"Phenomenology is the study of structures of consciousness as experienced from the first-person point of view."

Social differences are effects of how bodies inhabit spaces with others.

Orientations are about starting points. Being directed towards some objects and not others involves a more general orientation towards the world. The objects that we direct our attention towards reveal the direction we have taken in life. In this case, the text keeps mentioning a table as a point of reference:

So whether we can sustain our orientation towards the writing table depends on other social orientations, which affect what we can face at any given moment in time. We can consider perhaps how one’s background affects what it is that comes into view, as well as how the background is what allows what comes into view to be viewed.

While I understand the premise of the text and metaphor, I think a better object than a writing table could've been used to set an example since the text attempts to make a queer connection between Husserl's thesis of intentionality and the concept of "the behind":

Events can have backgrounds. This explains the conditions of emergence or an arrival of something as the thing that it appears to be in the present. Again, what one sees is shaped by a direction one has already taken, a direction that shapes what is available to this person, in the sense of what you face and what you can reach. What is in front of you also shapes what is behind you, what is available as the background to your vision.

In other words, we are oriented towards objects as things we “do things” with. I conclude that each body's perception cannot be one and the same because each body has had different experiences. Apply this to queer theory and heteronormativity in a way. Can objects around us with the meaning and background they have also be considered normalizing in this context? The process of perceiving from a queer perspective is simply different.

Toward a Queer Phenomenology

On Stuart Hall

Hall makes a good point in saying that identities are changing in modern societies. It is something I felt too. He defines the 'crisis of identity' as a set of 'double displacements' - both from your place in the world as well as the individual: the self. Starting from the Enlightenment, eventually we found out that the individual changes in relationship to others. The interaction between self and society basically. And this is what has been shifting. The search for an identity has indeed become more open-ended with new possibilities, but it is also related to time and place. I can see how globalization has contributed to this, as the world became more interconnected, so did the pace at which societies change, like a domino effect. A few of the terms these thinkers associate with late-modern societies are: discontinuity, fragmentation, rupture, and dislocation. I believe the overarching idea is that there is no single identity. Are identities being "homogenized"? I don't think so. Globalization has spread knowledge about the things that are possible if anything, including the many different identities out there.

One such example important in the text contributing to identities is how nations are imagined. In my opinion, the text goes over this portion of one's identity for far too long. There are other anomalies contributing to the creation of one's identity as well, such as our interests, likes and dislikes. Identities aren't just where we hail from. It's also what we decide to do with our lives in terms of the things we occupy ourselves with. I'm surprised it doesn't mention these at all.

Summarise Kobena Mercers crisis of identity argument:

Identities experience a crisis because modern societies are ever-changing. Nothing is fixed anymore which leaves incoherence with a sense of doubt and uncertainty. Our identities are tied to the self and how we interact with the social systems we find ourselves in, and because these are fragmented, so are our identities.