Can Knowledge be (a) Performative?

Can Knowledge be (a) Performative? - Aleksandra Kołtun

The recent surge in popularity of the nations of performance and performativity provides an incentive for ezamining their productivity for contemporary models of knowledge production. Drawing upon a host of conceptions from performance studies, philosophy of language, literary theory, gender studies as well as the postconstructivist science and technology studies, the Author proposes that we investigate knowledge in terms of its performativity. The concept of "knowledge as (a) performative" draws attention to a specific, profoundly transformative, yet at the same time embedded character of knowledge, itself understood both as a product and a productive process. Such vision brings to focus its open-ended, non-linear, transient, and heterogeneous character, its active engagement with the world and within matrices of power, lack of clear-cut paths or easily measurable results. As a result, introducing the concept of knowledge as (a) performative entails a number of shifts in both ,language of description and issues at stake, concerning above all, the character and spaces of knowledge production, questions of broadly understood effectiveness, a link to power and ethics, as well as a more general problem of delineating the role of science in today's world.