Authority, power, and the University

A complaint biography includes the experiences that lead to a complaint, but also the experience of a complaint if that is indeed the course of action taken. In these cases, a biography of a complaint and that of a person are part of the same story; what happens to a complaint also happens to a person. In some cases, it takes a group to form in order to proceed with a complaint, or a complaint involves gathering testimonies from a number of people. What happens to a complaint also happens to a group of people. And given that a complaint can take many years to go through a system, the story of a complaint is often a story of exhaustion.

A complaint can take over lives.

A life can become a complaint.

Or a life can feel like a complaint.

I am also learning: when you make a complaint within an organization so

much is revealed about an organization.

A complaint biography might not even begin with something that has been explicitly said. A complaint biography might not even begin with the word no, or no might not only be expressed through words. To give a complaint biography we need to slow down, to get a sense of how a complaint is embedded within the intensity and thickness of a situation.

A situation: how you encounter a structure. A situation: how you are thrown.

Complaint can be the experience of the absence of exteriority to what you are complaining about.

You are there; you are right there; there you are.

- (Ahmed, 2019, p. 518)^[1]