characterized by a peculiar problemthey are at
once both invisible and too visible. Their visibility as other makes them
vulnerable to attack, to stereotype, to repression. On the other hand,
their invisibilitytheir lives as non-normative, as objects among
subjectscan bring on profound existential loneliness, anxiety, and
frustration. Here, we see that word anxiety again. Anxiety is at work
on both sides of this subject/object line (and in Kristevas view, again
at the micro scale within each selfs subconscious). As Kristeva and
Heidegger both assert, anxiety differs from fear in that anxiety has no
object.5 I like to think of anxiety as humidity, whereas fear is hail
hitting a roof. So, what we have is anxiety (which has no object) at
work on both sides of the subject/object relationship and, to a certain
extent, defining that relationship. As it has no object, clearly anxiety is
a function of and for the subject (the individual). And what is its
function? I would argue that anxietys function is to defend its subject
against any assault on its self or its identity. This is clearly illustrated
in almost any example of a gay person coming into conflict with a
homophobic person. Both of their identities are at stake in the
5

Kristevas use of the word anxiety seems interchangeable with her

use of the word dread.

encounter, and so anxiety is hard at work on both sides. They are

playing out an equation of identity in which there is a limited economy
of value. Anxiety, in defense of its selfs self6 (I think Kristeva would
agree) is what instigates the attack. In a sense, they have both been
rigidly defined in opposition to one another by subject societys
collective anxiety7. As Kristeva writes, confronting the foreigner
whom I reject and with whom at the same time I identify, I lose my
boundaries, I no longer have a container8I feel lost, indistinct, hazy.
(McAfee, pg. 123) This loss of identity places the self on the edge of a
precipice from which it must fight its way back. And with this fighting
back, the cycle of othering regrettably continues.
Here, Id like to introduce two new terms into this discussion of
Stranger: they are survival and annihilation. Used figuratively and
literally, these two terms describe the predicament of the Stranger
living in society. Like visibility and invisibility, the Stranger can find
him/herself forced from one category (survival) into another
(annihilation)9 by the aggressive will or words of another. Again, not to
overstate my point, this is life as a direct object. I do not mean to

I apologize for this its selfs self language. It is the only way I could
find to illustrate that anxiety is not the self, but a component (or guard
dog) of the self.
7
I would add here that they have likewise been defined by subject
societys collective lack of imagination.
8
I think container is used here to deliberately bring to mind the chora,
which is Greek for container/receptacle.
9
Here I am writing of spiritual, cultural, psychological, and physical
survival and annihilation.

suggest that the Strangers are defeated, beaten down, caricatures of

victimizationquite the contrary. But there is this very real sense in
which the Strangers energy is too often spent deflecting the
definitions, stereotypes, and expectations of the subject society. I
introduce the term survival not only to emphasize just what is
figuratively and literally at stake for the Stranger, but also to lead into
a discussion of the Strangers experience being perched between
survival and annihilation.
I would now like to introduce an Object group that I would
classify as the Stranger within a Strangerthe transgendered
individual. In addition to Kristevas Stranger within, the transgendered
person has a secondary Stranger insidea Stranger whose gender
identity (mind) does not match up with the persons sexual
characteristics (body). This person is made Stranger a third time by
the subject societys inability to classify his/her gender, and again a
fourth time when the person then reveals his/her sexual preference.
Regardless of what this sexual preference is, it is seen as aberrant,
because it relates directly back to the underlying aberrant gender
identity. This, by the way, highlights the fact that our sexual
preference is defined as much by our identity as by the identity of the
person to whom we find ourselves attracted.10
10

Even in the gay community, I think this is a fact that is often

overlooked. That is, if I identify as androgynous and express a
preference for women, then anyone who insists that I am a lesbian is
undercutting my own self-identification as not altogether woman.

For this group, the outside world poses many obstacles and
threats that are quite real.11 Visibility is important, for it is through
visibility that self-esteem and wellness are attained. But visibility can
pose a real threat to survival. On the other hand, invisibility is itself a
form of annihilation. This is the life of the transgendered otherfitting
in nowhere, posed with one impossible choice after another. A simple
question like which restroom should I use? becomes a pressing issue
of personal safety. And in what Kristeva would agree is the culmination
of internalized othering, the choice is usually made after a
deliberation on the comfort of the other people in proximity (subjects),
not ones own comfort. If I had more time, I would like to examine
other instances of Strangers who are othered two or three times
over, so that even their primary Stranger community rejects them as
Strangers. For instance, the black and Latino gay and transgendered
community, the gay physically disabled community, etc. The point I
hope to get across is this: Strangers are everywhere, and they all have
stories that, if told, would challenge us as individuals and challenge our
institutions in powerful ways.
From here, Id like to move into a discussion of the ways in which
Strangers read themselves into texts that exclude them. Id like to

11

Healthcare is often cited as posing the greatest obstacle to this

group. When a person doesnt have a physician who is sensitive to
his/her peculiar situation with respect to his/her body, discrimination
and shaming often follow. This can result in an avoidance of healthcare
visits altogether.

illustrate how this can be at times an act of desperation, of forcing

oneself awkwardly into the conversation, and at other times a
revolutionary act of defiance and spiritual regeneration.
Ill ask the reader to join me now in an exercise. Pretend that
you are a young gay person, between the ages of 13 and 17. You have
begun to understand your difference, but have been unable to
integrate it into your identity (even to yourself). You look around.
There are no positive representations of you in popular film, music, or
text media. You are always the punch line of a joke, an extravagant
showman to be laughed at, or the victim of hate speech or sexual and
physical aggression. That is, that with which you identify is always the
object of ridicule or violence. It is at this point, when it becomes
apparent that there is no you to be found out there, that something
interesting happens: you begin to read yourself into the media that
exclude you.
This is the experience of the young gay person. The imagination
takes over as the identity struggles for survival. Texts and films that
are were never intended to be understood as even remotely gay, find
their way into the queer teens gay canon. Often these media are
obsessed over, as is any text that could be loosely interpreted as
presenting a model of gay identity. I certainly didnt realize this was
the experience of other gay youth until I discovered the fact in my
twenties when talking among my gay peers. Not only did we all do

this, many of us were attracted to the same films and books. We had
all taken crumbs and imagined a cake. And somehow, through this, we
had survived.
The most historically significant example of Strangers reading
themselves into a text has to be that of the African slaves in the U.S.
and their relationship to the Exodus text12 of the Bible. White slave
owners, who were themselves Christian, believed that by introducing
the slaves to the New Testament, they could pacify them and culture
them to a certain extent. It is reported that most sermons in which a
white reverend attended to the slave population were focused on the
New Testament, specifically its household codes. These codes were
found in many of Pauls epistles, including Colosians, Ephesians, 1
Peter, Titus, etc. These codes presented a hierarchy to be followed in
practical living; God was at the top, and slaves were at the bottom.
This, the texts proclaim, is the natural order of the universe. It is easy
to see why the landowners were interested in indoctrinating their
slaves into the system of belief.
The landowners plan hit a snag when literate house slaves
began preaching the Exodus text of the Hebrew Bible rather than the
prescribed house codes. Exodus was a text written from the slaves
perspective, a text that showed God fighting on the side of the slaves,

12

The Prophets became very significant to this community as well. I

chose to focus on the Exodus narrative to keep my scope from
becoming too broad.

ultimately freeing those slaves from their bondage. This God was on
the side of the mistreated, the underclass, and would one day punish
the slave driver. This is the beginning of the black Christian church in
America, and a profound and moving example of a Stranger group
reading itself into a text that was introduced to them in order to
repress them. Empowerment, resilience, and limitless creativity seems
the province of the Stranger; again, these elements are exaggerated in
the Stranger world because they are survival acts, acts which make
living as Other bearable.
Now that we know the Stranger world, its otherness functioning
to define the subject world, its hidden narratives, its status as direct
object without agency, without representation, the question becomes,
What can be done? For the purposes of this paper, the answers
should be sought in the domain of language, not social services or allout social/political revolution. Reading Fischer through Kristeva, I
would suggest that Stranger narratives need to receive more attention,
both by Stranger communities as well as by the subject society. I think
Fischer, Burke, and Kristeva would all agree that language cannot be
legislated, and that we need to turn to more creative means to address
social problems as they overlap and are encompassed by bad language
and bad narratives. For my part, I dont think an ad campaign is the
answer either. Perhaps it reveals my bias as a writer to suggest that I
believe at least one answer could be found in the act of reading,

writing, listening, and story telling. All humans, subject and other, are
storytellers. Experience set in narrative has the potential to be
profoundly persuasive, and, it seems to me, these are the narratives
that all of our souls crave.

(Outside) Bibliography

Oliver, Kelly (ed). Ethics, Politics, and Difference in Julia Kristevas

Writings. Routledge Press, 1993. International.
Sjoholm, Celia. Kristeva and the Political. Routledge Press, 2005.
International.