Abolish
Abolish
Abolitionism starts from the belief that a particular arrangement (social, economic, material, institutional) is broken to the point it can no longer be salvaged. While the recent decades have seen a burst in abolitionist forms of study and practice, giving rise to energetic intellectual movements and street politics, cultural geographers have appeared more hesitant. The aim of this chapter is twofold. First, it diagnoses the subdisciplinary reluctance to embrace the abolitionist invitation, pointing in particular to the popularisation of a relational metaphysics and of an ethics of world-making. Second, the chapter offers a call for abolitions: of the myth of realism, of the bias towards world-building, of the conflation of emancipation with positive feeling, and of the urge towards concessions. Pursuing such endings, cultural geographers may find tools to critically engage, and if needed to explicitly confront, reformist investments in what ultimately harm us.
geography, abolition, critical theory, negativity, affirmationism, carcerality, black geographies, anarchism
Dekeyser, Thomas
0333acb4-04ff-423c-9127-4971096fd6a9
27 February 2026
Dekeyser, Thomas
0333acb4-04ff-423c-9127-4971096fd6a9
Dekeyser, Thomas
(2026)
Abolish.
In,
Merriman, Peter, Secor, Anna and Sumartojo, Shanti
(eds.)
Routledge Handbook of Cultural Geographies.
Routledge.
(doi:10.4324/9781003450887-47).
Record type:
Book Section
Abstract
Abolitionism starts from the belief that a particular arrangement (social, economic, material, institutional) is broken to the point it can no longer be salvaged. While the recent decades have seen a burst in abolitionist forms of study and practice, giving rise to energetic intellectual movements and street politics, cultural geographers have appeared more hesitant. The aim of this chapter is twofold. First, it diagnoses the subdisciplinary reluctance to embrace the abolitionist invitation, pointing in particular to the popularisation of a relational metaphysics and of an ethics of world-making. Second, the chapter offers a call for abolitions: of the myth of realism, of the bias towards world-building, of the conflation of emancipation with positive feeling, and of the urge towards concessions. Pursuing such endings, cultural geographers may find tools to critically engage, and if needed to explicitly confront, reformist investments in what ultimately harm us.
Text
Abolish - Submission April 2024
- Accepted Manuscript
More information
Published date: 27 February 2026
Keywords:
geography, abolition, critical theory, negativity, affirmationism, carcerality, black geographies, anarchism
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 510500
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/510500
PURE UUID: d1ae34fa-0f62-46d4-a6a3-20ad3dd8e36f
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Date deposited: 13 Apr 2026 09:52
Last modified: 13 Apr 2026 09:52
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Contributors
Author:
Thomas Dekeyser
Editor:
Peter Merriman
Editor:
Anna Secor
Editor:
Shanti Sumartojo
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