This paper begins by questioning the relationship between language and human existence. Challenging the instrumentalist view of language as a neutral tool wielded by autonomous subjects, it proposes an alternative understanding: we are beings embedded...
This paper begins by questioning the relationship between language and human existence. Challenging the instrumentalist view of language as a neutral tool wielded by autonomous subjects, it proposes an alternative understanding: we are beings embedded in language, whose very existence is shaped through linguistic operations beyond our control. Drawing on J. L. Austin's theory of speech acts, the study first explores how language can function performatively-not merely describing reality but enacting it under certain authorized conditions. Within this framework, hate speech is understood as a performative utterance, whose injurious effects arise from its embeddedness in institutional authority and social conventions. However, Judith Butler critically expands upon Austin's model, questioning the assumption that speech operates only within closed, fully determined contexts. Through Derrida's notion of iterability, Butler redefines the performativity of hate speech as rooted not in intention or authority, but in the structure of repetition and citation that exceeds any singular event of utterance.
Furthermore, Butler deepens Louis Althusser's theory of interpellation to propose that subject formation occurs not prior to language but through being called by language. From this perspective, hate speech does not merely attack pre-existing identities-it constitutes subjects through injurious address, fixing their position and silencing alternative ways of being.
This paper argues that such ontological violence cannot be addressed solely through regulation or punitive responses that locate responsibility in individual speakers. Instead, ethical accountability must be rethought in terms of discursive repetition and positionality. Drawing from Butler's framework, this study emphasizes the need for an educational response that begins with a reflective awareness of how we are named, how we name others, and how language configures the space of relationality and recognition. Importantly, the possibility of responding otherwise remains open: although injurious speech constrains subjectivation, the structure of repetition also allows for dislocation, resignification, and the ethical act of speaking back.
In this light, the act of re-narrating oneself-especially for those excluded from the linguistic space of recognition-becomes a vital practice of ethical resistance. Subjectivity is not a stable given, but a process of navigating repeated interpellations. This paper proposes that recognizing our linguistic embeddedness and attending to the affective and relational dynamics of speech is essential for confronting hate speech in educational settings. In doing so, we open the political and ethical space to “live through” hate speech otherwise, not by denying its power, but by transforming the terms of address under which we are constituted.