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ZENODO
Article . 2026
License: CC BY
Data sources: ZENODO
ZENODO
Article . 2026
License: CC BY
Data sources: Datacite
ZENODO
Article . 2026
License: CC BY
Data sources: Datacite
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Wounded Subjectivity and the Ethics of Non-innocence: Vulnerability, Structural Complicity, and Fragile Agency

Authors: Thalonikkara Devassy, Tinto; Upendra, C;

Wounded Subjectivity and the Ethics of Non-innocence: Vulnerability, Structural Complicity, and Fragile Agency

Abstract

Rooting its approach to the wounded subjectivity and ethics of non-innocence in the inescapability of harm, vulnerability and structural implication, the article draws on the work of Veena Das, Judith Butler, Adriana Cavarero, Paul Ricœur, Jean-Luc Nancy, Iris Marion Young, Bernard Williams and others to support a model of wounded subjectivity as an interdependent, non-innocent mode of selfhood produced by vulnerability, dependence, openness, exposure and entanglement with the lives of others, rather than a deviance from autonomy. The article argues that subjects are not complicit in the ordinary reproduction of structural harm through conscious wrongdoing, but rather through participation in institutional, economic, and social production processes that sustain life while distributing injury unevenly. Another condition theorized is non-innocence, or moral exposure: subjects who cannot purify or discharge moral responsibility for the situation. Against resignation and redemptive moralism, it offers an ethics without purity, grounded in vigilance, responsiveness and a future-oriented collective responsibility to reduce harm. Developing a conception of fragile agency and situating a wounded subjectivity as political anthropology, it refigures ethical and political life around the central ideas of co-existence, collective implication and the fragile work of sustaining shared life within damaged worlds.

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Keywords

Wounded subjectivity, non-innocence, structural complicity, ethics without purity, vulnerability and implication, ordinary life and injury, political anthropology of co-existence

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selected citations
These citations are derived from selected sources.
This is an alternative to the "Influence" indicator, which also reflects the overall/total impact of an article in the research community at large, based on the underlying citation network (diachronically).
BIP!Citations provided by BIP!
popularity
This indicator reflects the "current" impact/attention (the "hype") of an article in the research community at large, based on the underlying citation network.
BIP!Popularity provided by BIP!
influence
This indicator reflects the overall/total impact of an article in the research community at large, based on the underlying citation network (diachronically).
BIP!Influence provided by BIP!
impulse
This indicator reflects the initial momentum of an article directly after its publication, based on the underlying citation network.
BIP!Impulse provided by BIP!
0
Average
Average
Average