Sovereignty and Autonomy: An Addendum on Kings and Queens
In a video essay on the brilliant movie Sinners which I unfortunately cannot find for the life of me, an equally brilliant young black woman made the following point: “The vampires have autonomy, but they have no sovereignty. Their change frees them to be able to do what they want, but they also can’t be separate from their vampire ‘family’ ever again, can’t say ‘no’ to their leader, can’t even keep their own thoughts or memories to themselves.”
She described autonomy as the ‘freedom to do’, whereas sovereignty is the ‘freedom to not do’ or not have things done to you. A sovereign person gets to decide the boundaries of their own life, their own body. They are able to remove themselves from unwanted actions of others and uniformly dictate who has knowledge or control of it. It is inward-oriented. You cannot be moved unless you choose it, cannot be made to speak, be harmed, be known unless you allow it. That is what it is to be sovereign.
In contrast, autonomy is outward-oriented. To be autonomous is to make active choices and to affect the world by those choices. No one can tell you that you can’t go to a certain place, learn a certain skill, connect with certain people. These actions are freely chosen and unlimited, as seen by the way barriers fall for the black vampires, who no longer feel the weight of white society’s imposed restrictions on the businesses they can enter, establish, or–should they so choose–raze to the ground.
This clear and simple distinction transformed my view of life, and of Tarot. Having occasionally struggled with the differences between the domains of the King and Queen (or in my deck, the Ruler and Sovereign), this gave the final tool I needed to glean their meanings in my readings. The Queen, the keeper of house, home, and self, speaks to me of my presence within the self. She is reminding me of the imperative to say ‘no’ when necessary, to hold what is within me as sacred, to know it, nurture it, and be discerning with who and what I integrate into it. The King, the keeper of action, authority, and leadership, spurs me to action, movement, and exploration. He sends me out to make change in the world, and to consider in what ways I am and am not free to do what I want.
The King and Queen are the balance of the Outer and Inner domains, each the pinnacle of maturity, embodiment and understanding–but each harness that power with very different wisdoms. When you next see a King or Queen in your draws, consider what they have to say about sovereignty and autonomy.