Collective disorientation in the pandemic conjuncture

Abstract

ABSTRACT In its far-reaching impacts on global life, encroaching upon seemingly every aspect of social totality, the COVID-19 pandemic is an urgent topic for cultural studies. This article situates the pandemic within a historical conjuncture in which various post-neoliberal formations are being struggled over. These emergent formations will in turn be indelibly impacted by the pandemic’s social, cultural, and political economic dimensions. Key to this uncertain future is a phenomenon we call collective disorientation, a concept that is implicated in the emergence, experience, and effects of the pandemic, as well as the political prospects for surviving the cascading crises of the pandemic conjuncture. Though the pandemic is a historically disorienting force, the cultural studies tradition is remarkably well-equipped to contribute to collective struggles seeking loci for new articulations beyond the COVID-19 conjuncture.