Race and Gender Identity Kinds and Ontic Oppression

Abstract This chapter introduces a third variety of race and gender kinds, ‘race and gender identity kinds’. A distinction is drawn between two senses of identity: identity as norm-relevancy and identity as identification. The chapter shows how both types of identity kind can be incorporated into the constraints and enablements framework. It argues that race and gender identity (as norm-relevancy) kinds cannot be ontically oppressive but that race and gender identity (as identification) kinds can, though they are not always ontically oppressive and can sometimes even serve an emancipatory function. Finally, the chapter shows how attending to identity kinds and the needs to which they can give rise draws our attention to a distinctive form of ontic oppression, ‘selective ontic oppression’, which affects some, but not all, individuals who are constructed as members of the relevant kind.