Introduction to Feminist Vigilance

This chapter argues that vigilance is an untheorized but potent concept for feminist thought and politics. Prevailing conceptions cast vigilance as reactive and defensive, often as cognitive alertness and attentiveness against either boredom or danger. A popular trope is the masculinist figure of the lone vigilante who metes out violent retribution. Sotirin argues instead for feminist vigilance as an embodied agency informed by an ethics of relationality valuing communality and care. She urges feminists to mobilize vigilance not as defensive but as hopeful, responsive, and connected. Chapter authors elaborate on this invitation by framing vigilance as technofeminist activism; postcolonial feminist critique; Black women’s self-care; the work of women religious; a mode of critique and anticipation about media portrayals of race, gender, and violence; the ethics of academic research and computer coding; and collective civic action. Together, they frame feminist vigilance as a critical strategy and commitment for confronting the precarities and complexities of contemporary social life.