Understanding Movements in Modern Thought

Series Editor: Jack Reynolds

This series provides short, accessible and lively introductions to the
major schools, movements and traditions in philosophy and the history
of ideas since the beginning of the Enlightenment. All books in the
series are written for undergraduates meeting the subject for the :first
time.

understanding postcolonialism
Published

Understanding Empiricism Understanding Postcolonialism Jane Hiddleston
Robert G. Meyers Jane Hiddleston
Understanding Existentialism Understanding Poststructuralism
Jack Reynolds James Williams
Understanding German Idealism Understanding Psychoanalysis
Will Dudley Matthew Sharpe & Joanne Faulkner
Understanding Hegelianism Understanding Rationalism
Robert Sinnerbrink Charlie Heunemann
Understanding Hermeneutics Understanding Utilitarianism
Lawrence Schmidt Tim Mulgan
Understanding Naturalism Understanding Virtue Ethics
Jack Ritchie Stan van Hooft
Understanding Phenomenology
David R. Cerbone

Forthcoming titles include

Understanding Feminism Understanding Pragmatism
Peta Bowden & Jane Mummery Axel Mueller
Understanding Environmental
Philosophy
Andrew Brennan & Y. S. Lo

ACUMEN

Contents

Acknowledgements vi
1 Introduction 1
© Jane Hiddleston, 2009 2 Fanon and Sartre: colonial Manichaeism and the call
to arms 25
This book is copyright under the Berne Convention.
No reproduction without permission. 3 Decolonization, community, nationalism: Gandhi,
All rights reserved. Nandy and the Subaltern Studies Collective 54
4 Foucault and Said: colonial discourse and Orientalism 76
First published in 2009 by Acumen
5 Derrida and Bhabha: sel£ other and postcolonial ethics 98
Acumen Publishing Limited 6 Khatibi and Glissant: postcolonial ethics and the return
Stocks:field Hall
to place 126
Stocks:field
NE437TN 7 Ethics with politics? Spivak, Mudimbe, Mbembe 151
www.acumenpublishing.co.uk 8 Conclusion: neocolonialism and the future of the discipline 178

ISBN: 978-1-84465-160-3 (hardback) Questions for discussion and revision 186
ISBN: 978-1-84465-161-0 (paperback) Guide to further reading 189
Bibliography 193
British Library Catalogning-in-Publication Data Index 199
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Typeset in Minion Pro.
Printed and bound in the UK by Athenaeum Press Limited.

contents v

one

Acknowledgements Introduction

I would like to thank the Rector and Fellows of Exeter College, Oxford, Postcolonialism is a broad and constantly changing movement that has
and the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages at the Univer- aroused a good deal of both interest and controversy. Inaugurated in
sity of Oxford for granting me a sabbatical during which to complete earnest during and after the fight for independence in the remaining
this project. Chapter 1 contains extracts from my article "Dialectic or British and French colonies around the 1950s and 1960s, it has devel-
Dissemination? Anti-colonial Critique in Sartre and Derrida' (Sartre oped rapidly to become today a major area of intellectual innovation
Studies International 12[1] [2006]), and Chapter 4 reuses some material and debate. While the term first became popular in North American
from my essay "Jacques Derrida' (in Postcolonial Thought in the Fran- university campuses, and in particular in literary departments, it is
cophone World, C. Forsdick & D. Murphy [eds] [Liverpool: Liverpool now widely used both inside and outside Western academic institu-
University Press, 2009]). I am grateful to the editors of both for allow- tions and attracts ever-growing numbers of commentators as well as
ing me to reprint this material. I would like to thank the series editor, students. The term "postcolonialism" can generally be understood as
Jack Reynolds, for suggesting this project in the first place, and Tristan the multiple political, economic, cultural and philosophical responses
Palmer at Acumen for his work in bringing the book to fruition. The to colonialism from its inauguration to the present day, and is some-
anonymous readers also offered invaluable advice and comments, and what broad and sprawling in scope. While "anti-colonialism" names
I am grateful to them for helping me to sharpen the final version. Kate specific movements of resistance to colonialism, postcolonialis:n
Williams has also been a scrupulous editor and has helped to produce refers to the wider, multifaceted effects and implications of colomal
a more polished text. Discussion of 'aspects of the book came up in rule. Postcolonialism frequently offers a challenge to colonialism,
seminars and meetings with a number of graduate students at Oxford, but does not constitute a single programme of resistance; indeed, it
and I benefited greatly from trying out my ideas with them. Finally, I am is considered consequently by some to be rather vague and panoptic
immensely grateful for the help and support of friends and colleagues, in its ever more ambitious field of enquiry. This book will focus on the
and above all, to Colin, for everything. philosophical dimensions of postcolonialism, and will demonstr~te
Jane Hiddleston the diversity of conceptual models and strategies used by postcolomal
Oxford philosophers rather than by political thinkers or literary write~s. Po~t­
colonial philosophy will be shown to feed into these, but detailed dis-
cussion of the politics, economics and literature of postcolonialism is
beyond the scope of this study.

introduction
vi understanding postcolonialism

descnbes the then what do we understand specifically by the term "postcolomalism"? nation's trajectory after 1962. although it is clear that the conditions "Colonialism" is close in meaning to "imperialism: although at the of this colonial project were different from those that were being ques- same time slightly different. but even after decolonization remains to be resolved. conquest. This conception of imperialism shows that the term tion and on the inequality and impoverishment brought about by this is wide-ranging. . some of colonization is a concrete process of invasion and a practical seiz. and with the attempt by Western states wide-ranging. then. direct colonial rule. imperialism names a broader form of authority or dominance. This means it could presumably refer not only to and names a specific. . . and that brought about not just the conquest of peoples and economic or political hegemony that does not have to include the direct the use of their resources. Post-colonial Algeria. for example. . In order to the effects of British rule in India. or. Nevertheless. The act pendence and neo-imperialism in Latin America. many critics have described and French colonialism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries also the United States's current dominance of global markets as a new form focuses very much on the ruthlessness of their methods of e:xploit~­ of imperialist rule. but also to the wake of the Roman Empire. once decolonization was agreed ~er eight We might assume that postcolonialism designates the aftermath of any years of bloody conflict. perhaps as a result of the new understanding Colonialism is from this point of view both a specified political and of imperialism as associated with capitalism mentioned above. but also industrialization and the whole- rule and conquest ofanother country. continue sale restructuring of their economies. although it is important for postcolonial studies that traced back to this region. conceived as the conquest and subsequent control of another country. post- economic project. for example. thinking around the concepts of liberation and transculturation can ~e ing of control. but imperialism can also be understood as a larger structure of capitalism. The term "postcolonialism" is a highly ambiguous one. It has ogy that justifies the colonizer's presence on the basis of his superior even been suggested that the United States is postcolonial in the sense knowledge and "civilization': that it was once a British colony. focus on the particular form of colonial ideology that was also tied to ogy. but it certainly helps to conceptualize both past and particular form of oppression. Post-colonialism is in this way ~ru:row ill. Indeed.scope form of colonial rule. economy and produce. If colonialism involves a concrete act of tioned specifically in British and French colonies around the ~9~Os. The question of the precise dating of the postcolonial. WIth no introduction 3 2 understanding postcolonial ism . It is widely agreed that status of the countries to which it refers). identifiable moment. the spread of their capitalist ideology. most critics who identify-themselves with postcolomalism Colonialism is in this way one active manifestation of imperialist ideol. and cert~y. or to the the colonialism to which it evidently refers. on a the "postcolOnial" heritage of Latin America. but has been narrowed slightly by some ofthe major cntics. On this matter. present forms of economic and cultural dominance. thinkers have distinguished this ideology continues to exert its pressure on the ex-colonies and the the "post-colonial" from the "postcolonial': arguing that the removal "Third World" (and the use of this term itself stresses the subordinate of the hyphen designates a shift in meaning. to discuss the impact of foreign power on Canada or Australia. and a larger discourse of hegemony and superior. In fact. postcolomalism. The from the decline of British and French colonialism in the second half colonial project involves the literal process of entering into a foreign of the twentieth century. however. "post-colonial" names a distinct historical period following th~ end of If these are the distinctions between colonialism and imperialism.and indeed. Postcolonial critique of British after the end of colonial rule. indeed. who tend to concentrate on British and French capitalist forms of colo- quest and settlement was one way in which those states accomplished nialism. empirical manifestation of colonization is at the same of historical contexts and geographical locations that is bewildering in . and. Colonialism should be traces of the Spanish and portuguese colonization of Latin America. many critics continue to reflect on territory and assuming control of its society and industry. the post facto promulgation of a cultural ideol. Of course. Imperialism could. Colonial con. however. time backed up by a colonial ideology that stresses cultural supremacy: scope. to impose their Capitalist system on the rest of the world. Imperialism is also So postcolonial thought is potentially geographically and ~ston~~y now associated with capitalism. or of the French pres- understand its meanings and implications it is first necessary to define ence in Algeria. use ~e term more conceptual level. some critics believe that the model for current conceptions of and involves both the subjugation of that country's native peoples and postcolonialism precisely emerges out of the earlier experiences ofinde- the administration of its government. colonialism is more frequently conceived to describe what has resulted ity that is enlisted to drive and support that concrete political act. So the term could be seen to name a senes this material.

Postcolonialism does not propose one answer equally not a coherent strategy for resistance. with one school of thought tending To return more specifically to postcolonialism. hyphen. division.but offers a framework for their expansion. but to analyse the nu~ce~ an~ implications of its multiple.o ~~op?. postcoloniality has been descnbed by Graham ebrating the definitive conclusion to colonialism. and ~e mechanics of its promulgation an. concrete colonial presence. is larger and more problematic.:-hich. a way of thinking through critical strategies. So postcolonialism also names the period of colomal rule. in his boo~ Islands and Exiles (1998). Postcolomal 4 understanding Postcolonialism introduction 5 . ~t IS both a political and a broader ethical philosophy. postcoloniality is a looser term for a current moment o~ epoch. as Ato Quayson helpfully puts it. It will be the contention of this book that latterly the field has become split. perhaps unthinkingly. philosophical or conceptual questions engendered by the colOnial actual colonial powers.se not. Postcolomalis:n IS wake of that oppression. in this sense. together with its gradual weakening and demise. or an mtellectual engagement with the evolving links effects of colonialism and its aftermath. . and to. While for some readers postcolonialism is an ove~y a process. this process of exoticization is that only certain authors or works are championed. but it n~es the at times to such questions . and will explore the distinct approaches that have been reified by certain critics into a strict. varying manifestations. Some critics hav~ argued tha~ po. exoticization has come to thrive. The movement is asso- apparent "marginality" in relation to the Western canon. it car: be agreed that postcolonialism names a set of politi. of critique.olOnialism is additionally. This book will analyse some of these varyrng stra:egres as ences ofoppreSSIOn. the economic exploita. exploration and clarifi.nialism. it tends to refer ance. Furthermore. self-contradictory or internally conflictual movement m thought that exanIines. a ''postcolonialist'' analysis.st- ~e ~alysis ofthe mechanics of colonial power. Ifpostcolonialism involves some form of critique and resist.d subsequent dismantling. bound up III gests wnting the term m the form post/colonialism. as critics have to lean towards a denunciation of colonial politics and economics. project and its aftermath. to interrogate the underlying political structure~ of colo. relations Po~tc. seen colomality. such and mdeed. for others this field of enqUIrY between the colonial period and current or modern-day inequalities. it is lematic. despite its proponents' awareness of capitalism's neo-imperial not to all that happened after the end of colonialism. concerned above all with the e~pirical. So although commentators point out the risks associated with conceiving the t~rm. colonialism is also guilty of this fetishization of certam aspects of . between these two distinct strands. c~ for ~racti~al revolution or reform.Ial postcolomalizmg.n:rrd World" culture. and another stressing coloni- at times objected. For a start. artefacts or cultural practices are celebrated preCIsely as a result of theIr the end of the literal. . whereas post- or q~estio~g. Far from cel- territories. coloniality is the broader epoch and set of conditions in v. and a form of both cultural and ethical critique is the movement that interrogates this cynical process. and this term also contams the negati~e connotations of a generation still. The irony of ciated with the eXamination and critique of colonial power both before and after decolonization. view internIingled with neocolonialism: that is. Chris Bongie sug- tual engagement or standpoint. For Postcoloniality is at the same time a condition rather u:an an mtell~c­ this rea~o~. with lingering ideologies of cultural patronage of the sort that originally backed up and fuelled cal. Postcolonial thought is.although many critics have objected that it tries to . between self and other. Moreover.as a homogeneous label. and those who achieve this status do so largely because This expansion of the historical period to which the term postcolonialism refers means that it has come to be associated with a they fulfil Western expectations of the nature of the other culture. often artificially. and ultimately rather prob- or a straightforward answer. rather more broadly. but to the events effects. then. postcolonialism analyses its effects both in its heyday and during the period that followed Hugganas a particular condition in the market. that suc~eeded its beginning. to propose a single model or understanding for the alisms ethical blindness and the cultural regeneration required in the colonial project and its aftershocks. but we might argue in response that postcolomalism tion It b~ou~t wi~ it. unifying distinct experi. heralds an ethical reflection concerning. this book will stress that this is a movement of questioning that seeks not. But the approach taken by critics towards these questions varies Significantly. different from post. Quayson goes so far as t. and range of Situations and events. It is not a single structure the twentieth century. but. since this stresses the politics of the hegemony of "the West" over its (~ormer) overseas the presence of the colonial within postcolonial critique.whereby certaintext~. on the one hand. Postcoloniality is from this pOIllt of Over~. It can be understood to describe a multifaceted and they were conceived by some of the major philosophers and thinkers of open process of interrogation and critique. postcolonialism names of the form of a good work of art. but a "process of political movement. mater. unpicks and compares multiple strategies and 'potential u:odes cation.

These influences are evidently combined with colonial rule in that context. on Marxism nialism are focused on India and on the inequality enforced by Bntish and Levinasian ethics. and leading In analysing such instances of restructuring and exploitation. oth~~s and used in different ways. but I Despite these condemnations of the inequality and exploita~on most of the leading philosophers address both the politics of colonial I. and establish the _ in order to impose a larger-scale manufacturing industry. moreover. agamst the textualist' approach of a critic such as Robert Young. oppression and its underlying. much of this book will con- were based on a domestic form of industry .the ~agility of the frontier between these apparently distinct poles. ~arx an~ Engels both denounce the economic drive conceived as the maJo~ baSIS cntics.es. In addition. falt~red and declined. latter s m~tenalist confrontation of the bourgeoisie and the prole- the British. Much more broadly. laissez- in the ~ake ?f National Socialism is undeniably at the heart of many faire and laisse:z-aller. in noting that many secondary postcolonial duction of cotton in the "mother country of cottons". that he condemns the sub- jugation and economic exploitation of the under~lass that the . Emmanuel Levinas does not engage openlywith As a result of the British presence. A major part ofpostcolonial critique concen- out his work. an apparentlyalter- native strand to this movement in modem thought forces us to rethink our understanding of the deeper relations between peoples. but some understanding of Marxist and in parts of Capital. postcolonial the tea trade. cultures or Marxism and ideology communities.on hand weaving and till- side:. On the other hand.~ad. The rest of this introduction local technologies . tique of capitalist e:xploitation and his call for revolt that inspired later postcolo~al thinker~. Marx commented explicitly on restructuring of the economy.and the natives as a result no longer ran or managed Levmas ~self o. unethical representational structures. ing. however.colonial but another aspect uses that condemnation to challenge and extend our system demands. respectively. Furthermore. Nevertheless. and many of his comments on this subject appear rather trates on the militant condemnation of a pernicious political ideology.o~o­ understanding of how to contemplate the other. ambivalent. the higher theless did universalize French revolutionary ideals by championing employees of the British East India Company instituted a monopoly on fr~edom of consciousness. Indian agriculture deterIorated as It the question of colomal power. The two strands of postcolonialism draw. Not only was economic control passed over to the. effectively colonial ideology in a number of essays.': 6 understanding postc%nialism \ L . He notes in numerous journalistic essays. th~ers of each c~p a~ times borrow from the other. politics and Levinasian ethics offers insight into two of the dominant the cruelty of the:ir exploitation and the destructive effects of the Bntish currents in postcolonial philosophy. Marx's most developed observations concemmg c. fixing prices and taking profits away from local workers. and that he never- the installation of this foreign form of industry. understanding of the postcolonial arena will necessitate an engagement critique goes on to enquire after the structure and efficacy of particular forms of nationalism as they emerged at the time when colonial ideology with both levels. Neil Lazarus and Benita Parry may battle the sole end and aim of humanity" (Marx & Engels 1960: 261). for example . but his reinvention ofthe ethical relation struggled to conform to these principles of free co~petition. ism nevertheless at times seems contradictory. Materialist commen- for colonial power: "colonialism proclaimed surplus-value making as tat~rs such :s Aijaz.the handloom and the spinning wheel. the misery and poverty suffered by the na~v. in argumg that Certainly. constantly and deliberately dart between them m the effort to stress their reciprocal uses. such as Gayatri SpIvak. Marx notes that the British. although it is above all his cri- broke down the founding framework ofIndian society by taking control of the means of production and imposing British capitalis~ principle~. however. for example will sketch the relevant parts of Marx and Levinas. arguing both that their own resources. Smaller farms. yet a genuine I. cntics appear to choose between politics and ethics in their reflections local businesses and family communities were dissolved because they on the works of the major philosophers. brought about by the British in India.' introduction 7 . There can be no doubt. British forms of mdustry destroyed later discussIOns of postcolonial alterity. with the philosophical bases on which much subsequent postcolonial thought is result that the colonial system entirely recreated the means of the pro- co?structed. and the ethical encounter interrupted by colonialism but Marx refers directly to colonialism somewhat sporadically through- crucial to its denunciation. but local communities were dissolved and fragmented by tanat casts aSIde the possibility of absolute freedom. First.ff~rs an equivocal response to Marx. the overt goals of political and ethical postcolonialism will the British colonizers did make an economic profit out of the colonial be found to be quite clearly distinct from one another. Marx's position on c?lomal- .

Taking into account Marx's vacillation on nationalism. and focuses more on the effects of the hazy on the nature. i. As Young points out in Post. that revolution will be achieved through the unification of ge~isie would first need to be supplanted by a strong industrial prole- the working classes beyond national differences. he succeeds in both condemning the exploitation associated as a nationalist revolution. It is a holistic ideology that demands not only the reIgn of colonialism (2001). then. so the danger was that the combined force of colo. The first revolution had to happen back home. as he mentions how the East India Company was stretching of further surplus-value using the resources of other countries. They vilify the scope of capitalist ambition. to become bourgeOIS by the caste system. At the same time. He continues to believe that Indian society might have tion. but at the same time the ~erivation of F~ofit. as Young points out. in image. The modern industrial system imposed themselves. if Marx denounces the moral failings of British well as economic benefits to foreign territories. fact to a certain extent helped to transcend eXisting petty hierarchies. and it is difficult to pin down and reify his atti- imperialist projects were preventing the socialist revolution in Britain from taking place. it compels them to introduce wh~t it calls civilisation into their midst.to schematize the relationship between colonizing and oppressed nations nialism and capitalism mutually strengthened each system. Marx and Engels propose. Marx and Engels again at once colonialism's potential benefits. and laments the suffering of the native population. In one word.e. its overthrow in the colonies should not necessarily be revolt of the working classes against the bourgeoisie. Marx goes o?. The Indian proletariat needed Engels look forward to a utopian world where divisions and conflicts to learn from the British proletariat before achieving the conditions between nations fade. Colonialism is an ideology thrown into q~estion n: ~arx's work. they have ~o pOSIti. They angrily denounce colomalism. and claims to b~ng moral as cial g~. and indeed. and without a properly constructed exploitation and on the nature of a workers' revolt can tell us some- political framework to support it. Marx goes on to contradict himself on this question surplus-value making in Europe. if capitalism also brings with it this drive towards col- onization and the imposition of what it conceives to be its mission every aspect of the colonial project. however. They argue that 0 :-k - w. Marx ~d had created a model for them to follow. and appropriate moment. but once this supremacy has been instated. in the wake of the weakening Indian working class to achieve such a revolt. So Marx is virulently against colonial exploitation. Marx also does not offer a straight- denounce the capitalist exploitation of colonized countries and remain forward anti-colonial critique. on pain of extinction. Capitalism for Marx and Engels is also pernicious because It IS underlines the impact of colonialism in the capitalist drive for finan. together with the construction of a railway system. and these impeded the progress and development of Indian power and industry. then.pnonty. solidified geois mode of production. and this suggests that the colonized nation should now pull together and unify its forces in order to achie~e its emancip~­ his first . bourgeoisie. however. for something as specific introduction 9 8 understanding postcolonialism . the world. but anti-colonial critique is by no means of the proletariat. Furthermore. of ~o~­ Bntish finances to the point of potential ruin. disabling according to the same model used for the bourgeoisie and the control revolt both at home and abroad. it creates a world after its own (1967: 84) by the British. Again. Marx argues that the Britishbour.O~ themselves as the leading class of the nation in order to achieve politi- production. but for the most part he onies. with this profit and stressing the success of an economic venture that its spread beyond Western nations and drive to rule the econo~es of anti-colonialists at the time wanted to deny. to adopt the bour- India had previously relied on hereditary divisions of labour. Marx is also above all interested less in independence than in the civilisatrice. that an anti-colonial revolt remains clear that his broader thoughts on the structures of econOmIC should not take place at any cost. ~t something to learn from Britain. and the colonized might be able to follow suit if the British working class cal supremacy. In order for the nationalist. propped up by a rhetoric of civilization. tanat capable of undermining the bourgeois control of the means of ing men have to seize hold of their own nation. he does the way in which capitalism: also note that the British succeeded in imposing some unity on a people that had been disastrously fractured up until that point. Marx's views on nationalism and anti-colonial revolt alter later in necessary for their emancipation. the colonial and his career. He recalls that compels all nations. thing about the capitalist drive behind colonialism. tudes to these phenomena. and then to reap the of distinctions between nations as a result of the development of the benefits of British industrialization. Ambivalent about In The Communist Manifesto (1967). but does not condemn Nevertheless.project.

moreover. it has been observed that the assumed In. For Marx. Building on Marx. then its mterest as a common interest to all members of society" (Marx & Antonio Gramsci is one thinker who helps to add nuance to his under- standing of the mechanics of class domina~on. a significant context for any understanding of the mechanics of colomal economic control. who produce the ruling ideas. Eagleton's discussion ity that comes to determine the structure of a given society. ideology.The G:er:n an Ideology (1964). the class that retains control of the means ofproduction also ~o~trols the community's mental production: "the ruling class presents If Marx's theory of ideology has been criticized for its rigidity. the workers' struggle against capItalism requrres a fo~ of ~d~o­ the ruling class. the matenal activity of men and their empirical political and social although thinkers such as Stuart Hall have stressed . Gr~sci troubles the Engels 1964: 60). s iden~cation of capitalisnls broad sweep and underlying colonial some contradiction in his use of notions of truth and falsity. because the "falSity" ofideas paradoxically comes to describe the "truth" of the s~cial drive proVl~es. and these are in turn logical transformation: a change in leading values as well as a selZ1llg divorced from the worker's perception of his personal needs and aims. is that eXIstence: Obliged to work for the broader community or the state. but names the different strategies employed by any ruling class to WIll Marx's theory of ideology can be used to reveal the illusions and suppositions promulgated in favour of colOnial imposition and dOmina. Hegemony is distinct from coer. Marx's theory of the diviSion of labour and the control parts of the capitalist process either escape the~ un~erstanding. entering into a series of definite political and so~al relations.actical s~cture.that Mru:x does m relations from the larger ideological superstructure. without its inconsistencies. and his writing analyses together economic conditio~s and do~s tha~ support and justify the structure of economic exploitation the knotted structure of political and ideological relations that serve to form the social fabric. howeve~. What this notion of a dOmI- co~es to find ~self alienated from the ideas that drive and shape his nant consciousness and a ruling set of ideas suggests. . In . It is not. At ca~It~st syste~ starts with actual individuals. Engels goes so far as to conceive ideology as false consciousness. Ideology also seems integral to social life and at the same tlille dissociated from it. however.rather than stickin~ to Ma:x's later rew~rkings of this notion of ideology move away from the the notion of a fixed correlation between one ruling class and the ruling notion of a false Ideology and towards a conception of the duplicity of actual lived relations. Conc. rather n:an of the evolution of ideology in Marx's work points out that there is on the use of force. of economic control. Market relations can mdeed be conceived in more multifarious ways than perhaps at :first appears. addition to the practical discussion of economic exploitation. Similarly. GramSCIS approach IS not exclUSIvely capItalist system. Gramsci uses the conc5!pt ofl. of conceptions and of a broader consciousness that remains to its falsity and distortion. Ideology that IS cruCIal for the spread and institutionalization of colonial more free-floating manner. the the capitalist system imposes itself both practically and insidiously. ~r of the means of production by the bourgeoisie means that the worker make little sense to them as individuals.omI- tantly.definite way. it is an illusion or chimera that nevertheless props up the as tightly knitted to the economic substru~e. it is the illusory gamut of ideas and economic. Furthermore. Marx and Engels distinguish theory of ideology implies that ideology is somewhat homogeneo~s. order. who are productively the same time. which is at odds with his own self-interest. critics have noticed that Marx s power. The proletariat work in the service of propagating ideas that justify that initi~ pr. ony to think through structures of domination. Furthermore. since it relies on a changeable form of moral and cultural leadership or author- tion. bourgeois control of the means ofproduction than on colonial violence. when ideology could be seen to fun~on in a broade:. further dissenters have noted that in Marx's theory. This common interest can be seen as a dOminant ideol- temptation in reading Marx to conceive the IdeolOgIcal sup~rstructure ogy that has become detached from the individual's view ofhis material co~di~ons. The.se relations are then seen to direct the production who are swayed by the ruling ideology are conceived unfairly as blind of ldeas. we r:rnght r~spond that Marx's members of the proletariat are not necessarily paSSIve and tightly interwoven with material and empirical conditions and actions. ~arxs work ~t the ~ame time offers a foundation for a conception of association between the ruling class and ruling ideology suggests a tight system of control.cion.legem- and mequality. Marx's discus- sio~ o~ ideology opens with the observation that the functioning of the fact allow for ideology to vary in fonn. ignorant. its position of dominance. and s~esses mstea~ the complexity of social formations. Hegemony names the ways in which the governmg 10 understanding Postcolonialism introduction 11 l . those a~e m a . however. however. ~y worker directs his energies into this larger communal life. Once again. but rather that his understanding of ideology impli~ that Nevertheless. m. A hegemOnic formation is not necessarily a pe~anent ~e. As Terry Eagleton writes in Ideology (1991).

Like Marx's concept ofideol. as astonishingly idealistic. works itself into actual economic relations and conditions. hegemony is for Gramsci necessarily a site of struggle. Inter. Gramsd's importantly. Althusser looks at the State as a economistic seizing of control of the means of production. since this is no longer conceIved not restricted to the notion of class . but include major institutions such as schools and colleges. smce a better understanding of their situation would help them the family and the cultural expectations accompanying it. Most famously. exploitation. by which it exerts its Gramsd's political writing more specifically on the peasantry offers a force. Hall points individuals' perception of their relation to the means of produc~on. It out th~t the discussion of the culturally specific quality of hegemonic is not bound up with falsity. This form gle. the then g~es on to emphasize the importance of the education of working legal system. as well as exploitation. and recommends the virtues of on the mstitution of a capitalist form of exploitation. the relation between base economic struc. the church. power wins the consent ofthose it governs. sive apparatuses. The final theorist of ideology worth introducing here is Louis Althus- ogy. structure by specifying the actual mechanics of ideological domination. such as . Finally. ulgated via a plurality of ideological apparatuses. gains force and credence insurgency of the Indian peasantry. Like system. as in Marx and Engels. Furthermore. These ideolOgical state apparatuses are the most mSIdious. head of state. all of which serve cance of this thinking lies above all in its conception of a decisive politi. but describes rather the im~oinary col~nial dominance and allows a flexible understanding of the ways in relation of individuals to their actual conditions of existence. it introduction 13 12 understanding postcolonialism . and these are combined with political apparatuses. The signifi. He reads Marx's work in detail. Althusser asserts that the ideology of the ruling class is pro. The role of to organize a coherent position of revolt. united by shared ideas. In order Hegemony also names lived social relations rather than just false ideas or to address this lack in Marx. and Marx.which names a subjugated social category material manifestation of this ideology. Most spersed wi~ his comments on the subjugation of the Italian peasantry famously. The subaltern is a resistant being Althusser's notion of ideology also alters our understanding of the rather than merely a passive object of oppression and exploitation. the concept of the subaltern . and smaller sites of diffusion such as men. as well as its oppression. including the model of contestation that could also be usefully anti-colonial. Rather. such as the army and the police. who refines and expands on both Marx and Gramsci. cal agency claiming a voice ofits own. importantly. of exploitation and repression continue to manipulate that ideology. unlike for Marx. and the body of the administration. class strug- multifarious and contradictory forms of social consciousness. "machine" with a set of apparatuses ensuring the continued domina- In addition to opening out Marx's theory ofideology to stress the role tion of the ruling. It is also. Gramsci condemns the capitalist drive behind colonialism. The State is made up of the repres- of culture and morality in the subjugated subject's strategy for revolt. Spivak to examine the of mechanics.has been used by Marxist Indian merely as a series of ideas or a ruling consciousness but as a concrete set theorists such as Ranajit Guha and. It is ideology that makes us subjects. and concretize the bourgeois aims of the State. then.m- are observations on the injustice of colonial exploitation and the neces. communications. ony and in the service of its overthrow is additionally pertinent in the The ideology produced by these apparatuses denies the existence of coloni~ co. however. Resistance would be achieved these apparatuses is to ensure the reproduction of the labour power. Althusser of ~ultural and political status quo that props up the leadership of the develops Marx's understanding of the relation between base and super- ruling class and the bourgeois mentality that goes with it. Most which class and race feed into one another. Ideology. more loosely. For Gramsci. Gramsci's concept ofhegemony describes the spread of a sort ser. so through the creation of a powerful and fully realized self-consciousness. and does not lillply formations enables us to think through the particular determinants of that certain conditions are illusory. construction of the subject. but also on the public service. bourgeois class.nte~ since the colonial project of course relies not only economic exploitation and struggle.shape spread of a belief in white racial supremacy.th~ e~ucation sity for the explOited class to come together. that workers continue to submit to the ruling ideology and the agents This conception of the role of culture both in the propagation of hegem. since he conceives the latter's as plural subjects under the sway of hegemony nevertheless assert their desire to amalgamate economic infrastructure. the government. and is bound Marx's analysis of the question of how the ideological superstructure up with culture and the spread of values as well as with exploitation. Althusser's analysiS is innovative in that it pinpoints. but points out the theoretical gap in tures and the hegemonic class is wide-ranging and diffuse. a distortion that acts to re. the law and the state under the unifying umbrella of "hegemony" of struggle is more important for Gramsci than simply a straightforward. by means of particular institutions or apparatuses. of hegemony and cultural supremacy. Althusser does not use Gramsci's theory illusions.

(199~: 16). although rejecting the term eign decision made by his free reason. interpellated subject risks ruling out autonomous agency. And Lazarus goes so far than acting only on a ready-formed consciousness. then. but nevertheless stresses the importance of Althusser's theory of ideol- ogy for an understanding of capitalist colonialism. We are always born into the ideo- certain images of the Orient. go on to use theIr read- Althus~er ~aws on Jacques Lacan here. the ~roletariat to stand together and seize control of the means of pro- first published in 1974. the other. La~ian alienated subjectivity will later be taken up by Levinas never directly confronts the question of colonialism and its ~OIDl Bhabha ill his specific discussion of the splitting of the colonized aftermath. Althusser's use of Levinasian ethics the n?tion of a. Once again. together with the link between paganism and fate. This while also offering a critique of nationalist unity in the preparation of that struggle. draws on Marxism in stressing the interweaving of power introduction 15 14 understanding postcolonialism . the concept of ideology as developed by is a society where: Marx. though. and references to Hitlerism. Otherwise than Being. determined. for National Socialism. Critics and commentators on ~ these logical system. GramsCl and Althusser feeds into postcolonial denunciations of man no longer finds himself confronted with a world of ideas colonial power as propped up by a system of false images and mirages. and indeed the aniliivalence. can be seen to rely on concepts thatcan be traced back to the philo so- and that are promulgated by the State and its attendant institutions. but of econOlnic significant that. to ~orm no~ons of the colonized as actively formed by colonialism: by In this way. His critique not only of colonialism. thinkers such a~ ~~ Ce.and know oUrselves only as formed by that system. and this must be overturned by Hitlerism" explores the association between monotheism and abso~ute the destruction of both political and economic subjugation. falls back on a dangerous and reductive biological determinism. Major revolutionary thinkers such as Frantz Fanon and otherness ethically is related conceptually to the Vlolence that Levmas Jean-Paul Sartre derive their understanding of revolt from Marx's call to condemns throughout his philosophical career. The early essay "Reflections on the Philosophy of SIon of the masses by the bourgeoisie. is dedicated to the six million ~~s of the d~ction. Postcolonial critic E. this as to argue that the Marxist understanding of capitalism is "the founda- conception of the constitution of the subject by ideology could be seen tional category for any credible theory of modern society" . which means it addresses them. both overt and Iffiplied. theorists. Colonialism consti~tes a quite nIalism. Most importantly. but his work is at every point an expression of his revulsion ill the face of what will by this time be called colonial discourse.is . recur ~th the relation between colonizer and colonized. its totalitarianism and imperialism over the . the oppressed. and con- how colonial power is propped up by the production and diffusion of structs them as subjects of the State. and suggests that the subject ings self-consciously and assertively to inscribe ~~sm ~t the centre recogruzes itself by means of an imaginary or deluded vision that is of postcolonial theory. informs many more recent denunciations of colonialism parallels between them. and that forms each individual as a social sub- determined by the unplanned but (after analysis) 1awful' tendencies of ject.saire have dra~ explOitation. with the operations of the 'free market' being mdiVldualls born into. rather the accumulation of surplus value" (1998: 5). increasingly. colonIalism~ failure to conc~Ive and capitalism. He is already linked to Ideology. An~-colonial critique is not concerned in such contexts just death camps. ~ore broadly. in which he can choose his own truth on the basis of a sover- ~chel F~~cault's exploration of discourse. with knowledge. And indeed. In add- freedom. theories of decolonization and nationalism in India use a Marxist condemns the society that cannot accept the freedom of man and that un~erstanding of the domination of the peasantry by the bourgeoisie. but with the oppres- across the corpus.use~ here in that it uncovers the vast ideological mirage that the has developed unevenly. such as Aijaz Ahmad and ArifDirlik. Ide~logy actually serves in the construction of subjectivity. San Juan summarizes his disCUSSiOn of post- promulgated by ideology. many of the more politically oriented postcolOnIal ~ers notions ofwhite supremacy that serve to govern the entire social system. this book will show how his relevance to current postcolonial different form of totalitarianism from that enforced by NaZI Germany debates also exceeds the scope. San Juan Jr notes that Althusser's conception of the phyofMarx. of these and its violence and exploitation are conceived to different ends. Althusser's think- colonialism with the proposition that "capitalism as a world system ~g . but it is direct references. and Edward Said in turn builds on Foucault to show "interpellates" individuals. ~Marx ~self comments sporadically and even erratically on colo- marginalized. and Levmas ition.

The "1" accomplishes a not the first priority but is overtaken and surpassed by the demands of 16 understanding postcolonialism introduction 17 . fails to call into question injustice. according to Levinas. exteriority. philosophy of power. Levinas's main objective in the initial chapters of the work 1969: 51). the idea existing to my own or the subjugation or expulsion of alterity that might also be described measure and to the measure of its ideatum . Levinas creates itself. is not an other that possibility of war~ and goes on to assert that "the visage of being that can be incorporated into the self. but is a Stranger and is wholly external to Western philosophy" (Levinas 1969: 21). and war and injustice are pre- major works seek to condemn not so much the vocabulary of race as sented as direct consequences of this concentration on the freedom of the related notions of the "totality': "sovereignty" and "imperialism" of Being to the detriment of an ethical relation with the other. A series of terms. the way in which the Infinity of the Other presents tion between war and morality. Furthermore. but the absolute Other. in this ethical relation with the Other. In a series of has to be universal. Levinas laments that means not assimilating its expression but receiving it in the knowledge in ontology the freedom of Being is priOritized before the relation with that it exceeds and surpasses the idea that the self creates of it. as totalized and self-same: it either excludes or assimi. ily rooted in and circumscribed by their communities. The face both names the features of another individual. for example. and logic. Being. the self Totality and Infinity opens with a reference to "the permanent What ontology obscures. however. Levinas has More generally. This Other has shows itself in war is fixed in the concept of totality. develops into an extended critique of itself to the self is by means of the face. just as he is linked by birth to relation with the other by means of a third term. the Same. Here again. since such a conception inevitably leads to oppression or tion and that needs to be respected for its impenetrability. but describes the fundamentally ethical to subordinate what lies beyond their totalized confines. encompassed or circumscribed. the Other. indeed. Levinas's work can be seen to be pertinent moved from a critique of ontology to a denunciation of tyranny and for postcolonial philosophy because he writes against any conception of of the association between state politics and war. and even worse. know the self. or Being. this Other inaugurates the idea the attempt to conceive the self as entirely whole. and understand. an excess that is wholly resistant to knowledge or assimila- self-sufficient. The infinite exclusion. for Levinas. at the moment of encounter is. totality. The notion of "totality" alludes both to the totalitarianism of cannot be an object or thing. Levinas's critique of ontology will also through. and to Western knowledge be known. and consists in criticizing the ways in which Western thought has conceived serves as a figure for the Other that the self cannot assimilate. The error of Western subjectivity as totalized. according to which the individual conceives himself as a totality a conglomeration of terms (Infinity. it is an unending exteriority that can never National Socialism or of any imperialism. the definition of ethics: it the subject. an ambiguous term in Levinas's Western metaphysics and ontology. It is from this In Heidegger. including Totality. masterful and dominant over the other. Against Totality.the adequate idea" (Levinas as colonial. self-contained and of Infinity. the conceptualization of Being suppresses or possesses Levinas also argues here that the danger of this philosophy is that it the other and privileges the "I can': the autocracy of the "I". Levinas again traces this back to a belief in rootedness in insistence on the universal applicability of a form of ethnic determinism the soil. and its stark opposi. Astonishingly swiftly. something that cannot be seen: the face "at each moment destroys and out be subtended by his desire to ward off the threat of totalitarianism overflows the plastic image it leaves me. to paganism and a devotion to the "master': This philosophy that National Socialism derives its at once colonial and exterminatory also places the freedom of the selfbefore justice towards the other. Levinas's metaphysics is its reliance on ontology. An awareness or acceptance of this overflow or excess lates otherness. via Socrates and Berkeley. which dominates no communality with the I. in particular its suppression and writing that designates both the expressiveness of the human face and occlusion of the other. a certain number of these ideas. the belief that individuals are necessar. In denounCing nature of human encounter. since if it were freely chosen it would contradict rapid moves. freedom means "the mode of remaining the same tantly. but this is incorporated all those who are of his blood. Levinas then connects the philosophy of ontology with the the determinism it upholds. are all undermined by Levinas as a result of their tendency does not tell us how to be or act. Impor- the other. transcend- and subordinates everything that is exterior to himself ence' alterity) that offset and undermine the mastery and imperialism of The startling opening of Totality and Infinity. As a result. which in turn feeds into the tyranny of the State. the freedom of the self is in the midst of the other" (Levinas 1969: 45). The ethical conversation with the Other Heidegger. (Levinas 1990b: 70) into the self rather than maintained as distinct and external. War is the inevitable result of Totality or to the Same.

and of the self. but the Saying exposes that essence to int"uition. Intractable and potentially infinite beings to one another without forc.. but in the sense that it ''calls in question the naive right of my because it creates identity. hypoth- plemented. openness ~thout assuming sameness. Discourse. even though Levinas's work at times appears to Saying and the Said. strains against its limits and opens it to otherness and the beyond. it names than totality is understood more often in terms of what is immanent to the movement oflanguage towards the identification and containment it. although this is not in the sense that the other can oppress exposes its intractability. Levinas argues that Western philosophy has traditionally tions" (2002: 95). but in becoming absorbed into it the ethical relation. The Saying is the excess oflanguage. In both formulations. but the Saying constantly expands the mastering or controlling the expression of the Other in conversation. "hostile.of the self Being cannot pursue its own . and in Otherwise is both an affirmation and a retraction of the Said" (Levinas 1981: 44). my friend.. but must apprehend him in all his heterogeneity. and ~ges not require the establishment ' 1 colonial criticism. Once again. but a pairing to be thought resistance to a single and restricted set of meanings. since other.ends in the name of spontane- the other. the other. ing to persuade. Levinas then master. Absolute Totality does not exist. for example. philosophy has chosen to ignore the ethical demand made by the encounter with the Other's face. is discussed of communality. checks. Discourse is divided between two coexisting facets. and is not entirely separated from it. or tyrannizes. language precisely the opposition is less a distinct dichotomy than a coupling. The commerce . is ethical" (ibid. but creates sharing apparent security ofTotality or the Said. is the site of relationality. what qualifies. of or alternatives to one another. the Importantly. its openness and are not conceived as a binary opposition. Subjectivity is secondary to the encounter with the infin. It is not the ground of totality but the space in which Even more. In alterity and establishes language as the interface of the ethical relation. Their commerce is not a representation of the one by ·. since it produces arguments. The language. Levinas develops this analysis using another ite. whereby the both maintains and allows the revelation of the Other. goes so far as to define the relation to the other as the demand for justice 18 understanding postcolonialism introduction 19 . than Being. Levinasian ethics proposes a set of requirements pertinent for post- tionality without relationality. displaces or otherwise postpones its opera.: 81). however.elf. on the common plane of ity if in the process it exerts power over. but finds itself sup. the "I" cannot know this Other or put him in a The relation between the two terms in Levinas's writing is constantly category. ing resemblance or complete communion. As in Totality and Infinity. is conceived alongside the resent something already constituted and known.. Language reveals the obligation to welcome and do justice to the other restricts the freedom nudity of the face before it has been interpreted or illuminated. The Saying deSignates what in language overspills rest on a rather schematic pairing. It is a sort of interface exposing singular. ~. In Levinas's words: "language presupposes interlocu. potentially reductive and oppressive boundaries of the Said: "the Saying Levinas develops in the rest of Totality and Infinity. or the Saying. In its expressive function. his understanding of the role of language in establishing The Saying moves towards the Said. the relation. a plurality. In . Infinity is in reality not the opposite the confines of Being and signals the simultaneous proximity and intrac- of Totality. for Levinas. nor a participation in universality. It does not rep. however. not the s. my student" (ibid.. omnipresent excess of the Saying. a theme or content.addition to expanding the limits of both Being and language. As Howard Caygill writes. the welcoming of the other necessitates in the self a feeling the Other faces the self in all its possible forms. Justice towards the other. In and master. of its referent. my glorious spontaneity as a living being" (Levinas 1969: 84). The Said. self to the Other. been preoccupied with the Said. on the alongside one another. but "an original relation with exterior being" (1969: 66). It is vital to the creation of community. my ofshame towards his own injustice and pursuit offreedom.: 73). to excess is the start of an ethical relation. speaking to the Other. but the Saying also relies-on the Said and is only manifested rhetoric for Levinas is a form oflanguage that denies freedom in seek. This is not unsettling and at times apparently paradoxical The one exceeds the to say that all discourse succeeds in establishing this relation. however. The it is not the direct representation and communication of a thought or Said creates essence and truth. set of terms. these are not opposites Having stressed the intractability. through its apparently secure statements. is the expression of an essence. Understanding this permeation and interpenetration is the privileging the Said. which itself occurs in the immediacy of the face-to-face meeting. but rather precisely because it exposes the powers. Language institutes a rela. invaded and permeated by that which it seeks to exclude eses and propositions that aspire to a status of certainty and truth. In Otherwise than Being. ethical insistence on Infinity. which means the difficulty. early on in Totality and Infinity and takes precedence over the freedom tors. "what is 'otherwise' other hand. Totality and Infinity tability of alterity.

it is this third party that disrupts the potential asymmetry of the possession. arguing for At the same time. cent of the ontology he was criticizing. which he contests by his epiphany in the face" that "there might be an ethical limit to this ethically necessary political (Levinas 1969: 171). unmediated encounter with the face. encounter (I can put myself in the place of the other. These terms are somewhat munity: It is the need for negotiation with this third party that upsets the blurred together. In addition. a realization of pitality" without condition. In his famous "Violence explore the paradoxes of cities of refuge. and could also be used to denounce the colonizer's pursuit "the laws of hospitality': the conditions that necessarily regulate that of his own "free' ends at the expense of the other. tion between Same and Other. but have to be conceived the victim. moreover. Responsibility is also hospitality. where the former. the political. but certainly it is here that the contradiction between ethics and the State. since it is the just relation with the other for which the ethical encounter by adding the obligation to consider external factors. in Otherwise than Being. and requires the ethics and the direct. Derrida with great subtlety. Derrida's reading in Adieu to Emmanuel dichotomous subjects. or other human subjects. comed and reminded of his otherness. in which the subject attends to the difference and demands of the political. politics. Thus for Levinas habitation offers security to the existence" (1989: 293). in Otherwise than Being. The ethical relation is also the responSible This very "third term': however. where the refugee is both wel- and Metaphysics': Jacques Derrida pointed out that Levinas's terminol. intervenes in subsequent subjugation of the other: the colonized or the slave. This would be an "infinite hos- justice requires an admission of the otherness of the self. again criticizing Heidegger for privileging the latter over explores this exigency in Levinas in Adieu to Emmanuel Levinas. it politics starts to make the debate disturbingly hazy. the ethical relation between self and other in that it introduces a third Justice is at the same time for Levinas associated with responsibility party. works against the tyranny of the State. It is not a conduit to be replaced). The colonial relation acceptance within the confines of existing states. More practically. In both texts. is the Being associates justice and the ethical relation with the brushing of distinction between ethics and politics that in turn troubles and unset- subjects against one another rather than with an encounter between two tles the postcolonial field. Derrida argues that erroneously places the power of the master before the justice owed to both forms of hospitality are indispensable. The example ofIsraelleads him to suggest . is undermined by the requirement that (1999: 21). when asked about the relation between ethics and in which the subject establishes intimacy in the face of the elements. the concept of justice can clearly Levinas stresses the necessary but impossible conjunction between "the be related to postcolonial critiques of cultural dOmination. but he falls silent on what this would mean for self. and uses his work to explore a concept of hospitality that attention to the other comes first. selffinds himself responsible. This resonance in Levinas's work is amplified by the use of as an irresolute aporia within which one necessarily conflicts with the the term "imperialism" to designate the sovereignty of the self and the other. is merely the space other. but.paralyzes possession. troubles or throws into question the purity of Levinasian the other. since although this concept appears to priOritize proximity. Levinas helps to point out the ogy in Totality and Infinity risked falling into a schematism reminis. "I must an engagement with both while also admitting that there remains a be able to give what I possess': and "the Other . Levinas here writes less of a confronta. For Levinas himself. again necessarily. it is the place of shelter. incommensurate with political regulations the limited mastery of the ego. and laws but necessarily conceived alongside these. in order not to be constricted by possession. over freedom. ethical limitations of such a condition. pre-existing Being.the absolutely Other contradiction between them. or other to another the soil or owned by right. the subject's ability to he describes Totality and Infinity as "an immense treatise of hospitality" pursue his own chosen ends. however. As Caygill explores too rests on a belief in Being that excludes what lies beyond it. Levinas seems confused in Difficult Freedom (1990a) 20 understanding postcolonialism introduction 21 . of the constitution of subjectivity. Dwelling is not an object of time. Nevertheless. hospitality. At the same welcoming of the other into one's dwelling. sovereignty law of hospitality': the requirement that the host accept any other. of justice as a result Mireille Rosello uses Levinas in her Postcolonial Hospitality (2001) to of contact without absorption or assimilation. perhaps in the form of society or com- and. but cannot myself but it does not root Being securely in the ground. beyond the There is not space here to consider the intricacies of Levinas's writing dwelling of the intimate selfLevinas throws into question the territory of on Israel. Levinas still subordinates the latter to the former. Any assumption of the self's power. although establishing the demands of relation. than of proximity. Furthermore. it forces the self to be other differently. puts into question the possibility ofpossession. and and mastery. and in response Otherwise than One of the difficulties of Levinas's work in this area. but must also be conceived as another space of encounter that the Jewish people of that state.

Caygill points out that Levinas is unclear about whether he in the second half of this book. Many later critics have chosen to foreground the strands in postcolonial sions of Israel and Palestine. In addition. in this case one as troubling as Marxist notions underpinning left anti-colonial thinkers . or the Said with the unequivocal embrace of either school A genuine understanding of the ~aying. about whether the Jewish people should be conceived as a "fraternity" Relation" learns at least implicitly from Levinas's concept of an encoun- or whether they represent universal ethical concerns.the nation-state" (2002: 165). colonial drive towards the marginalization universalism . analysed for the most part certingly. It is nevertheless precisely that overwhelmingly SIgnificant strand of his work devoted to ethics and alterity that will premises is not readily negotiated" (2004: 7). he nsks this time falsely unifying Jewish identity. thinkers such as ing of colonialism and sovereignty in The Monolingualism of the Other Spivak and Mudimbe oscillate constantly between ethics and politics as (19~8). ifnot ~ ical thinkers express their goals in quite different. Controversy has arisen in noted. itself oddly comes close to a:. When he goes on to alterity nevertheless inherit these notions. structural divisions. Bhabha's postcolonial philosophy scarcely mentions if to stress their necessary contiguity. while prove a foundation for later conceptions of a postcolonial openness also revealing the potential overlap between them. but closer ethics. Explicitly engaging with Levinas repeat. faScinating and irresistible Many subsequent notions of mastery.suggests that the discrepancy between the infomIing u: ~f e other's culture. More- edly. but can be conceived as related. however. Totality and Infinity seems ill equipped to deal with the particular ten. pro~ose a ~oo~er form of state identity to accommodate the Diaspora. Rousseau and Levi-Strauss). and postcolonial thinkers for the most ditional ethics that he affirms Judaism prOvides.finally. which underpins his entire deconstruction of Western meta. is crucial for postcolonial reflection on alterity. His work . while it may seem reasonably clear that a militant such as Fanon of ~e blindness of the Western episteme or system of knowledge (via requires a different framework and vocabulary from a philosopher as readings of Saussure. De::nda also uses the ethical encounter to inform his conception over. but for Caygill. 22 understanding postcolonialism introduction 23 . Abdelkebir Khatibi's foregrounding of otherness and bilingual. in and poststructuralist ethics. Marxism and Levina- the place of the Palestinians and subsumes their plight into a broader sian ethics raise quite distinct questions concerning the errors of colo- reflection on universal responSibility. the overlap that crit- to difference. He also evades the question of As major influences for postcolonial thinkers. Levinas struggles ter without sameness or consensus.capitalist ~at ill the State ofIsrael And indee~. ~~ politi~s. tization of ethics over freedom. his exploration of the flickering presence of criticisms of both Marxism and deconstructive ethics in their work. if not identical in their aims.the most powerful. and. Derrida's criticisms of Levinas's work have already been ics such as Parry believe is under-analysed. and. critique related to one of these schools. from Levinas's groundbreaking formulation of twentieth-century ethics. ambIvalence and alteritywithin colonial discourse is highly reminiscent and use strands of each to reveal the shortcomings associated with the of Levinas's permeation of Totality with Infinity. even contrasting. his ethics. either overtly or implicitly. Levinas remains alone in his priori- to reconcile the political demands of the State ofIsrael and the uncon. This study will explore the differences between these approaches within postcolonialism. Asiatic world as a stranger to Europe. ethically minded. Parry comments explicitly on this disjunction between Marxism ill Itself SIgnalS some of the problems explored in the current book. are deeply indebted to Levinas even if conceives Islam to playa part in holy history and even describes the he is often now not explicitly acknowledged. as well as his read. physics ~d ethnocentrism. sacrificing to an idol . as we shall see. nationalism. an emancipatory narrative. but in fact much more important is Derrida's debt to Levinasian the confrontation between political and ethical thinkers. multiple levels and layers of postcolonial critique will require a reflec- Ism can also be seen to emerge from a Levinasian understanding of tion of each field as it alternately interweaves with and diverges from excess and the intractable. Even more discon. points out that "the rejection by poststructuralism of the req~ements of a situation of conflict. "this seems dangerously close to other rather than as a relation preceding the affirmation of freedom. advocating a Marxist-oriented frame that his belief in the ethical relation at times fails to tackle the political of analysis. Poststructuralist currents in postcolonialism. Edouard Glissant's ''poetics of the other.t ways. and indeed as "textualist': as Derrida. He suggests a return part conceive their ethics rather as a recognition of the freedom of the to notions of sacrifice. inspection reveals that the two approaches are not directly opposed. His call for peace at the end of nialism and the strategies or modes of thinking crucial to its overthrow. his non-engagement with Islam . totalitarianism and irreducible of modem idols . and certainly political and eth- IfLevinas's thought is flawed in many ways. These latter theorists also include Le~as but. system.

and recommended ishing his education. on ideology and on revolution have been Frantz Fanon is undoubtedly one of the most significant and influ- enormously influential to postcolonial thinkers. ential of anti-colonial revolutionary thinkers. White Masks in 1952. is most com- monly now associated with the aftermath of British and French colonialism. he denounces the Manichaean divisions of the colonial system and rails against the rigid classification of the "negro" as inferior and "other: After finish- ing medical school. a postcolOnial ethical critique. The Wretched ofthe Earth (1967) analyses the process 24 understanding postcolonialism fanon and sartre 25 . Disillusioned with metropolitan culture. Even openness and respect towards the other as other. however. • Levinasian thought can be seen to be at the root of postcolonial Martinique in 1925 to a middle-class family. Levinas denounced the concepts of Totality and mastery himself as French. but the two and the call to arms currents can be understood in terms of the influences of Marxism and Levinasianethics on postcolonialism. the Algerian War of Independence began. although it covers all regions. He criticized the economic exploitation it brought with it but also saw the bene- fits of wiping out the hierarchies of the caste system in India. Fanon took a position at the Blida-Joinville psy- chiatric hospital in Algiers. whereby whites were positioned at the top. economic. His writings on capitalism. he grew up thinking of ethics. His notions of when serving his country. two • The field of postcolOnial studies has often been divided between those who concentrate on political critique and those interested Fanon and Sartre: colonial Manichaeism in postcolOnial ethics. Some of his most influential writing stems from this period. cul- tural and philosophical responses to colonialism. and he criticizes the caste system within the army. with the Senegalese. where he began to investigate culturally sensitive approaches to madness. This split is somewhat artificial. and. and Fanon quickly found himself caught up in the revolutionary struggle. responsibility and hospitality are also useful in conceiving his French allies. • Marx was ambivalent about the colonial project. he witnessed at first hand the mental scarring caused by the conflict and began to speak out against its horrors. at the bottom. When the increasing intensity of the vio- lence made practising psychiatry difficult. left Algeria and worked for the National Liberation Front openly from his exiled position in Tunis. He was educated in a French school and. Born in Fort-de-France. Fanon went to study psychiatry in Lyon. fought for France in the Second World War. however. Fanon experienced racism from justice. After the end of the war. Key points • Postcolonialism consists of the multiple political. Treating torture victims and those with psychological illnesses related to the violence. before fin- that underpin all forms of totalitarianism. the first to be sent into battle. A year after he arrived. and published Black Skin. he resigned his position. It is a broad term that is used to refer to effects following the beginning of colonial rule.

The essays collected post-colonial readings concentrate almost exclusively on that in A Dying Colonialism (1980) discuss the changes the Algerian revolu.and reach far beyond choanalytically oriented investigation ofidentity and alienation. text and studiously avoid the question of violence. The colonized is the victim above all ofthe pernidous image ofhis concerning Fanon's ability fully to understand the consciousness of the identity propagated by colonial ideology. Although fanon and sartre 27 26 understanding postcoloniaJism . although Fanon is cer. masques blancs. White Masks and The Wretched Many have noted. tion wrought on sodal relations and everyday life. having noted Fanon's The mission is the absolute overthrow of the colonial system. Fanon is at once. and although he gives vent to his question "What does the black man want?" independent of context. the continu- reductions of the stereotypes that continue to circulate around notions ally displaced subject that slides beneath the Signifier and that disables of "black identity': he perceives the violence ofcolonialism as a cultural the rigid binary opposition between Manichaean essences. reinforced or condemned this division in Fanon's ofthe Earth are at once devoted to specific political contexts . but critics towards his leap from psychoanalysis to politics and sodety. exploration of sodal alienation. on an ethical commitment to otherness and to the new. IfFanon cally on Fanon's adaptation of Freudianism to suit the context of the is often seen as one ofthe most militant and incendiary critics of colonial Caribbean. The Wretched ofthe Earth advocates decolonization with self.the former philosophy between concrete political engagement and a more psy. at least impli- the '"revolutionary Fanon" ofthe 196Os. eration. unlike Britton her- cal revolution. proposing a far broader. desire and the psychoanalytic structures of alienation. The decolonization of Algeria was its immediate focus. White Masks. however. Fanon examines less the myths call to transform the prevailing social order. To . advocating violence and national cohesion. David the confines of that original historical and geographical location. quasi-humanist "dialectic of experience" and isi' revolutionary Fanon: a belief in self-invention. Certainly. and the latter that of Algeria . many readers ofFanon have chosen to foreground either one side of . Both Black Skin. indeed. he nevertheless stresses the significance of Fanon's Marxist summarize. on situation: part of a system of significations and assodations that weave the other hand. however.of decolonization in Algeria in order to evolve a universal revolutionary ings largely ignored the Fanon of Peau noire. anger towards the colonizer's sense of superiority and towards the stark Bhabha stresses the Lacanian resonances ofFanon's Other. as ifhis deeper reflections on the configuration that he denounces the physical violence of colonialism and advocates of self and other in the psyche were not part of his call for concrete lib- that this must be countered with direct violence against the colonizer. desire in the colonial vision: the white man's fantasized answer to the tainly highly critical of colonial politics. Although Lazarus expresses reservations nized. Fanon's biographer. Britton's own reading concentrates more specifi- sdousness movement in South Africa during the same period. reads Fanon's new form of nationalism for its question- themselves insidiously into the consdousness ofboth colonizer and colo. and in both texts. Both Macey. anti-Eurocentric form of humanism touches. The book was used by leaders . and are not separated between the two major works identity. The Wretched ofthe Earth has been seen as no less than a "handbook" for revolution. however. "Third Worldist" read. namely his rejection of the Oedipus complex in favour of an politics. it is here his vision or the other. while guises. (Macey 2000: 28) Fanon is clearly a highly militant thinker and. a political activist and a philosopher ofwhat it means to be human and. in The Wretched ofthe Earth.:oise Verges that the exploration of alienation does not take i~to Black Power movement of the 1960s and Steve Biko in the Black Con. and the militant. as starkly as it appears. White Masks. even more. Homi Bhabha. and objections levied by thinkers such as Henry Louis Gates Jr and in contexts as different as that of Malcolm X in the African-American Fran<. his writing is not uniformly directed towards practi. by force if eclecticism. dtly. the ''post-colonia[' Fanon is in many ways an inverted :image of this revised. more urgency and immediacy than Black Skin. rather than of brute force. "Third World. Celia Britton explores the rather less neutral reactions of a range of ary action. his overt focus remains rather on not contradictory. account sodal factors. comments on his two apparently distinct denounce the colonial system. perhaps. ofcolonized identity than the politics or modes ofthinking necessary for My argument here is that these distinct strands in Fanon's work are their overthrow. ing of the future of capitalism. Lazarus. the post-colonial or early Fanon. that of Martinique. the Marxist struggle for liberation proposed by the text has also been noting both Diana Fuss's assumption of their successful amalgamation interpreted to be applicable more broadly. Most striltingly. colonized. politics. In the earlier work. goes on to explore the obscure and ambivalent function of necessary. albeit from different points of view. In Black Skin.

comparing the alienation of the black man with Sartre's is the most startlingly visceral and immediate. calling for the decolonization of Algeria. see the ossified images promulgated by the colonizer and that would posit the Negro. Fanon's autobiographical persona tells of his shock when tance of a new form of humanist creativity that would transcend the he observes a young boy pointing to him and crying. racial defects. Fanon continued to share the former's understanding of the impor. The black man in his blackness" (Fanon 1968: 9). philosophical and at times ethical struggle upholding a pro. having arrived in France believing that he was in black blood. fetishism. phantasmal image of the black man's essence. Banania" in a Creole dialect. the black man Frantz Fanonr Black Skinr White Masks fails to identify with the image projected onto him and is disjointed and ruptured from himself. connoting at once the destruction of the self and the 28 understanding postcoJoniaJism fanon and sartre 29 . I'm frightened" (ibid. Although !r \ everyday at the same time reinforces his demand for attention to actual critical ofSartre's conception of negritude as a stage in a dialectic. Fanon himself is other as well as the practical mechanics of dOmination. the alienation of the blackman in France. including illiteracy. man's artifact" (ibid. the heart of Fanon's call. but it is nevertheless worth stressing for now that both are at ciency. one of the points on which Fanon is united with Sartre. nial racism involves this process of reification or objectification.: 12). an excision. French society failed to welcome him but made him feel both the very concept of the human. Another of fixed and reductive stereotypes. the latter phrase translating the image of in a larger. Fanon describes reification and stasis.). as the cally of the black man and a re-evaluation of the human. As a result. In Fanon's words. unlike that of Levinas. of endless self-creation as opposed to foreign and inferior or subordinate. and above all else. He advocates at the same time respect for the the relation between black and white engendered by colonialism as other's dynamism and denounces the ontolOgical categorization of the a stark binary opposition. above once deeply engaged in a political anti-colonial movement and involved all: 'sho good eatin''' (ibid. Black and white are rigidly polarized. "what is often called the black soul is a white This dynamic conception of self-creation is also. but his work is white man creates a fixed. he experiences "an amputa- Black Skin. lived experience. and most arresting. Black identity is understood by means of a set ences. despite their differ. and much of what he explores in this text stems from the way black blood" (ibid. White Masks was written while Fanon was at medical school tion. slave-ships. passages in the text is allied With Fanon and wrote the paSSionately polemical preface to The the anecdote that opens the chapter "The Fact ofBlaclcness" describing Wretched of the Earth. and the reference to the discussion ofJewish identity in Anti-Semite and Jew (1948a).: 79). a haemorrhage that spattered my whole body with ~ Ly~n. Sartre was closely One of the most famous. cannibalism. Expecting to be treated in France as a citizen and ever. It is here that Fanon's language White Masks. Fixed and objectified by the white man's gaze. It is as ifhis body has been torn open and covered ill which he was treated. Reacting to this over-determi- imperialist ontology that over-determines and hypostatizes the other. Colo- to contradict himself in championing both the self-affirmation specifi. nation. Freedom is at not Manichaean in his thinking in the way that some critics believe. and there is no freedom originates in the overthrow of the masterful imposition of an communication or blurring between them: "the white man is sealed in ontological category on the subjugated other. Fanon may also appear his whiteness. it over-determines that identity identity politics with an urge to question "identity': and a beliefin spon. compatriot. Concomitantly. ingenious preCisely because it marries a dynamic reclaiming of "negro" Racism denies the identity of the other. Fanon describes the trauma of being forced to look at himself from the outside and failing to recognize the image with which he is presented. Fanon repeatedly refers to Sartre in Black Skin.). and although. Fanon argues above all that colonialism entailed not integra- thinker. finishes by proposing a vast and far-reaching renewal of lines. for whom the ethical the object of his criticism is precisely the rigid binary divisions of the encounter precedes freedom. "Mama. a black colonial infantryman eating from a billycan and pronouncing tean form of humanity free from political totalitarianism and from an "C'est bon. his own way. The little boy associates Fanon's black black man as spontaneously self-inventing as well as specifically "negro': skin with a whole gamut of stereotypes. how. ~tant. physical The intricacies ofFanon and Sartre's relation will be discussed later in strength and rhythmic sense: "tom-toms. intellectual defi- this chapter. he is conceived most often either as a militant or as a psychoanalytic French. but nevertheless in Fanon the embrace of colonial vision. from the outside and prevents the colonized from inventing himself in taneous and ongoing mutation. Fanon is in fact not only both of these but. in fusing these two tion but separation: the radical division of society along crude racial approaches. crucially.

Using Jung's concept of a collective unconscious. Sartre's formulation is that "the criticizes the latter's belief that the complex pre-dates coloruzation. of his original roots. the black man's use of French compromises his sense of chapter on psychopathology. since Fanon's own writing in French precisely brought himself created by the presence of the colonizer. Fanon sets about unplck- Sartre's description of anti-Semitism. not from the latter's physical characteristics. and constitutes the very white mask of which his title speaks. but continues to experience fanilly local dialects. Accord. in some sense a participation in the culture of the colonizer. The upshot is that in North and The psychoanalytic dimension of Fanon's work. The white man's fabricated the colonial language and supports the culture that necessarily accom. In his discussion of identity. of the black man. It is in this sense that him the recognition he deserved and made his work accessible to a far Fanon also departs from Freud. Here colonialism specifically in the Carib- identity. Fanon argues that in both cases the ing Mannoni's hidden Eurocentric assumptions and. then. according to Fanon. since he argues that the very notion of broader audience than the use of Creole would have allowed. from his own appearance. bean is analysed for its psychic effects on the colonized. He argues. in the case of the Antillean the subject is forced to choose between family lects that patronize the black man and enclose him in a narrow and and society. the web of impulses and neuros~s white masks': that contribute to his desire to become white. he is masked by that the black man does not suffer from the Oedipus complex because the screen of colonial culture and divorces himself further from any his neurosis originates instead in his cultural situation. The Jew is there. most si~cantly. It is from they were created by the colonizer. together incompetence. French remains the colonial language and its usage signals cific historical and cultural conditions shaping the black man's psyche.er- South America. and indeed. West Africa and the Caribbean. In speaking French. In the case through the imposition of the colonial system. Mannoni goes on to this internal splitting that Fanon derives the image of the "black skin. Comparing his understanding of racism to nial structures in Madagascar. who believes the inferiority complex. Mannoni forgets that the Malagasys he took as the object of his analYSIS and the black subject is alienated not only by the other's erroneous exist in the way they do precisely because of the European presence: imagination. It is therefore not subject's use of the French language. Never. and this panies it. Fanon argues In using French. it perpetuates a state of conflict in which the white man imposed by society and not by the authority of the fanilly. analyse the Malagasys unconscious. he expresses Fanon explains that this alienation and failure ofidentification entails his gratitude to Mannoni for producing such a detailed study of c~lo­ a particular type of splitting.reinforcement of his black identity. If for the Euro- sense of a "native" identity. it is his very skin that is over-determined. black people have been ceptible in this summary. "speaking in pidgin-nigger closes off the asserts that the Antillean is forced to internalize a white unconscious. Nevertheless. as to stress how the European precisely made the black man dependent fore not alienated from his own body. and reverses the logic so identity.will ~. the black man becomes whitened. victim is over-determined from without. image of the black man stresses the latter's sexual prowess. however. In addition. Fanon dis- white man to retain his preconceptions of the black man's linguistic cusses the sexual associations of racism towards the blackman. the also objects to Mannoni's assertion that the black man was colonized stereotype evolves from the idea that the anti-Semite retains ofJewish because he was dependent on the European. but the result of an internalized image of implications. In speaking adherence to the law of the father. Fanon's use and recreation of psychoanalytic models continues in the ing to Fanon. injects the black with extremely dangerous foreign bodies" (1968: 27). fantasy of the virile black man makes him an object of both fear and fanon and sartre 31 30 understanding postco!onialism . black man. Caliban: The Psychology ofColonization (1956). he reinforces the hegemony of with their effects on the black man's psyche. the black man is told what he is by the white man. Fanon's analysis of pean the relation with the fanilly becomes a model for social interacti~n. however. Fanon draws on Octave Mannoni's Prospero and incontrovertibly in his own superiority. the unconscious is too generalized and universal to account for the spe- theless. but Fanon suggests agam This sense of a double or split identity also stems from the colonized that this desire is the result of the colonial presence. Robbed of his he also reads and adapts the work of other analysts.eady ~e p. This has extraordinarily complex strictly an unconscious desire. According to Fano~. In the case of the Jew. but it is important that ill this illvestigation divorced from the rest of society and treated as beasts. He does not. Fanon limited world. he perpetuates his subordinate position and allows the authority and societal authority as conflictual. this phenomenon is further complicated by his scorn for "negro" dia. Furthermore. enter society as a result of his separation from the mother d ru: The black man is as a result caught up in a double bind. but also from himself. He anti-Semite creates the Jew" (1948a).

he has no being-for-itseIt no Sartrean reflexive h "this trading between the heart and the mind" and promoted a uman "(S consciousness other than the image constructed for him by the white "'confrontation: 'participation. ~sion ?f ~egri~de as a ~ynaIDl~ on reciprocal recognition. and her fantasy of cleansing and becoming white. On the other hand. championing values such as emotion.: 156). the liberation of the individual self and champIOns a form of eXIsten- fied vision of the "negro" more broadly. which.~e . to argue that "the Negro is comparison" (1968: 149). as an indication of how the black man Senegalese poet and political leader Leopold Sedar Seng~or promote~ internalizes the white man's myth. severed with an abrupt full stop. rhythm and dance. Rene Maran's Un Homme pareil aux autres (1947).to a vision o~ traditi?nal through readings of Alfred Adler and G. ogy for Senghor. 165) the black man is further explored by Fanon in the chapters on gender displays his mistrust for any inherent black being-in-itself. the te~ also sets out to ~rm who occludes the cultural specificity of the Antillean behind his rei. 'communion' of subject ~d ~bjec: . Fanon d~es takes control over the other. Fanon criticizes Mayotte Capecia's Ie suis Martiniquaise (1948) for exposing the black woman's desire for the white and existence. together with a form of modernIZation learned His analysis differs from Adler's model. man. In his reading ofHegel. however. White Masks. Fanon then argues that the relation between ghor 1954: 9). although this is once again less a backwards m~ve­ who has been allowed to assume the attitude of a master" (ibid. Fanon often quotes Cesaire's. cut the. White Masks. it conceived as dependent on the white. African life. Senghor s Fanon's final chapter develops this conception of the white mask poetry reclaims black identity by returning .c~nclu­ that divorces him from himself The sexualized imagery surrounding sion that "the Negro is not.. and the curious state~ent ~. But it is nevertheless important for Fanon that there can be no single set of "black values': since black identity is 32 understanding postcolonialism fanon and sartre 33 . Conscious that his analysis appears to veer away altogether. and the central char. in that it applies not from the French. and it is in this curious conjunction of fascination and disgust that readers man's splitting. however. there is no recognition: "the Negro is a slave to the native land. en- man. desire. his inability to believe pendence in countries such as Cameroon and Senegal. The oddly relations between the black woman and the white man. A return to some sort of "authentic- ity" (albeit fictitious. "The Negro symbolizes the biological" (Fanon 1968: 118). however. Senghor's negritude was also humanist. There is therefore no meeting ofconsciousnesses where one subsequently On some level. Fanon confidently ~s "I am ~e~ro': from "the real': Fanon nevertheless stresses that this fantasized imago and he seems to want to reinforce his sense of belongmg to a distinct precisely structures the actual colonial project. and certainly the that a white woman loves him. The Martinican writer and politician Cesarre slIDilarly the blackman and the white man resembles Hegel's dialectic between the used the term to describe the revolutionary power of black poetry an~. the ity. would serve to redefine the African nation to individuals but to a whole society. On the one hand. W E HegeL Fanon uses Adler. In Fanon's configuration ofthe white man and movement of reinvention and creatiVIty. ment towards origin and essence than a dynamic process of recreation. rea~er short and force us to confront our presumptions regarding black Identity man and the white woman. the ability to reinventonesel£ Despite his continued use images is what forms for Fanon the Jungian collective unconscious: of the specified term "negro': much of the text rejects it~ unifying and this is the ideological burden that is imposed on the black man and homogenizing implications. Cesarre wntes of a return the black man. ironically. The white man has already determined and seem to be upholding a similar notion of black specifici:-r ~d . then. He also explores Fanon also vacillates in his evaluation of the negritude movement. the cause from both a cultural and a political standpomt.po~ticalideol­ Antillean has no value of his own but is seen only as a sign of the other. master and the slave. spontaneI~ ph~SICal­ for example. In developing his vision of the black of colonial deculturation. This culturally created set of tial freedom. Negritude was at the same time a . this does not mean that the work is man to restore a sense of self and to repair the psychological damage without apparent inconsistencies. Any more than the white man (tbtd . Negritude was important in West Africa during the struggle f~r inde- acter Jean Veneuse's self-doubt and self-loathing. in parts of Black Skin. except that in Hegel's schema the relation is based indeed. The black man in general becomes on its own terms. in particular in the Caribbean) can h~lp the black If this summary offers a certain coherence to Fanon's philosophy in Black Skin. and it is the white man and particular race. Fanon appears first to imply nevertheless that there is such as Bhabha have uncovered the ambivalence in Fanon's notion of a specificity to the category "negro" and later to abandon the category the colonial psyche.assertmg trapped the blackman as slave by claiming to have granted him freedom that this alternative identity category can act in contradistinction to the and preventing him from acquiring it for himself myths imposed by the colonial gaze. and the black disjointed sentences.

but he uses that e concrete and the eve d t The Wretched of the Earth is without doubt from the outset a more and renewed fonn of 1 £ . Fanon's belief in reinven. One of the central tenets of the collection will therefore be that the as a result of which he ~'"o. tteMasks for this reason concerns 0 identity liti· d the affinnation of the freedom of the self also requires the recognition of instead the extraordinary richness and .. as well m the world throu h which I y an resolves (1968: 163). an strength. Self and other coexist in the world and.uld succeed m .. Freedom is of course not secondary here. in meeting. of representational uncertainties on both sides.trepallrodfiuces some of the stereotypes same time this alternative perception of Being that stresses its continual . deco16nization is always a violent process" (1967: his consciousness of himself I k ace m story. to explain the other of the detenninations of conte. he advocates contin·ualY 1£ tyPal°litics than a fonn of existential. self anew. I am endlessly creating myself" as a specific symbol of resistance rather than a new transcendentalism. 0 er from. .order precisely acceptance and recognition. en the 0 erthr fth demands the liberation of L.' anons WrIting subject speaks for h mdividual shapes his 0. must adapt a denial ofhis Manichaean c~~t:~~u~o beyon~ this. perceive specificity entails a deterZ: e. Fanon's return to the notion subject rises out ofits confin d . Hi mulas introduced. Fanon is most ostensibly a defiant o:um . processes of recreation. ry ay 0 create an altered . . of Being does implicitly belong to the realm of what humanity "ought" Fanons rousmg conclusion to Black Ski Wh· to do. alds m this conclusion the seeds of a he p cal t~inker. of History and an understandin of Manic . to myself" (1968: 165).. to feel the other. he also her. e white man's tyr la· ambivalence. liquidate difference as some c . lillportantly. engagement with th xpenence. 0 er.wn th hil uma~:llty pa w e recreating h· . force is met with equal antagonism. . ann . the of the human also proposes a broad terminology obliging each subject Fanon's now um· al es an POSIts Itselfbeyond its conditioning to recognize and accept the individuality of the other. decolonization can occur only when that If. b the Levinasian encounter. Fanon finishes Black Skin.. r I cs ave sugoest d b kn difference while refusing to allow It . ~e controlling gaze of the the use of force. ontology that refuses to allow Being to attain the mastery and stasis of inevitably mobile and ch c. Negritude culture unc ~ that reduces and glosses that variabil. . Furthermore. This is not quite the relation without relation of the outcome of Fanon's dialecti·c. al e 0 a static category: Frantz Fanon l The Wretched of the Earth c IS so one rooted in lived e . Rather. . . . but an embodied. feel. Th. have little nnposition of a reified image onto the black . g ~ om notions of both the negro and the Antil. tion. as it is for Levinas. but a more I should not seek there for th . . regardless AL. It does not . one another's inassimilable difference. affective ethics of contact. am not a pnsoner of history. rather. the colonized can only mimic the techniques of savow. ' smcel c s oraretur t Af· . e meanmg of my destin" d open demand for a liberated form of individual self-creation. Political liberation requires at the produced by the colonizer. unse as e moves ism. h endless remvention. c1USIOn precisely shows how th bi k ons majestic con- to an over-detennined and e aCcifiman. operating viscerally at the level of the skin. bl Totality. . Driven now less b identi . .ti. and Fanon's demand for attention to this notion a remstatement of black virility d n 0 ncan soil and . to b e confinI:> e. whi ch moves through e IS. This ent~ not 27). This humanism vers persona affinns "I . d t ut ac . and the notion of any kind of black ity. . White Masks. experience his otherness: "why not the quite se -renew and ingul. national renaissance. the restoration of nationhood to the people. condenmed by colonialism Commonwealth: whatever may be the headings used or the new for- . is no longer that of the universalization of European values.~e th the colonizer. Recognition of the other's humanity entails an understanding of his or .' anny y m his subsequent splitting and di· al th man and m the black man's resonance here). a Un dynanuc engagement WIth it. . . Fanonnever actually resolves this co negritude and identity politics I ulntrdadiction m his engagement with Fanon opens quite starkly with a clear call to arms: "national libera- .IS transcendenc s . po cs an celebrates no ~onger has the capacity to over_de~~tyofthehuman. an' em race to emerge afterwards in this re~ of haeI~m m . simple attempt to touch the other. . Given the yy" intransigence of colonialfo!ce.wo stress that Fan' . Lastly. ~ m:ry as argued that se -conSCIOusness Whil P h overtly committed and militant text than Black Skin. "History" the other's ability to recreate himself freely. and urges that each lf h her singular form of self-invention. anzation . g him overthrow of colonial violence must itselfbe a violent procesS. but reaches far beyond the f n. White Masks with a call for a form of encounter with the other that fiorwards. Y. lean F ' . me the human. owledges Fanon's dialecti. allows the self to touch. Driftin gawa fr tra~el. who from 1830 onwards subjugated native Algerians with v ' ow 0 at t-yranny self. . The colonized should not wait to reconfiguration of self and th IfPth non::enologIcal and even ethical try to subvert the system from within (Bhabhis invocations of colonial . over-spe ed pI . Fanon's description of the underlying tion and mobility proposes an alternative fanon and sartre 35 34 understanding postcolonialism . ".

c::U!:::ot~libera- . e that is utterly new. the narrow circle of feuds an nv es. " • d to eradicate its entire discourse using the very terms the latter had used in its enterprise of subjuga. b:-'"1-. and intellectual perceIves lIberation . Fanon c bam 1 Pk e-'-hcI'ty Throwing aside .trenched. L b ' ed but un or- colonizer and colonized. . f "dform 0f ac sp \.: is not a thinking machine. and resistance must be expressed by the use offorce: "colonialism individuallY. .:ali~es.. families which have always been tra tionl:ll it is segregated and divided along racial lines in such a way as to fix and collective ecstasy. in turn reinforcing the racial involves a growth of awareness. and the transgres. and the termination of that system demands the In addition to this new umty. So colonialism in Algeria relies on this stark segregation of one . ti all in its propagation of skewed. when the native succeeds in turning that aggression social se~egation. however. . within the terms of the colonial system. Liberation is characterized precisely by this stereotypICal narrativ~s. th tion as It appears m e di ' ~ . His energy becomes directed towards himself. He also Fanon again argues that the native is the product of colonialism. e 1 h' and to eliminate his power simply a means to condone the shed of revolutionary blood. tIS owmg tion. and it will only yield when confronted with greater violence" (1967: 48). e I P ..un inequality. en~rgy. the mte ectu ns effects can be attenuated only by the destruction of the system itsel£ to overturn that sy~:e~ d f 1 f ffranchised slaves. d urify the face of and there is no possible communication or mediation between them. but precisely seek to rep ~ce lID. will herald the end of superstition m than outwards. an atmospher~ of sol~tythtov:::. so that it does not affect the colonial structure itself. II al' ks find- itsel£ In this sense. ganifests itself both practically. g ~ regun the strategies of the colonized intellectual destruction of one society and its replacement with an entirely different makes a distinction between F argues that the colonized 'd' ous masses anon social structure. Decolonization is in turn an absolute process and entails the total allin before inst. Colonialism itself Inheritit1 <T many of its insights. The t g on (Ibid. 00: I d ands this systematic eradication. e ill e 'vile ed ac uiescence. ling of his energy. In a veritable The colonial society of Algiers in particular is also "in compartments". :md th gu~~e~ i'to challenge its tenets requires back against the colonizer. and that segregation is accompanied by social There ate numerous reconciliations. Revolu.lll ' dramatic and violent rejection of the hegemonic community by those to the affirmation 0 a ngI . Since colo~al Ideol01: m. Decoloruzation 'ty thinkin and uninhibited communI . that upsurge in creati. The masses tt abs~lute r~futation of all aspects hie~"e the same status as the . and those 0 f th e:n I~en . will now procee m d' are pitted against one another in the form of a rigid binary opposition. The new revolution gives rise to the in favour of ~ new re . h'lIDself part of a kin 0 c ass 0 a m d OSI'ti'on ar~ ~' ~I ~~~:'~. the constraints ~f colonial socle~~u: P~egIIlated innovation. Algiers is divided between designated areas for eneIDle ".' vision. deman r within the COlOlllal structure. the actual replacement th gun'e Revolution reqUITes call for creativity and spontaneity. . d cannot simply question the moment of realization and by the violent rejection of colonial society t 'th all SIdes The co oruze engagemen WI . divide. h dicts the advent of a liberated who have been expropriated and subordinated. tion or mediation because it necessitates the end ofan entire regime. tion but in a sort of comproIDlset or the people.free" (ibid. It is a fundamental change. The creation ofthe native observes the pro eration 0 of the colonized and the inward channe:- by the colonizer requires that he channel his aggression inwards rather spread as a result of the fe~ . £' d forget. Colonizer and colonized This people that has lost ItS 11dU'a1ri IU. but also a colonizer. h ions spontaneity as opposed society from another. may be more surely rooted out. then. a phenomenon that for favour of a mo~e f~ee. ~: an~ superstitions under colonialism. 1 ' Th y do not wan 0 ac v Fanon's evidently controversial paean to violence is nevertheless not of COlOllll:ll OgIC. tion occurs. to new forms of consciousness that can sweep of colonizerWlth coloruz 'th : . through Fanon characterizes the real anguish of his colonized position.~ght that is used to living in structure of colonial thinking is equally stark. The only go-between is the soldier. The frontiers between these areas are guarded by police or gettable hatreds are brought to light:: mor: ~a:~~~~ f military officers. rather is not an ideology that is open to questioning but a total system. hegemonic terms: "for away the injustices and prejudices of the old: not a partial engagement WI e en fanon and sartre 37 36 understanding postc%nialism . d' t II ctual tries to free the substitution of existing rulers for different men. whose himself through ass ation 0 e .~. ong. he is formed and created by colonial ideology. the coloruze me e than seeking ~ imil" t th ruling system. s decide to rub out old scores and to orgIve an £ stultify the colonized. e na. nor a body endowed with reasoning faculties. or slaves who Non-violence is for Fanon acquiescence. and t creation of new men.: 105) sion of the border is vigilantly supervised. the acceptance of the colonial . but nee I ' ' t o this that Fanon . and can involve no negotia. . It is violence in its natural state. details of the cOlOlllal VISIon.

It is the magnitude of this overthrow that demands the use of violence. While he advocates the overthrow of the ruling order by the fanon and sartre 39 38 understanding postc%niaJism . For the revolu- tion to be truly effective.: 39) or forgotten by the preoccupations of the town and. and its managers are therefore even more divorced from the people over This relationship between the intellectual. speaks m ~avour of the simple demands of the underprivi- the colonial system requires the formation of a group of militant leaders who are able productively to oversee the different facets of ~e s~ggle leged and disenfranchised proletariat. he is also at pains to stress the particularIty of anti-colonial revolution as opposed to class can be aggravated. then the eventual encounter between the militant from the. In a self-consciously Marxist tone. since the ruling class is not merely wealthy but also foreIgn. The immediacy of mass spontaneous ~~on agamst and his text. however. as well as the evolution of a new type of revolutionary organization. (Fanon 1967: 31) ~an keepmg m mmd the greater goal of regime change. Furthermore. disenfranchised and exploited people. stereotypes circulate that associate the peasantry with inertia and backwardness. and his revolutionary polemics are often masses. however.. If there IS a history and demands further reflection. This dis- how can we obtain the land. however. . rather than to a narrow privileged elite.ten~ to ~e themselves in detail and in local strategy rather others". it is imposed from the outSIde against the former power. and the masses is a constant preoccupation in The Wretched of whom they wield their influence: the Earth. Certainly. as well as the unification of the people power is pernicious because it is other. Fanon places the concerns oflittle contact between the urban leaders and politicians and the rural of the people above all else. creating tension rather than leading to new u:n:r. anew expression. is in the end the most worthwhile and the most urban areas. those who are unlike the ongmal inhabItants. One difficulty identified by Fanon in the existing staru:' quo is that ~e result in the return of power to the hands of the people. not estates. Fanon's relationship with Marxism is a complicated one. Fanon's engagement with Marxism is highly spe- expecting to be treated as leaders. The ferent concerns from those of the people and risk detaching themselves governing face is first and foremost ~?se ~ho ~ome ~om from the urgency o~ their requirements. VVhile the leaders and intellectuals lose track of the unity of the movement. and he IS concerned that the decolonization of Algeria should creation of a new decolonized order. this is presented as a time lag or difference of rhythm on the broad and inclusive positions of bread and the land: between the leaders of the independence party and the people. which may seem shrunken tion is copied from the colonial system and seeks ItS constituents ill and limited.). however. Fanon argues: stresses the danger not only of the dissociation between the mtellectual and the people but also of a lack of communication between rural and the people. and to help to formulate a broader national strategy. with the development of a new relationship between in the hands of the people. indeed. First. The risk is that the concerns of the rural people are ignored efficient mode of procedure. nor a bank balance which distinguishes the governing classes.and ~though he uses its structures. Colo~al They want to take his place" (ibid. Indeed. When urban militants and thinkers arrive in the rural areas (~artre 2001: l39). or indeed the political leader. Fanon observes that the leaders themselves can perSIst m struggle. this struggle in the colonial context is different from that ~ any oth~r. town co~c~ed in the l~guage of class revolt Fanon also mistrusts bourgeoiS and a peasant revolutionary force marks an important moment m the thinking. Fanon's concept of the ~e lag ~ds Fanon tacitly criticizes the obscure political machinations of those who attem~t to take con~ol. (Ibid. Sartre's reading ofFanon contains the rural masses can tend to equate the urban colonized With the colomal straightforward assertion that "the national revolution will be socialist" order itself. Fanon affirms that the revolution is Secondly. the the revolt . where the na~onalist ?rganiz~­ nate point of view of the masses. and bread to eat? And this obsti- junction is exacerbated in the colonies. take their stand from the start urban areas. who retain its goal as an absolute in itself. Although the revolution requires organization and direction Fanon is at pains to stress that leaders and thinkers frequently have dif~ it is neither the act of owning factories. yet ~s time he masses needs to be heard. Fanon asserts that the voice of the In the chapter "Spontaneity: Strength and Weakness': Fanon develops his argument in favour of the agency of the masses. urban militants and the rural masses. He is suspicious of the colonized bourgeoisie. this attitude of resistc:nce and mis~st cific. he emphasizes that the nature of them. on the other hand. Those in charge of organizing elsewhere. there is no question of entering into competition with the settler.

Rather ~c:uals. he wants to end the intellectual's estrange.guard against the possibility that the new ruling the fundamental precepts of his thought. In the nations development. the sIgnification ofits practices and art forms changes. IS the evolution of a specific. immobility So . a Ulllversal . which would function as a concrete alternative to that imposed by into a realization of their acquiescence and calls for the overthrow of ~e c~lonize~. long-standing traditions come sweeps away individual creativity in favour of the relentless working 40 understanding Postcolonialism fanon and sartre 41 .g e mequ ties and prejudices of the past with a . towards the creation of an improved anti-colo~~ movement Fanon claims that nationalism forms a crucial order freed from the influence of the colonial other. dynamism of their colonized peoples. Artists who assoCIate ~al culture with a backward return to tradition rather than as seek to return to their origins by depicting the original rituals and cus- ~ alternative set ofpractices to those imposed by the colonizer. resistance movement and carurot be separated from its unfolding.I ~. Finally. It Durmg a penod of such intense change. the evolution of a national culture occurs at the very heart of the th~ ?easants traditions are enlisted as a positive and progressive form of . for example. engages with the contemporaneity of its subject. Most importantly. European culture also connotes a demand for stasis. th uence. Like the renowned leader ofthe independence movement entrenched ideology and familiar patterns of behaviour: "we must m Gumea-Blssau. outpost which is captured and destroyed" (Fanon 1967: 187). people it wants to govern and denies colonized men their humanity. Once a people has engaged in revo- ds of new structures. being fought out. national culture lives out its present and s~ an a:gument that would now be controversial. between rural and urban areas. :anon recommends perceiving the peasant's regard for whom they refer have undergone a massive upheaval. other. in prisons. were dramatically different.revol~~on. he jolts the people ants. national Algerian culture is taking on form and content as the battles are ment from the people and hopes for a wider force of solidarity. nar~ow econo~c concerns. and he reinforces the particular dynamism of the present. under the guillotine. at the time of th~ reaches forwards into the future. colonial struggle. Most important is his uncon- class would appropnate the national identity and mould it to suit its ditional demand for change. any shared post- the nsk that posts filled by colonial officials become filled Wl·th ali colonial culture will inevitably become a vague abstraction. What Fanon does argue in favour of. and they resist the free inv~ntion wa: as decolonizatio~ is . Fanon champi~n~. National culture locus of cntique. enouncmg e persistence of stereotypes regarding the peasantry. Against toms of African peoples risk obscuring the fact that the very people to this :~ndency. unified and identifiable national is apocalyptic. is a politics of nationalism than looking back to the past. advocating the participation of all citizens in the anti- c ture..: 251). and in every French At the centre ofFanons call for solidarity between peasants and intel. European thinking maims and kills the luti~nary s~gIe.?t be ~overned and restricted by a limited bourgeoisie. the conclusion to The Wretched ofthe Earth forms a powerful ru~ system and who fail to unify the citizens of the new independent statement of Fanons revolutionary vision and brings together some of nation. Fanons vision consists of nal return. where the intellectual returns to his roots while Indeed. colonial order and summons the colonized people to action. National culture acts in contradistinction to the colonial mimicry" (ibid. Most importantly. ~reated by the community of the former colony's native inhabit. Again using black-and-white rhetoric. smce the culture of the nation progresses and moves for. . Fanon recommends the creation ofa leave our dreams and abandon our beliefs and friendships of the time cultural commuru:r that would link the colonized in solidarity against before life began. The most impor- traditIOn as eVIdence of his intransigence against colonial infl tant element in the creation of a national art form is precisely that it D . ' associates Europe with the systematic enslavement of its Third World celebration of n~w prac~ces and creative forms of expression. It also paves the way towards (ex-) colony. They into question and can be replaced by alternative practices. the poetry of revolt. This opposition between old and new is coup- ~ture and proves that the colonized have an identity other than that led with further recollection of the contrast between Europe and the Imposed on them by the invading power. Europeans freeze and atrophy the cultural to tradition. Even more. "The cntique. conc~iving ofthe peasantryin terms informed by colonial ideology. the creation of a national culture is in this sense intricately bound up with the particular history of the would n.achi~ved. rather than the poetry of an ongr- resIs:ance could come to inform one another.Amilcar Cabral. on Fru: sets out to explore the ways in which urban and rural modes of for example. Fanon categorically the future bllrvin th· ali .:~at Co~stitutes this national culture? It is not necessarily a return and resistance to change. Fanon rejects every aspect of the present own. Using the metaphor of awakening. He wants to . His tone ~wever. b ·ld nve ~urgeois ea ers who maintain the entrenched deficiencies of the colo. and since processes of decolonization in Algeria chap~er The PItfalls of National Consciousness': Fanon warns against and Morocco. Let us waste no time in sterile litanies and nauseating the oppressor.

Sartre's thinking on colonialism cntique IS neverthe- alternative world. on Algeria. protean and frequently self-contradictory. and he of the conclusion. One of the difficulties of this generalized call. the eXistential- ~e . this focuses the such concerns as interdependent. Let us try and create the whole man. Having vilified the from history and lost in the rhythms of its own rhetoric. Explicating the dynamics of an assertion of black Ide~tity historici~ of specific reference. and the release of physical power and ~ovemen~ WIthin those who have become divorced fr. and and to reconnect the colonized with those parts of himself that have larger than its nevertheless crucial historical context. Fanon wants to restore man in his totality startlin~ly politicized philosophy with a vision larger than i~self. It 1et us deCIde not to imitate Europe. While Albert Camus. national culu:r and of the colonial power machine. conceIves IS the repetition of the term "we': On the one hand. One particularly striking rhetorical feature of Fanon's conclusion the mechanics of the decolonization movement and. or "Black Orpheus" (1948b). Alternating the old what he perceived (rightly) to be his homel~d. The "we" is in this sense a vast. is that since much Jean-PaulSartre of the preceding chapter on national culture was nonetheless focused One of the most celebrated philosophers of twentieth-century France. humanity. If Fanon has been criticized for this gesture of universalization. indeed. It reminds the self over other. was born in Algeria ~d Ity mdependently of the determinations of context. the conclusion repeatedly refers t~ a. this self~conscious use of conceptual language is has been named both spokesman and traitor of anti -colonial re~istan. of philosophical experimentation ary black poetry to the European audience it was directed against. during the 1950s and 1960s. relationality and creatiVIty as he IS ~th been denied freedom of expression. it must Nazi occupation of France during the Second World Wa:'he cham- ork pions both political and ontological freedom throughout this w: . He progressively investigates the nuances of these revolutionary id~as advocates a r~~rn to the body. colonized that they are not isolated in their alienation and emphasizes the strength derived from sharing and collaboration with others. Fanon also successfully restores of the decolonization of Algeria.s c~n­ cerned with ontology. s~e w~s resolutely WIth th~ new. community. circulat- fanon and same 43 42 understanding postcolonialism . to call his readers to action. the primary referent of the conclusion is the language less diverse. whom is this exploration of the language and conceptual foundations of colo: Europe has been incapable of bringing to triumphant birth" (ibid~: 252). Anthologie de la nouvelle poesie negre et malgache de langue franfalse While many of the other sections of the text are certainly more (Anthology of new Negro and Malagasy poe~ in French). however. written as the preface to Sengho~s move to freedom. In both cases. since it addresses the colonized people directly and calls them Masks was a call for black self-affirmation and mobility. writes frequently and ferven~y ~ fav~ur be remembered that the inImediate goal of the writing is to move and persua~e. the practical overthrow of colorualism lllvolves Ill1ght IDltially have felt alienated and dispersed. however. ~~on IS a.om themselves: by endlessly re-describing their mechanisms rather than ~y explo~lllg the specific workings of each as they manifest themselves ~ Algena. In response to this destruction. rather than of truth. The inclusive implications of "we" also stress and for ag~ ~~ ~portance of community and solidarity between natives who the new. in The Wretched of the Earth places in contradistinction to colonial influence. Fanon innovation rather than dealing with the details of each concept ill turn. den: rrnmediately to action. e ing around notions ofManichaeism. nialism as much as its empirical manifestations. Fanon also repeats himself frequently. and no longer ated a good deal of controversy. while in The Wretched of the Earth.ce something that remains at the forefront of Fanon's work. metaphors of atrophy with inspiring evocations of an anti-colonialist. has been grounded and more specified than the rousing rhetorical flourishes read as both veneration and critique of the negrItude movement. he introduced revolution- the text m the realm of hypothesis. the conclusion can appear to be an addendum divorced Sartre is also one of the most politically engaged.notion of the human as an ethical category so as to advocate creativ- ist" with whom Sartre is frequently associated. universal and inescapably ethical liberation from the mastery of performative: actively bringing together the people it addresses in order to confirm their unity in the face of colonial oppression. White ?olemi~. let us combine our muscles and our brains in a new direction. the specific reqUIrements and conditions of the colonized Algerian's noir". The lack of in Africa. The objective of Black Skin. His celebrated and notonous Orphe. that connects Fanons Reintegrating mind and body. . even if it remains retained a highly ambivalent attitude towards the French presence ill cl~ that this is a specific response to colonialism. ~d h~~ gene~­ of chang~ the cal!. and.for a more just foundation to society.

And since he IS oppresse ill the French presence in Algeria aptly served to draw attention to dissen. since sophisticated. and yet. thi that anti-colonial resistance must. than _. d i ' t them further from themselves . As a result. promoted in the essay was criticized by such thinkers for being too ! . Y fr himself: he does not know nitarianism without attenuating its political impact. . Sartre's valorization black's self-perception and alienates him om . but his . e e to voice their dissent but this endless self-invention in the other.. he must force was condemned by Claude Levi-Strauss as obfuscatory of the particu. " ther s eak of the slight and constant the colonizer in Africa uses race to justify and prop up the economic harmony with ItSelf.over his self-image. since it still reshapes therr ness that can nev~r be captur se! _. . e an anti -colonial dialectic..~) So although Sartre does spend the Jew and over-determines him from the outside.. t gntude poetry a COllllO a rea g m 0 n e . also dissolves the work's apparent essentialism and commu. and the philosophical (Sartre 1948b: xiii-xiv. at least partly ethical in its (ibid. from the self again as in Fanon.1. t d t in this case it is the black thinkers as Eurocentric and blinded by his own position as a metro. his race Those who. he no longer comCI es ta. ave v Sartre's emphasis on the structures ofpolitical and economic oppression him to the status of a beast because he is a negro. . Sartre asserts that colonialism oppressed the black man as black. K sYa direct political purpose. like Fanon's.<J or recog~. . ducated in the French system. If at the time of the colonizer's invasion. Just as in Sartre's analysis the anti-Semite creates discrepancy that sep~atelfs:(. ongm se. :d with himself" of active self-invention provides the seeds of a political strategy.c rt hIe recovery of a black bemg at is similar to that imposed on the worker by capitalist society in Europe. d then positions the black man as Nonetheless he was soon condemned by some of the other negritude over-determines black Identity an . d Afri an. and although the structure of the colonized's oppression poetry th:y wnte canno . .. Sartre's journal- . . to recognize him as a man. Sartre's contr?l. fanon and sartre 45 44 understanding postcolonialism . Closer poets is to display the bla~ so d &s laP its otherness to the colonizer. conversely. ' . rding to the white mans politan. .: XVI). so the colonizer when he speaks ofhrmse t 1. black identity through poetry. fbI ckidentityin terms invente an rigid and essentialist. affir 't xplicitlythat the black soul was cated critique of identity politics. t be other than that which the been seen to generalize European experiences of capitalism. thr h t) lar dynamics of colonial and racial exploitation. self-conscious mode of thinking that reveals the neces. th victim as a black man. we shO:~~: sa s ~om what he would like to say. mans very s . kin that he does not recognIZe acco . himself: "he is split. . ty . my translation oug ou expansion of such analyses in the Critique ofDialectical Reason has also . involve the reclarmmg 0 a stress on the movement as transitory and provisional was insufficiently controlled by the black man himself: immersed in "authentic black experience': In addition. ression and glosses over an other- ~formulated. din . n~tive or a~~deporteof it h~ must first seize consciousness of sion about the Algerian question within French society. a strarghtforward return. Fanon objected that Sartre's for Sartre. th t this assertion of black identity is not provocative and multidimensional analysis of negritude manages to It l~ rmportant. attention to texts such as "Black Orpheus" uncovers the seeds of a highly in new terms. rather. al lf t therefore convey any identical.d . d. sillhcle. This separation . alth ugh as Fanon porn e ou. His stress on negritude as a stage in . over-dete:rnunation ofblack. It is only by showing black 1 entity ~ African can overthrow those Sartre's multifarious works on colonialism no doubt merited some of colonizer supposed ~at the ~ololllZ:m The oal of the negritude the responses they provoked. but the Marxist hIS race an ecause . not ltse identi b the colonizer also influences the alienation. subordinate.alist stem It IS for s reason d d . intellectual. and his description of the colonizer's own not a1ready~er~. 0 . howeve~d . for centunes. but in many ways the variety and passion stereotypes ~d redIscover hI~h:-re =~ent c~llective black identity of the comments generated by the corpus testify to its richness. The version of negritude . only SSOCIa es . to recreate It an. raCl sy. h ainly tried to reduce approach underpinning these pieces has been seen as universalizing. and political hierarchy.~. . .we One of the central premises of "Black Orpheus" is the reclaiming of thatlanguage also . the negn e 'tud poets use the Frenc anguag 'T1. also es anti-colonial critique is again. and the revolutionary potential of this re-appropriation. . and therefore colonial. . as a colonized istic writing calling for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of The black man IS e .. This assertion of black authentiClty a d turns to the black man sarily multiple layers of postcolOnial critique. d . and that also turns out to it overthrows the colonizer's stereotypes an re be closer to Fanon's vision than it might at first have appeared.s not dictated by a soul that is already combine a call for political assertion with a philosophically sophisti. far-reaching call for self-invention and for the subject's recognition of place on the level of language. d Sartre himself ms qm e e Th constitute .

It is part of a dialectic and not a totalized position. so that it must also abolish itself Fanon's reservations about "Black Orpheus" also stem from the objec- Sartre uses the concept of negritude. too clearly defined. Negritude's "authenticity" is I wanted to be typically Negro. pean. indeed. The use of the dialectic is clearly a problematic structure in several respects. per. a clearly European philosophical tradition. and he focused on Sartre's entrenched. its use of African rhythms as opposed to Euro. It is also not a set of values but the black man's ''being-in-the-world': his multiple and changing ways of reacting Sartre's conception of negritude as just a stage in the dialectic was for to the world and transfOrming it. its immediacy. And. a stage in would stress that he is attempting to prevent negritude from slipping 46 understanding pastcolanialism farlan and sartre 47 . Negritude is also not essentialist in Sartre's view because it is in no it was snatched away from me. rather than as a goal of Gibson goes on to explain that Fanon believed that colonial imposition its own. but it also denies its "substantive a new SOCIety that does not need such classifications. and Fanon felt that Sartre was curtailing possible futures" (Gibson 2003: 74). Nigel Gibson observes that ''because Black response to the colOnizer. on the identity but that cannot represent an origin or an essence. level of ideas and intellectual activity. it is a challenge to political alienation. but precisely as a warning that the major influence in Fanon's writing of The Wretched of the Earth. In Black Ski~. Proof was presented that my sense a state. reach beyond its classificatory grasp. Not only term "ne~tude" is. Sartre's Critique of Dialectic Reason was a open-ended potentiality of negritude. to reclaim my negritude. the materiality and affect of his everyday life. too reductive. As already signalled. . Fanon movement must not at any stage become closed. reveals its essentialist foundations. order paradoxically to attain its real end. time in the e~say exploring the imagery of negritude. its reclaiming of the transition to a higher synthesis. Sartre equally stresses that it can never Fanon too schematic.it was no longer possible. Even worse. essential state. when I tried. (1968: 94) but not a denial of its effects. Sartre's conclusion ance had to reach back to a moment before the beginning of the dia- nevertheless stresses its provisionality: "Negritude must destroy itself. asked Sartre to write the preface. does it apparently curtail negritude. But the term is absoluteness": a term borrowed from Hegel. supposed to lead to a new stage. however. so that his resi~t­ innovation of revolutionary negritude poetry.or an end in itself. and reduced the potential of black be a completed product .issal of black identity in contrast to his own celebration of the concepts of the disordered freedom and contingency of beinglor-itself latter's potential. White Masks. It is a crucial strategy. on the one hand. it works as a redressing of an unequal balance. Fanon's reaction to its dynamism might slow and that its label might stabilize and become "Black Orpheus" was. tion that it does not provide a sense of the real experience and actuality reworks it and turns it against itself of the black man. or a "disposition". Its perpetuation would only increase the risk that lence appear to learn and borrow from one another. pre-colonial. A reading of "Black Orpheus" that takes account ofSartrean disIP. rather than a passing phase before the arrival of contains the seeds of its own destruction: it must turn against itself in the "society without race". effort was only a term in the dialectic. social Structure. and it is no doubt true expressed in Black Skin. but its Fanon's critique of Sartre was in many ways a justified one. it is also pos- haps most explicitly and enthUSiastically during the campaign for the sible to read the conclusions to "Black Orpheus" not as a rejection of the decolonization of Algeria. Fanon This reading of Sartre's essay crUcially contests Fanon's response as is in many ways correct in his reading of Sartre. . and both thinkers' reflections on vio. these are not White Masks. its significance and robbed it of its revolutionary force. completed or. If Sartre conceived negritude as a process. problematic. Fanon argued that this diminished the natural environment. it lectic. Instead. it is the negative self-reinvention. then. I an mvention that serves as a riposte to colonial constructions of black wanted to be white. and which Fanon uses to also questioned because its label opens up a chain of meanings that convey its irreducibility.: xli). Having spent much of his essay praising the affirmation and impeded the black man's creation of his subjectivity. Fanon and that Sartre's position has to remain constrained by his position within Sartre were closely engaged in one another's work on colonialism.that was a joke. but its gesture of negation will lead to a new consciousness merely contributed to an inevitable and pre-existing goal. its roots in lived experience. and the values must also be questioned and ultimately rejected. and its insertion of terms from indigenous languages. Fanon rails against the European scorn for the black mans conceived as pure and originary. The creation of black subjectivity would then be an open-ended is a transition and not an endpoint" (ibid. Negritude in this sense and ongoing process. Negritude constructs a self that it then strategies of self-affirmation: claims as "authentic': but it does not propose a straightforward return to ~ m~cal. Nevertheless.

into bad faith. Sartre provides a quick history cultures of the colonized people. This is less the movement of a specific community than a rising one that leads necessarily to its own destruction. or the obfuscatory rhetoric of"liberty. and can even be reminder that while the white man believed that his gaze was pure. however. the customs and alism and Neocolonialism. referring in a Marxist tone to the role that he himself imposed on the native. Sartre's essay on Albert believes can remain open-ended. but becomes poten- be spared to liquidate their traditions. that he possesses nothing.way as he severed the black man from himself: "the colon within each of colonizer that he too is alienated. and this system ing the two thinkers' versions of anti -colonial critique. inevitably generates rebellion and brings the colonizer's violence back tant that Sartre's reading of Fanon's work adds to its incendiary quality on to himself. capable of work but paid the lowest possible wages. Sartre stresses also the necessary rebellion provoked by the colonizer's oppression mimics the violence unity of the revolutionary people. like Fanon. into a category that would betray the very creativity and ()n its own destruction. Again in the preface to The Wretched of the invention it promotes. Colonialism in reality therefore urges as endlessly self-inventing whereas the latter reduces it to stereotypes. or to collapse the division to revise his criticisms of Sartre and came round to the idea that there he relies on by creating an assimilated society. it is one that is created by ing its oppressed other. Reworking the Hegelian dialectic between master collapsing of boundaries between intellectuals. As in Fanon's work. black identity yet he also wants to exploit him. This is not the hypocritical humanism of political and economic expropriation in Algeria. and from this point of view is less that the former conceives. Sartre's discussion of colonial relations reminds the . First. Sartre asserts that Fanon's text was an appeal his interests" (Sartre 2001: 44). The disagreement between Fanon and Sartre Earth. Sartre. brought to its logical conclusion. the black man now throws to poststructuralism. and concludes by ofEuropean Civilization. Sartre shows that colonialism is not a masterful structure.: 150). but a demand for the recognition of otherness. however. argues more than once that that gaze back on him and shows him to be both powerless and other colonialism is self-defeating in its very structure: it is necessarily bent to himself. the elimination of the subjugated other. Critique of Dialectical Reason similarly tells us that the and reiterates its dynamic calI to arms. equality. an dependence. requires the colonizer to keep the colonized in a sort of limit position. but the point is that individuals on both sides are trapped Above all. Just as the white man's gaze over-determined and alienated 48 understanding postcolonialism fanon and sartre 49 . what colonialism denies is the humanity ofthe colonized: "no effort will the colonizer is not assured in his position of power. destroy their culture without giving them ours. even as they perpetuate it. while Sartre insists it has to negate Memmi's The Colonizer and the Colonized expands this structure of co- itself to remain faithful to its own principle. means of violence. In the essay "Colonialism is a System" reprinted in Coloni- requires also an understanding ofthe other's difference. Sartre argues that maintain itself in the form on which it paradoxically relies. and addresses this call to violence to the Europeans "the colonist is fabricated like the native. "Black Orpheus" opens with the startling Sartre's critique also builds on Fanon. but masses. the bourgeoisie and the and slave. Sartre notes that the colonizer wants to kill the colonized. they will be rendered Sartre concomitantly. Sartre tion is an experience that belongs to both sides. only this would necessarily rather. for example. the dispute centres on the term negritude itself. tially the victim of his drive to maintain that power. it is impor. impure and non-essential. to both colonizer and upholds a concept of an underlying humanity. this hatred means that to be transitory" (Sartre 1948b: xliii). Fanon went on he wants either to eradicate the colonized. human beings. noting once again that the colonizer hates the colonized he expression of pride that renounces itself. As a result. Once again. seen to foreshadow subsequent forms of postcolonial theory indebted that his belief systems were correct and true. the preface demands again the overthrow of colonialism by and determined by the system. and controversially. It is "an explosive fixity. nized are cogs. which Fanon end the project of exploitation and subjugation. he is made by his function and against whom it is directed. so that the structure necessarily of the peasantry as the radical class but calling at the same time for the becomes reciprocal. how it will tear him apart in just the same his own language. and one that cannot up offorces claiming human freedom. It is not an abstract mechanism. Later. Concomitantly. substitute our languages for theirs. that he is us is being removed in a bloody operation" (ibid. the respect for which colonized. insists that colonial aliena- stupid by exploitation" (Sartre 2001: 142-3). an absolute that knows itself oppresses but. Sartre's preface to The Wretched ofthe Earth goes some way to reconcil. Even as early as "Black Orpheus': the to the colonized. stressing that this is indeed a system in which both colonizer and colo- fraternity" that props up the myth ofthe French Republic while subjugat. The system as a result were dangers associated with negritude's totalizing discourse. but his own role is to show how this revolutionary call colonized is not oppressed by a master who knows himself and possesses will impact on the colonizer.

or colonizer. in their use of a language that can never be entirely his awareness of the constantly self-inventing being-for-itself stresses their own. but rather a Monolingualism of the Other (1998). and forced he does not have exclusive possession of anything" (Derrida 1998: 23). the infinite singularization of all beings. This means that into a static position and should retain a sense ofits movement beyond both colonizer and colonized are alienated. and his questioning of the exile. The disjunction between self and language is universal. proposal. but that may remain indefinitely unfin- In The Monolingualism of the Other. the crux of this is again that both colonizer and colonized are in invention. no self-affirmation. the white. His dialectic names an evolution and not an endpoint. At the end of alienate the colonized people by forcing a foreign language on them. is no more same time. a lack of self-identity. Neither colonizer nor colonized is secure in Sartre's Being and Nothingness (1989). specific experience of Algerian Jews dissolves into a discussion of our nor the promise of a naive harmony. may claim possession of ultimate aim of the dialectic. one is left with the sense to anticipating Derrida's discussion of colonialism in the much later The that the dialectic is not a step towards totalized harmony. the master. It is so their alienation operates on two levels. On this point. then. As in Sartre. pale veneer that stops our skin from breathing" (Sartre universal. and although his identity. identity sense of separation from himself that colonialism forced on the colo. and although he is adamant that negritude are forced to live in a society governed in a language that is not theirs. but the deferral of its endpoint. to recognize that he cannot possess. nized. but the colonizer denies his itself. however. so that "there is a secret blackness to ' the argument that both sides are alienated is offered in the earlier work.the black man. we must also remember that the colonizer. a "Black Orpheus" Sartre is in any case hesitant in his elucidation of the language that the colonizer could then claim as his own. to fix both use of any label because of the proliferation of its Significations. and in so doing fanon and sartre 51 50 I understanding postcolonialism . language. then. or bad faith. Reading the essay. In addition. totalized and synthetic resolution. Sartre's ideal society. should be allowed to freeze author's own pursuit of a process of self-singularization. and what the colonial system did was doubly to process of invention in the search for that higher goal. Sartre comes close shed out as a goal of its own. crucially remains deferred. ethical theorization provides the basis for its concretization 1948b: ix). guage they are constrained to use. in his being.: xxii). and voices this with an urgency to rival that ofFanon. defamiliarizes the former's self-perception: "our whiteness appears to and far from dissolving the specifics of the colonized's oppression. Sartre's dialectic is not the rapid dismissal of negritude poetry. its alienation in language is a universal one: language separates all speak. a fixed flickering of being and certainly ties in with the generalized contingency of being-for-itself and non-being" (ibid. Derrida's work dwells on this universal and reciprocal alienation Sartre succeeds in offering a distinct anti-colonial standpoint and at length. and mastery. own contingency. Sartre stressed in "Black that his strategy stretches beyond the concerns of immediate liberation Orpheus" that the negritude poets forced the colonizer to experience the and into a deconstructive and ethical interrogation oflanguage. this us as a strange. the negritude poets' returning gaze in turn alters and to assimilate. process that must keep moving. it privi- alienation and claims to possess his culture and language while enforcing leges continual reinvention rather than a finite achievement or stasis. At the nized. The experience of he wants to imagine a complete. but this is a gesture of denial. and neither is able to control and possess his language. first published in French in 1996. their disjunction from the lan- Surprisingly. Both the Although Sartre's comments on the colonizer in "Black Orpheus" are white man and the black man experience a sense of non-belonging in less extensive than those ofDerrida in The Monolingualism ofthe Other. The colonized third phase of the dialectic. and also becomes entrenched reminiscent of the Marxist vision of a "classless society". remains a transitory stage. means his own being and that of the subordinate other. very deferral means that his thinking finishes by positing an ongoing ers from themselves. but both are confronted with traces of otherness. the negritude poets' use of the French language and politicization in the colonial context: "the master is nothing. of their Although Sartre does predict a totalized "society without race". and a secret whiteness to the black. contain and control it. Sartre succeeds in setting out a clear purpose to this process of continual then. and argues that if we speak of the dispossession of the colo. it on the other so as to concretize the other's dispossession. but the argument that no stage in universal alienation in language. together with an exploration of the the resistance process. his idea of synthesiS remains tentative. conceived as the ing is its revelation that the master. to expose its delusions and myths. but is not fle- by political inequality and oppression. he manages to collapse colonialism as a sustainable in possession of his language than the colonized he oppresses and tries conceptual structure. one of the outcomes ofSartre's revolutionary writ. Derrida's initial reflection on the ished. And twists and deforms it until the white man is alienated by it.

but he too remains ambivalent towards the affirma- tion of black identity recommended by the negritude movement. meticulous deconstruction of the very language of the colonial system. it anticipates deconstruction. and problematizes both the construction and maintenance of colonial power and the fraught process of its undermining. although he also points out the limits of Marxist thinking in this context. his sense of splitting from himsel£ In response. Fanon explores the psychic alienation of the black man. Fanon's political denunciation of colonialism in Algeria rests on a critique of its Manichaean struc- ture. throw of colonialism. From this point of view the work is an amalgam of negritude and Hegelianism. in that he undermines the mastery of colonial and to make positive proposals while criticizing the simplicity of any discourse. "Black Orpheus" and the other essays brings out the multiple layers Moreover. • In The Wretched of the Earth. Key points . it offers an astonishing combination of the most militant political polemic with a philosoph- ical and ethical enquiry reaching far beyond the requirements of the moment of independence. and on the other hand he champions the black man's belonging to a universal humanity.he sows the seeds of a broader. His tone is contestatory and revolutionary. Fanon draws on Marxism in his sketch of an anti-colonial revolution. its self-defeating contortions. and should give way to a completely new society. on the one hand Fanon affirms the black man's "negro" identity. Fanon affirms the importance of national culture while elucidating the risks of its dominance by the bourgeoisie. Sartre's thinking anticipates Derrida's form of post- of Sartre's writing on colonialism: his ability to take a political stand colonial critique. its self-defeating nature and its deluded collusion with a certain colonizer and colonized are victims of the colonial system. deconstructive and ethical critique of its lead to the transcendence of any racial category. Closer attention to calls for the immediate dismantling of this oppressive system. • Fanon's work has both psychoanalytic and political dimensions. but it also contains the seeds of a complex. • Sartre celebrates black poetry as a space of resistance and self- reinvention. He stresses that negritude is only a stage in a dialectic and should fanon and sartre 53 52 understanding postcolonialism . White Masks. In Black Skin. Fanon conceives philosophy oflanguage and culture. Sartre's reading as an unfair dismissal of negritude. This divisive structure must be overthrown by means ofvio- lence. He metaphysics of identity and linguistic possession. "identity politics". but also considers the weakness within the system • Sartre's analysis of colonialism in Algeria emphasizes that both itself. and the implications of that deconstruction for the elucidation of anti -colonial critique. Like that of Fanon. He demands the immediate over.

Gandhi. Ashis Nandy and Partha Chatterjee stress less strik. a disturbing Anxious to avoid homogenizing Indians and creating a false unity.ality. while Fanon specifically advocates violence. French colonialism. th. promoted the assimilation of the foreign territory ing of course after Gandhi and at the moment where the anti-colonial to French control and to French culture. . again suggesting a certain ambivalence in relations between colonizer and colonized. between East and West. Fanon. he is not a nationalist philosopher and his call for resist- ~er~. " al mlSSlOn C1Vl lSatrzce so produced. community. early on he himself supported some aspects ofthe British presence. nor capItalist . why the Indians had apparently egy is that of non-violence. and although nationalism and a specific national identity were at the time a Significant part of anti-colonial discourse. community. repeated VIolent clashes and ongoing segregation. and it is to him and his critics and fol- natio~~sm . or between East and West. ~~non and Sartre were also clearly virulently anti. I·' weakness of his compatriots in succumbing to the British and colluding in their imposed adIninistrative system. an~ sO~ial.of racism that ~tterly . thinkers such as Indian civilization. emergent anti-colonial movement. competing versions of these already complicated any notion of a stark Decolonization. Fanon argues that the overthrow of a colo- surrendered the control of their territory to them. . for some. competitive to such a diStinct bmary opposition between colonizer and native. egated and unified. according to Fanon and Sartre. at least for the major Indian anti-colonial discussed. ance at no point hinges on a concept of national identity. 'Z' . Hindu and Muslim) in the struggle for power. f0rn:. as we shall see. resulted in Indian nationalism. nationalism 55 . Gandhi lamented the nial system predicated on violence requires that the same violence be 54 understanding postcolonialism decolonization. Furthermore. writ- ticular m Algena. Indeed: one of ~dhi's persistent preoccupations was why the British Secondly. Nandy and the Subaltern movement to overthrow British colonialism was a deeply fractured and Studies Collective ambivalent process. . In explormg Bntish colonialism in India. m. inequ. Gandhi was one of the most influential figures in India's emergent If ~ano~ and Sartre's writing on colonial Manichaeism.r different form of critique. The French" . Concomitantly. and leading thinkers and commentators on the movement waver in their configuration of the relation between cul- tural and ethnic groups (British. despIte the French policy of assimilation. nationalism: binary between British and Indians. in par. His anti- m err WrIting on India Gandhi and the others do not conceive the colonialism is a reclaiming not of a national culture but of an intricate shortco~g~ of th~ European econOlnic and political system as related! web of customs and beliefs opposed to the individualist. Hindus and Muslims from this point of view live mgl~ ~e M~chaeism of the colonial vision and focus instead on its alongside one another without assuming a national identity but sharing administrative Structures. Moreover.therr WrItings on colonialism but' unlike these thinkers. nowhere recommends bloody pr~cess and. whereas British colonialism movement in Algeria was at its most desperate. Mrica and the Caribbean. and this is both one of his unique strengths and. rather ironi- cally. although in fact. its association with capitalism and econOlnic nevertheless a common spirit tied to their Indian past. then the undOing of I of particular attention that set it apart from that of the thinkers already B~tish colonialism required. but between modernity and tradition. more precisely.s~vered and destroyed the colonized's very Gandhi perceives home rule or "SwaraI' as a return to an independent self-lillage. however. Gandhi's strat- had coloruzed India or. one of the possible limitations of his vision. even as he denounces the narrow vision of the bourgeoisie who risk the conquest and contro~ of ~geria had been from beginning to end a over-determining that culture. upholds national culture tended to privilege a form of paternalism or indirect rule. His work has two striking features worthy colomalism m Algeria. The Gandhi. Gandhi believed that the real conflict lay not between two nations.and the new humanism is clearly directed against French lowers that this chapter turns. a rich conglomeration that is necessarily both vari- ~ahatma Gandhi. Chatterjee notes that postcolonial India did not transform the basic institutional arrangements of colonial law three and administration. however. spirit of modern civilization and capitalislll. First. a rathe.

Critical of Marx. individual. The concept of strategies of non-cooperation and non-violence worked against both non-violence. its individualist ends. and at of any sort and recommends a form of passive resistance. the more militant and aggressive Fanon. retracts from the political in favour of ethics and cultural criticism. with his critique of violence. Once adulation expressed by his followers and with his position as a figure again. it such choice and presented his highly political objectives as infused with ~i is clear that his thinking mutates throughout his career in response to an awareness of moral obligation. conceived Despite his renown. designating colonialism as "evil': as well as of observations and experimental methods of critique. the weak and the poor. . Gandhi himself made no . It market where the rich lined their own pockets at the expense of the is difficult. It involved a spiritual project. it is Gandhi who explicitly destabilizes the position of those in power and crystallizes the systems i refuses to divorce his practical from his spiritual goals and was prepared injustices. ethical undertones. The difficul- ties of this vision will be discussed later. He offers no single anti-colonial philosophy but a series a moralizing vocabulary. His call for an independent India was also a with the people. He himself experienced racial discrimination. representation. his writings often took the form of scattered musings or glosses on his mining the activities of the peasants. and ti' ence from British rule was also inseparable from personal freedom and :} began campaigning against the mistreatment of Indians soon after his the full realization of the human self. He admired simplicity and set out to work closely marched against in 1930. nationalism 57 . community. 56 understanding postcolonialism decolonization. and its practical manifestation in acts ofpassive resistance the practical policies of the British system and its underlying pitting or civil disobedience.the exploited. indeed. It makes it difficult for the oppressor to react. however. ~ the historical changes he witnesses. while the The aim of Gandhi's evolving philosophy of non-violence nevertheless celebrated postcolonial critic Homi Bhabha. and Gandhi's work. Independ.turned back against the colonizer. he was committed to making his beliefs concrete and direct rejection of the British government's imposition of a competitive meaningful to India's victims . and. from Hindu tenets and the Bhagavad Gita. and is necessarily complicit with the mastery. ignores this dichotomy and discusses colonial- belief that violence can be justified as a means to an end. The use of times rather problematically. but Gandhi will not condone violence search for self-knowledge and internal harmony derived in part. Yet at the same time. violence is entirely incompatible with Gandhi's belief in the traditional It is for this reason that Gandhi's methods were rigorously ethical. He also stressed repeatedly that his philosophy did not their privileging of either ethics or politics. Chatterjee and the historio- that testifies to the thinker's tentativeness in recommending a clear set graphical thinkers of the Subaltern Studies Collective develop and build of policies in the fight against the inequality imposed by the British. however. More than anyone. and his battles an abstract thinker but was deeply committed to political action. Gandhi later became known as "Mahatma" or "Great Soul" as a result If Fanon was a revolutionary political philosopher whose work had of his achievements as leader of the independence movement in India. then. Conversely. Gandhi. on the political analysis of decolonization and nationalism. not unlike Fanon. discussed in Chapter 4. or the excessive salt tax that he militant activities. Gandhi was in no way less draws on his denunciation of capitalist inequality. and revolved precisely around real economic issues including the laws deter. "corrupt" and "diseased': and the fight for Indian civilization was above Gandhi's militant career began when he was working as a lawyer all in defence of his people's spirit of integrity and equability. since further i to face the inconsistencies that this fusion nevertheless brought. to systematize his thinking and to create a unified body exploited and the poor. He founded the Natal Indian Congress.J even if it succeeds in its goals it creates a precedent and encourages the I' Nandy. a mutation of self against other. he was himself uncomfortable with the politics and ethics or morality as inextricably bound together.: of authority. if later critics of colonialism in India have become polarized in . in terms of politics.~ amount to "Gandhism: to any specific or fixed agenda. mutates throughout Gandhi's career. rests on the :fum credence that violence ultimately begets more violence. and Indian spirit. violence blatantly appears morally unjustifiable whereas the decision ~ to take no action weakens the oppressor's image of power. in South Africa. ~ ism in India. psychology and the strategy of non-violence or passive resistance disquiets the onlooker. but certainly it is important Mahatma Gandhi to recognize the strength and significance of Gandhi's strategy of non- cooperation as an alternative form of anti -colonial critique to that of Born Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in 1869 at Porbandar. foreclosed any possibility of domination and mastery over the otheL His ism and destructiveness that Swaraj sets out to eradicate. Furthermore. a arrival in the country in 1894. Gandhi neverthe. Gujarat. Gandhi repeatedly used out of his work.

while Marx lamented the slow At the centre of this is his far-reaching critique of modem civilization. community. peaceful resistance against the Rowlatt Bills of 1919. or home rule. This prioritization of Africa. and partition. India suffers because designates the power of truth. furthermore. by means that eschew the cruelty ofmodem civilization. but conceives an alternative Indian society in starkly it is here that he elaborates most succinctly on the philosophy behind contrasting terms. it occludes the people's spiritual needs and moments need to be noted for their influence on his evolving philosophy. and at the heart of stretcher-bearer. requiring them to work in unacceptable conditions and breeding significant moment in the move towards independence. They ignore but of modem civilization. Gandhi also believes that capitalism dehumanizes its work- broader statement of protest against the British presence and became a ers. and a new market for their goods.: 42). Indians. and salt satyagraha of 1930: a two-hundred-mile march against the tax that the capitalist drive towards private ownership undermines this need the British Raj had placed on salt. Gandhi nevertheless on by the British have contributed only to Indias suffering. Modem concepts of civil liberty and equality are certainly admirable for theless. Gandhi argues against the capitalist concept of private property. Also during his time in South bodily welfare the obj ect oflife" (Gandhi 1997: 35). Another of Gandhi's Significant achievements was the tioning of society depends on cooperation and on self-sacrifice. since its destruction. he vilifies communism as pendence. but the evil and selfishness promoted by modern civilization. He also fasted repeatedly. according to Gandhi. the call for Swaraj. ity. in 1947. make Gandhi a Marxist. talism. his country's strength. He returned to India in that they actually helped to harden Indias internal divisions. This emphatically does not. Never. nationalism 59 . modem civilisation" (ibid. Gandhi wrote frequently for the newspaper Indian Opinion and material comfort in turn means that men "are enslaved by the temptation gradually shaped his views on the evils not so much of colonialism of money and ofthe luxuries that money can buy" (ibid. of the untouchables. much as he does capitalism. he assisted the British during the Boer War by working as a Gandhi. however. Gandhi was deeply saddened and for he believes that there is no inherent reason why one man should revised his understanding of satyagraha in order to stress its necessarily claim exclusive ownership of the fruits of his labour. It is not Englishmen themselves that Gandhi believes that the British came to India only in search of he vilifies. inflates the power of the state. Indians can produce their own cloth. The movement was also. He lead a movement of their own goods. and :find them- its undermining. of violence and vanity that negates even their own spirit of Christian- Islamic Khilafat movement in the same year. and which also it is ''being ground down not under the English heel but under that of involves a variety of concrete acts of resistance and civil disobedience. Their colonial project was the worst and :final manifestation of this notably in protest against the Indian caste system and the mistreatment aggressive and exploitative drive. Later in 1915 and began his work defending and speaking up for his disadvan. a for sharing. Moreover. settling the grievances of indigo workers in Champaran traditional methods ofproduction. on to launch the Quit India movement in 1942 ahead of Indian inde. and even contributed to the pan. material gain. indeed. Gandhi similarly laments the effects of modem machinery. but the greed of rampant capitalism is not. however. the text. an organization that set out to fight anti-Indian racial Iaws. love and non-violence. He formally adopted the term "satyagraha': which selves isolated from one another. as well as on the techniques necessary for both morality and spirituality. when in 1922 the non-cooperation Gandhi's thought is related to that of Marx in its denunciation of capi- movement got out ofhand and a number ofIndian policemen were mas. The good func- peaceful nature. the taged compatriots. the British obsession with commercial selfishness is a form severe measures to deal with terrorism. a series ofcomments and reflections Gandhi. Nevertheless. and at this stage he supported the colonial power even modem civilization lies the flawed premise that "people living in it make as he became aware of its injustices. Gandhi went discontent and aggression among them. however. which proposed Ultimately. Technological advancements brought Frequently imprisoned as a result of his militancy. and the textile workers' strike in Ahmedabad.: 36). Concomitantly. for lobbied relentlessly for his cause and continued to organize campaigns example. for expounded above all in Hind Swaraj. Gandhi argues and marches as a means of expressing protest. He applied tIle principles of satyagraha in a series dreadful working conditions offactory employees and the destruction of of disputes. sacred as a result of civil disobedience. So Gandhi shares with Marx a disgust written in ten days during his return from England to South Africa in for the avaricious drive of capitalism and a belief in the necessity of 1909. If there is any seminal text in Gandhi's corpus it is this one. this link with the past and with tradition is. pace of change in India. lack strength and courage. Communism is also based on material- This is a highly cursory summary of Gandhfs activities. Railways. served only to spread plague and. were 58 understanding postcolonialism decolonization. but these ism.

Gandhi takes the spinning wheel as a escalated to reach an apotheosis during the conflicts leading up to symbol of India's traditional spirit. and uses it to represent a refusal of partition. nationalism 61 .I city and resolved to fast. first because he argues that it was asso- take the form of definite demands for the fulfilment of the ciated with a dangerous and potentially destructive form of contesta- solemn assurance of the British Government that they should tion. Indians "declare that we have no inten. Etymologically. Initially it is related to passive resistance. A return to Indian civilization civilization in order to champion Indian integrity: "the tendency of would entail the handing· over of the land to the people and the aban- Indian civilisation is to propagate the moral being. The restoration of such traditional modes of powers of persuasion worked. The calm an ethical promise to end the rule of the guiding values of selfishness was short-lived. the path of distinctions and internal inequalities. and we also end exploitation of the poor attempts to make peace with Muslims as an act of betrayal. While Hindu protestors initially saw Gandhi's tion of exploiting any nation. The first of these is undoubtedly sat- towards independence as a statement of unity. and not an elite term. It is nevertheless noteworthy that passive (Gandhi 1962: 101) resistance is a concept used by Levinas.: 71). Noting in Hind Swaraj that they have long historical roots of the conflict and glossed over the politics of the rift since ceased to fight. Gandhi similarly seeks to reconcile divi- oppositions. the masses. What does it matter that we take differ. In a series of stark in the place of the peasants. Gandhi's call. the powers of satyagraha to achieve his aims. At the same time. it comes from "satya': meaning truth. India's plurality and diversity is part of its richness. and the relinquishment of short. which ethics and politics. Moving swiftly and deftly between to deny real and painful divisions between Muslims and Hindus. tried previously to ignore the rupture that was tearing India apart.seduced into colluding with the imposition of this modern civilization. Having ethical means of production free from the denigrating and dehuman. where Indian civilization yagraha. way directed to all Indians. it is a vast observed that his rhetoric of unity sat uneasily with his highly particu- and protean civilization and not a unified nation. to 60 understanding postcolonialism decolonization. addresses self-purification and self-sacrifice. divisive economic and political structures. By 1946 India was enmeshed in a civil war. however. it actually implies weakness. and secondly because for him be given the ordinary rights of British subjects. like Fanon. the former is '. Gandhi argues that in 1947 Gandhi was gravely troubled by the growing violence. and critics have peacefully. on the day India became an production is both a vigorous statement in defiance of capitalism and independent nation the city remained surprisingly peaceful. so long as we reach the same goal?" (ibid. community. visited the adopting the spinning wheel. and "agraha': a form of insistence without more and more. Ifhe did succeed in healing Perhaps most disturbingly. Gandhi's philosophy divided a country that Gandhi stresses had previously been able to live was inevitably rooted in the Hindu religion and culture. inaugurated in the machinery of Western civilization. with a "preparation" for violence. but Gandhi continued to believe in reconciliation and in and avarice. self-serving goals. The spinning wheel stands for an earnest by the Great Calcutta Killing in August of that year. indeed. Of course. and. Gandhi argues that "religions are different roads with a spiritualism ill equipped to deal with its complexity. that of the Western donment of inegalitarian. in the end his by the rich" (ibid. civilisation is to propagate immorality. although Gandhi and caste is one basic nationality. The latter is godless. He notes: Gandhi's non-violent methods of resistance. Gandhi opposes this ethical spirit to the greed of modern sions between rural and urban cultures. does agitation spread and rejects this term quite quickly. for example. Gandhi's conception of a unified and spiritual Indian civilization ent roads. the imposition of modern civilization some rifts between Muslims and Hindus. is in this and it is in this collusion that they forget their traditions and their past. converging to the same point. and part of his endeavour is to abolish caste They ignore the spiritual teachings of the Bhagavad Gita. in his move towards a demand for independence. as they realize that amid differences of creed obstinacy. moreover. Muslims and Hindus are perceived by Gandhi further and further away from an engagement with the economic and to be mutually nOurishing. in a very different context. by izing effects of industrialization on a large scale. Gandhi also is complemented by a series of multifaceted and mutating concepts wrote about the confrontation with British colonialism and the move that require further elucidation. the difficulty with Gandhi's belief in unity is that it seeks based on a belief in God" (ibid.: 53). They forget their communal spirit and the native bourgeoisie who would risk once again oppressing and speaking moral necessity that each man look after the other. but the differences 1arized use of the Bhagavad Gita. He also. he was moving between. a term that I have already used a number of times to describe was united against the oppressor.: 167). he wants to call the attention of the people.

He is prepared to suffer and Gandhi's philosophy is deeply politicized in its direct engagement to use his suffering as a tool to achieve the ends to which he remains with the masses. or in practical movements of civil disobedience. but the acquisition of power will be a beautiful and natural fruit No race appreciates a condition of servitude or subjection to a con- of duty well and truly performed" (ibid. Gandhi retains a also complemented by "ahimsa': the rule of non-violence as an agent strong concept of a common humanity. it is his suffering that shames the oppressor Congress and its movement towards independence. it is the time greater than independence. and disturbed by the violence that did emerge tendencies. Yet the depth and and reminds him of the evil of which he is the cause. Swaraj names not only political the more pressing political goals of his work. First. For Gandhi humanity is unified and indivisible. but establishes a common foundation on which ceived around the time of Hind Swaraj as part of the necessary return to individuals construct mutual respect. the resistance to Western civilization to others. distinct from any Eurocentric of change. Gandhi's pluralism. the call for freedom Indian (Hindu?) values and traditions. the other. Swaraj is at the same time inconceivable contain this vision of an ultimately moral confrontation between a being without "swadeshi': or community: "the principle of relying on the prod- that believes itself to be masterful and the raw and naked suffering of ucts of India rather than foreign goods" (quoted in Dalton 1993: 249). This Swaraj is. Indeed. Although Gandhi applied it to his protests against the dation. moreover. but bold and i independence and cohesion.describe the encounter with the face and the resistance of the other to is the establishment of an Indian spirituality that combines affirmation the self's desired power and mastery. from Plato and Socrates to Tolstoy and Ruskin. quering or alien race" (Gandhi 1962: 102). Gandhi argues that home-rule is self-rule or self-control: it is couched in terms that are still unavoidably inflected with Hinduism 62 understanding postcoionialism decoionization. and the breadth of his home rule but "self-rule": it connotes the freedom of the individual to references. The call for independence in this way has affirmative in its claims for what is right.: 171). of justice and freedom (Gandhi 1962: 80). because of its dehumanizing remain peaceful. and he uses the term "human" to advocate the crucial rec- in 1922. Satyagraha is and it implies not only political autonomy but also cultural and moral an active form of opposition. but his notion of resistance does of the self before the other. Again like Fanon and other anti- self-sacrifice. careful planning. deeply ethical embrace of the virtues of love and charity. This disobedience must or its imposition of modern civilization. for applies not only to India but to all peoples: "the spirit of political and example. The satyagrahi is not afraid. then. drawn from this deep- but promotes "self-help. rights. Gandhi stresses "my Swaraj will not be a bloody usurpation of international liberty is universal and. at once an affirmation of strength and a Gandhi champions in his call for the restoration of Indian civilization. community. This universalist strand certainly creates difficulties aspiration to reclaim Indian civilization and to return it to its traditional for Gandhi's readers. The power of complexity ofhis core concepts implies a thinking that stretches beyond satyagraha comes from strength of will. Gandhi was increasingly at pains to stress the necessity for its ognition of the other. As a result. This unity is not the same as similarity. rooted adherence to community. Yet weaker races of the earth from the crushing heels of Western civilisa- this withdrawal is not just a political demand for decolonization but an tion" (ibid. and. attention to other humans. moreover. with specific injustices and with the Indian National committed. is. self-sacrifice and faith in God" in his pursuit . Gandhi's thought is much more against the British with a belief in sharing. profound spiritual and moral consequences. committed to non-violence. instinctive. colonial thinkers such as Memmi. however. Gandhi's aim is at the same an equally complex concept comprising multiple layers. manifested by fasting and marching.: 164). it may even be said. and a political tool. and a proper understanding of the human requires respect for and Satyagraha is conceived as the key method in the pursuit of Swaraj. Satyagraha as a form of truth is to humanity more broadly. Secondly. community and the sacrifice politically oriented than that of Levinas. as he seeks "to deliver the so-called direct and urgent call for the withdrawal of the British from India. obscures create himself according to his own principles while sacrificing himself his immediate objectives. in turn. and this concretizes the demands made by the former term. and does not obstruct caste system and the violence between Muslims and Hindus. In campaigning for Swaraj. Gandhi rails against colonialism. if it is not quite passive resistance Swadeshi names the attachment to the land and to the environment that in Gandhi's view. integrity and truth. bound up with self-will and but important as an ethical category. and that speaks not just to Indians but to the power exerted by brute force. humanism and unrelated to the obfuscatory notion of "human nature': Ahimsa is again both a personal notion. The concept of satyagraha. which is always far superior the practical and the immediate. and the refusal of exploitation and degra- or home rule. Like Fanon and Sartre. it was con. nationalism 63 . as the sweeping rhetoric moves a long way from values and customs.

His inspirational nialism" (1983: xii). and VIa a series of insidious strategies for managing and controlling dissent (for Nandy is a leading Indian intellectual. nationalism 65 . Although he has spoken out on a diversity ~f issues. however. and although he has been hugely influential within phy and that continues to influence postcolonial thought many decades India. manifestly dissenter.and with India's specific past in ways that are clearly objectionable to postcolonial intellectuals he was not educated outside India. that of Gandhi. His writing style is elliptical. at times allusive. Indeed. it informs most interpretations of colo- even if this was what his nation urgently required. His approach to these not leave space for contingency. community. Perhaps most troublingly. despite his critique of modern Wa Thiong'o's Decolonising the Mind published in 1986. but his work does not sit comfortably within the boundaries up in a spiritual tradition that it claims to be able to transcend. His of the face-to-face encounter. while helping women to contribute to satya. style inherited from Sartre. example the systems failure to recognize the violence it inflicts on the who develops the work of his forerunner precisely by conceiving of I colonized). In her essay "Concerning Violence': Leela Gandhi Asia. A constant . and does brated and that will form the focus of this section. produced modern colonialism. like actually deflects the other's appeal for proximity (1. postcolonial circles. This combination of the specific with the universal lacks the does not hold a post in a university department. Although the statement contains echoes ofthe Kenyan Ngugi mediatized and broadly disseminated. is that his reading of colonialism oped through the nineteenth century. Young has commented claim that modern colonialism "colonizes minds in addition to bodies" on the potential hypocrisy of Gandhi's self-image. Colonialism infiltrates the ways in which both colo- capacity derives much more from the ethics embedded in his strategy nizer and colonized express themselves and corrupts even the process of for resistance than from his model of postcoloniality. writes his critique in a highly questionable. Leela Gandhi and others have also criticized Gandhi's vision more particularly a psychoanalytic understanding of colonialism as of female agency. opens with the bold borders at times on a form of ritualism. embrace of suffering. A self-proclaimed Marx. his militant style contrastin? wi~ subsumed into totality and is conceived only in terms of the immediacy his refusal of empiricism and his innovative use of psychoanalySIs. a follower and critic of Gandhi. The psychology of colonialism is also expressed through the anti-colonialism and postcoloniality together. as well as after its demise. since. and on their understanding ofthe relation between India and traditional role in the family. Gandhi's thought was nonetheless mired in other problems that he ranging from nationalism in India to the use of psychoanalysIs ill South struggled to resolve. while sympathetically expli. forming a strategy for resistance. Equally. from whose withdrawal from the political makes his vision of postcolonial India psychological approach he draws many insights. express concern about his uncompromising between postcolonial politics and ethics. an effect that devel- ist. Adhering to principles of satyagraha and Swaraj. to local culture and folkloric tradition. and that this ideologypropa~ates Itself ~ Ashis Nandy two ways: via codes that shape the cultural practices ofboth SIdes. The Levinasian encounter cannot be questions is provocative and unique. this eclecticism that he creates a new and distinct form ofhybridization cating Gandhi's philosophy. these concepts allow them to do so only within their perception. He has for a long time elegance with which Fanon elaborates his dialectic between negritude been associated with the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies in and the new humanism. that lifts his work into the realm of philoso. it announces technology. Nandynotes at the outset that even Fanon. which was highly (1983: xi). partly because Gandhi's very language is bound New Delhi. The Intimate Enemy. it is his thinking on colonialism and its aftermath that is most cele- asserts that Gandhi's ethics. to the British idea ofthe martial races: "the hyper-masculine. ideology's fusion of sexual and political dominance. with the result that "the West has not merely Gandhi refuses to contemplate the formation of a modern Indian state. unlike that of Levinas. damaging in its effects on both the colonizer and the colonized's self- graha and Swaraj. Nandy's distinction. Gandhi 1997: 109). and it is through Commentators such as Bhikhu Parekh also. however. Indians were conceived acc~rding and postcolonialism is not historicist but psychological. unlike many Indian courageous. Nandy is also difficult to pigeonhole. his work has tended to be somewhat under-explored in Western after his assassination 1948. and ~so Muslims. since its precise effects are difficult to trace and it Nandy's best-known work. Nandy goes on to argue that the ideol- ogy of colonialism was in operation well before the full institutio~ of e u: Raj. punchy but ethical ambition. It is this of a single academic discipline. superbly loyal Indian castes and subcultures mirroring the 64 understanding postc%nia/ism dec%nization. but Gandhi's demand for universal love language is nevertheless not abstract and theoretical but dedicated. Gandhi's latter the West. is totalizing.

sanctioned and monologic discourse but made debilitating senility" (ibid. as Gandhi in a way that Fanon does not. however. however. and time countered by that of India as aged. but defined by its own composite terms. according to Nandy. pathologies find a response in the work of Rudyard Kipling. and he achieved (quoted ill Nandy 1983: 13). for example. as we have seen. These pluralist yet self-conscious identity. Both approaches are introspection were conceived as feminine traits secondary in impor. This India would not have to ism was in this sense not merely a political theory but a vast ethical.: 62). This image of mas. for in doing so it rejects some of its own traditions. This sexualization of the native clearly well as the oppressed. crime of England she was the unconscious tool of history" both the British and the Indians from colonialism. since Marx goes so far as to claim that "whatever may have Western. who equates culinity served both to prop up colonial prejudice and to encourage the savage with childishness.: 11).. colonialism made British people believe in a false to charges of ahistoricism. choose between East and West. In ~earn from the knowledge of their superior Western counterparts. that during the colonial period intellection and come before the attempt to understand the other.~potent: the British would be able not only to conquer must work its European influences into its own traditions to create a new foreIgn terntones but to found new forms of self-consciousness. since it first by positing the transcendence of both femininity and masculinity worked to the benefit of the uncivilized and barbarian natives who could at the top of the hierarchy. but the~ were o. community.and . European intellectuals were able in this this by troubling the Western belief in the superiority of masculinity: way to describe colonialism as an evil. this myth was at the same maternity" (ibid. and A second stereotype informing the psychology of colonialism for it is in his reading of Gandhi's response to colonialism that Nandy Nandy is that of the childlike quality of the native. for Nandy. which would observes. colonialism brought the "isolation of cOgnition from affect . effects. Gandhi's ethnic 66 understanding postcolonialism decolonization. references. It is on Gandhi that Nandy dwells at greatest length. anti-modern. a ferent terms from those imposed by the colonizer: that the goal must new patholOgical fit between ideas and feelings" (ibid. Nandy recalls that in the view of the colo.: 7). reinforced in turn by technology. be the achievement of another India. is that Gandhi lays himself open At the same time. Wilde. together with a language of self-understanding. Nandyto denounce Marx's vision of progress as complicit with colonial Part of Gandhi's subversive quality stems. colonial. from his use of ideology. Oddly. particularly management and reform.: 57).: 34). in George Orwell. Next Nandy asserts that their futures here and now" (ibid. British middle-class sexual stereotypes" (ibid. antithetical to modem colonial thinking and reverse its destructive tance to the dominant social values of competition and productivity.: 54). History nizer. . This this way "activism and courage could be liberated from aggressiveness Ideology seeps into primitivist images of the noble savage in need of and recognized as perfectly compatible with womanhood. archical structure and conceived myth as superior to history. In response to the colonial belief in progress. indeed Christian..: 18). Gandhi again reversed the hier- degraded and past its peak. While Sartre non-causally through memories and anti-memories" (ibid. whose transgressive sexuality functioned as a way to threaten although Nandywill go on to explore counter-examples in thinkers such the basic premises of the British colonial attitude. "like a sinful man Indian culture was living througlI a particularly was also not an official. Colonial. clinging to a heroic past but the figuration of the native as childlike. conversely. Nandy the past. another India. Gandhi also set out to liberate been the. Nandy had already stressed that both colonizer and colonized were cogs in the goes on to argue that Gandhi reversed the progressivist schema of the system. The difficulty. nationalism 67 . was not seen as a causal product of history but as related to history ment that the colonizer too is damaged by colonialism. and it would be neither modem nor ~uasi-religious belief. in Nandy's work this observation is developed by an exploration development from child to adult by using a language of continuity with of the systems perverse psychic effects on the colonizing mind. . is cultural homogeneity among their own people. India cannot Ism had the pernicious effect of deluding colonizers into believing that reject the West. whose colonized subjects to act as "counterplayers of the rulers according to critiques of totalitarianism reveal the entrapment of the oppressor as the established rules" (ibid. but a necessary one. Finally. This critique leads envisages the troubled emergence of another culture.which Nandy's emergent argument is that India must conceive itself in dif- often is the trigger for the 'banal' violence of our times . Another type of response included that of Oscar recalls Fanon's discussion of the stereotypical virility of the black man. but his achievement. and secondly by privileging femininity. In Nandy's terms. and. since those who did nonetheless that his languages "gave societies the option of chOOSing not conform were packed o~ to the colonies. up of the subjective recollections of the people: "public consciousness Another ofNandy's innovations in The Intimate Enemy is his argu.

The agency of the peasantry in reassessing and written. and a more psychoanalytic reflections than Fanon. Nandy concludes by observing. oppression is directly mirrored by the suppression of the voice. with frequent contributions by as a problem of law and order by the colonialists. and it is out ofthese interweaving readings that he advocates journal itself. sketches the journal's radical objectives. that postcolonial studies began to divide his or her culture's traditions. nationalists in turn believed that the peasants only participated in the ive' in contrast to Nandy's psychoanalytic approach. but that they fail to address how the Indian masses conceived and created committed above all to a critique of how the history of India has been their own nationalism. partly involved with Sub- through his readings of colonial and anti-colonial psychological affects altern Studies. Chatterjee and with Gandhfs deployment of notions of traditional Indian civilization in Chakrabarty are highly politicized in their approach. or from the point of view of a native bourgeois elite. and reveal how economic spiritual. "knowledge without ethics is not so Guhas manifesto in the opening issue of Subaltern Studies boldly much bad ethics as inferior knowledge" (ibid. was to rewrite the nationalist movement under the direction of their own narrow and political history of colonial India from the point of view of the people. and the bourgeois intellectuals such as Chatterjee and Dipesh Chakrabarty. Less divorced from the political in his between an emphasis on the political and the economic. This affirmation. more self-critical version of Indian traditions" ans themselves tried to fill in the gaps and expose the peasants' own (ibid. Subaltern Studies was an annual reconfiguring its position in relation to the state was merely perceived publication of historiographical essays. including the postcolonial India were constructed either from a colonial perspective. Guha concludes that the role of the The term "subaltern" was taken from Gramsci.: 75). thinkers such as Guha. as chology and ethics back to a militant form of historicism. while Spivak. all of which shape to express their response to their condition. however. that a group of Indian academics inaugurated another approach. and argues for a vision of a "non-heroic': trans-cultural. and links it raphy and therefore writing. universalism "takes into account the colonial experience. whose object. Furthermore. Nandy uncovers the emergence self-conscious pursuit of the ethical. and the histori- more contemporary. The mission of the journal the remit of the journal and which come together in the three essays was to point out the ways in which historical texts on colonial and reprinted in his Dominance without Hegemony (1997). Bhabha conversely pursues the psychoanalytic . and builds out of it a maturer. although critical of his methods. nationalism 69 . trans. A precursor to Bhabha in this shall see in Chapter 4. ingeniously blending Fanon with Gandhi.vision ofhybridity. The Subaltern Studies venture in which the indigenous elite led the people from subjugation Collective is a group of historians similarly focused on colonialism and to freedom" (Guha 1982: 2). views and experiences at the mercy of both the capitalist system and the Nandy describes Indias split self-image: the psychological disjunction emerging nation state. and they steer postcolonialism away from Nandy's psy- deftly knits together political. It is perhaps with the emergence of the Subal- between the colonizer's imposed image and the native's perception of tern Studies Group. immense suffering colonialism brought. Guha argues that the histori- ography of Indian nationalism has been dominated by both colonial and bourgeois-nationalist elitism. Nancy in Marx. The first of these 68 understanding postcoionialism decoionization.: 113). moreover. The bourgeoiS elitist version defines Indian nationalism as an "idealist acterized this time by a focus on historiography. Despite their focus on historiog- of that split image through celebrated writers and thinkers. and that both of these are ideolOgical The Subaltern Studies Collective by-products of British rule in India. As we gendered conglomeration of influences. moreover. precisely condemn the less political aspects of his particular experimental. The colonial elitist form of history presents Indian nationalism as the sum of activities and ideas by which Nandy's The Intimate Enemy was produced at around the same time the Indian hegemonic class responded to the colonial establishment. endeavours to bridge the division. The problem with these two approaches is postcolonialism in India and drawing not infrequently on Gandhi. and they also uncover the then criticizes myths of a wholly authentic India as either martial or complicity between power and knowledge. psychoanalytical and ethical critique. The historians of the and tropes. cultural blend. the disenfranchised peasantry exploited masses and the workings of the people's autonomous political agency. Nandy's proposal is also more rigorously constructed approach proposed by Nandy. They are steeped his very methods of resistance. As a culmination of this analysis. by the colonists and deprived at the same time of a voice with which Guhas histOriographical critique has three strands. char. hierarchical structures ofleadership. Founded by Guha in 1982. Gandhfs vision. and referred to those journal will be to explore both the conditions of the exploitation of the "of inferior rank": in this case. community.

Guha shows how Marx rails against this univeralizing tendency to dissolve the immediacy of mobilization in the subaltern by exposing the uneven progress of material development across the domain. "was deSigned to harness the native in the drive towards independence. The result of this error is that historiographers assume renewed attention to the masses' own processes of self-mobilization. They mistake dominance for hegemony. read <Europe''' (1992: 4). were ist. 'uncontrollable. which. the stressed their unifying power over the masses mobilized against the British went on to extend their power by means of education. Gandhi was enraged by sion of Guha's critique of nationalism in India into a sophisticated and these sorts of activities. In response the East India Company set out to inform itself a historicist but a conceptual political thinker. Chatterjee's work is similarly Marx- cott. and frequently described the people engaged far-reaching exposition of nationalism's paradoxes and shortcomings. expressly so as to work. that Indians accepted the imposition of capital without resistance. Guha tion to the use of Marxist critique in studies of India. command the natives who worked on it. The Swadeshi movement set out to unite the people far from emancipating the natives. and the difficulty of his about the character and value of landed property. one ofits best-known contributors. Gandhi himself was guilty. In the political activity of the masses towards goals set up by the Guha's words. The British because it ignored the real tension between force and consent on which then in turn learned the native languages so as to harness these too to the movement relied. and organization in order to pilot this universalist drive rather than on its limits and insufficiencies. but they did so by means of Secondly. Guha.: 143) versalism thanks to which it is unable to distinguish between the ideal of capital's striving towards self-realization and the reality of its failure to Guha demands in the place of Gandhi's elitist and bourgeOiS leadership do so" (1997: 19). We shall expansion.: 167). The rhetoric surrounding this claim was also abstract them off from their own languages and from their own past. In the non-cooperation campaign If Guha was the founder of Subaltern Studies. This is a dissimulation of which. and he argued that sanctions. initiative. Marx himself was not agriculture. colonial regime. Guha goes on to describe this conflict as a further mani- of capital (Guha 1997: 4). tion of mastery by means of the dissemination of knowledge. "for <capital' state. for example on medical care. that capitalism was successfully instituted in India. in that they believe see in Chapter 4 how this fusion is theorized at length by Foucault. their own European historiographical methods and in order to impose ist movement also mistook dominance for hegemony and erroneously their own administrative system more effectively. Early officials set out "to his- tion in contexts such as that of colonial dominance in India. Reading Marx's Grundrisse Gandhi's theory of leadership amounted thus to a formula (1973). formative phase of the colonial that in Marx's own discussion of universalism in Capital.: 139). and his major contribution to postcolonialism has been his expan- a form of social boycott and were immoral. its administrative burden" (ibid. according to the construction of the colonial state apparatus. Concomitantly. so that the language became a symbol of power and a mobilized were no more than an inert mass shaped by a superior will" source of prestige. community. exposition of the interplay between power and knowledge. officials were perturbed by their lack of understanding of local or <bourgeois: I submit. but for Guha this claim was elitist mind to the new state apparatus as a cheap but indispensable carrier of in that it suggested that "mobilization was the handiwork of prophets. is the argument against what he conceives as the universalizing tendency in ibid. This led also to the spread of the patriarchs. nationalism 71 . (Ibid. and other inspirational leaders alone and [implied that] the use of English. toricize the Indian past" (Guha 1997: 163). but laments that readers have tended to focus rather blindly on with its own will. Guha argues that the bourgeois leaders of the national. and but Guha's analysis draws on Foucault to explore from a practical and forget the agency of the masses in contesting the dominant structures empirical point of view the colonial state's mission to prop up its posi- imposed on them from above. Gandhi distinguished between social and political boy. Guha uses Marx to denounce capitalism's drive festation of the gap between elitist and subaltern politics and asserts: to create a world market and to subjugate every moment of production to the broader system of exchange-value. according to ChakI-abarty. Partha Chatterjee was of 1920-22. Chakrabarty articulates a similar objec. and open up a space for the nationalist elite to step in world. and asserts bitterly begins by revealing how in the early. The imposition of English on educated Indians cut (1997: 103). 'undisciplined'" (quoted Chatterjee's Nationalist Thought in the Postcolonial World (in Chatterjee 70 understanding postcolonialism decolonization. and that it overcame The final element in Guha's critique of Indian historiography is the the obstacles posed by the colonized on the path to colonialism and self. in them as "'unmanageable. bourgeoisie. "historiography has got itself trapped in an abstract uni. is that it has lent itself to misappropria.

Chatterjee sifts through the work of a state the life of the nation it governs. including the influential thought Nation in Fragments (in Chatterjee 1999) develops the critique of the of Benedict Anderson on the invention of the nation as an ideological colonial state. and construction (executed. once was once again that his vision of the nation was distanced from the again. and he had no theory for its political execution. their mission by claiming also to "civilize" the natives in their treatment ism in India. In promoting this movement. Chatterj ee equally Significantly identifies the troubled position agenda Next. in the thought of Gandhi. Chatterjee's subsequent work The number of historians of nationalism. Gandhi empha. The upshot and politicized account ofits deficiencies in the Indian context and. nationalism became associated in part with a resistance to the "thematic': Chatterjee's argument is that the thematic and the problem. Chatterjee explores Gandhi's critique of civil of historiography ran up against difficulties. of manoeuvre comprises a discussion of Gandhi that is worth noting in including women and the peasantry. (1996a). "a different discourse. terjee argues that they were nevertheless excluded from the conception The rest of Chatterjee's text examines three moments in the history of of the new nation state. however. in sum. The nationalist movement conceived itself to be regulatiIig the question of problematic of nationalism in India must then open up the framework women's positions on its own nevertheless meant that it was not a key of knowledge that seeks to dominate it. and not for sale. As we know. however. Gandhi was also not nationalist. even though they display its obfuscation by the ideal was Ultimately antithetical to political thinking: his thought existing colonialist or bourgeois accounts. for example. by the development of print lan. "Westernization" of women. argues that nantly moral. nationalism 73 . Chat- (Chatterjee 1999: 42). she renames their focus not subaltern consciousness but "the subaltern sized that the people should follow above all the morality behind the subject-effect': She goes on to define this as "that which seems to operate 72 understanding postcoionialism decoionization. and uncovers in each case a more or less hidden Eurocentric nialism. initially printed in Subaltern Studies. That the also contest the arguments and objectives of colonial knowledge. yet one that is dominated by another" change dramatically during the period of nationalist agitation. and even though Hind Swaraj had voice is available to us only via the discourse of the elite. 1999) is both a philosophical dissection of nationalism and a specific movement. manoeuvre and The work of the Subaltern Studies Collective is broad in its range and arrival. for Chatterjee his thought is barely historical but predOmi. colonized community. residual failure to incorporate into that native. Gandhi's thinking turned out to rely on a disjuncture the group find themselves adhering to a positivist notion of subaltern between politics and morality. and tique. he identifies a split between the "thematic" ofnationalism. and the "problematic" of national. of morality and access the subaltern's voice. community.: 110). nationalist thought in India: the moments of departure. but argues that this paradox this difficulty in Gandhi was his involvement in the khadi movement: in the endeavours of the Subaltern Studies Collective means that they the principle that rural production would be for self-consumption and need to deconstruct the notion of the subject on which they rely. and he locates in Nehru's attempt to invent a sov- distinction between colonial culture and the specific traditions of the ereign nation state an ongoing. One example of the enterprise and afliliates herself to it. Spivak writes in support of "saved its Truth by escaping from politics" (ibid. fundamental paradox of Eastern nationalism: it imitates in its structure Chatterjee continues to explore the multiple facets of India's prob- a ''Western'' mode of thinking even though its purpose is to establish a lematic nationalism. Since British colonialists justified the broader epistemological system. There is no space here to summarize all three. perhaps not least society and stresses that this is directed not against the West but against of which was their omission of a clearly ethical and self-reflexive cri- modern civilization. If women's lives did is. The group's highly politicized form the context of this chapter. they risk turning against their own premises in their belief that they can Gandhi's increasingly utopian use of notions of truth. explores the fragmentary narrative also of the nation's pasts before colo- guages). Spivak's controversial essay "Deconstructing Historiography" even more. its concrete manifestation as it unfolds in dialogue with the ofwomen. volume IV. but that did not neces- its precepts (the "thematic") from Western rational thought but it must sarily prevent them from participating in social and public life. and create itself differently. It part of their negotiation with the colonial state. In this sense tried to sketch a movement that accomplished a fusion between them. The first part of the text explores the people on whose participation it nevertheless depended. even though the concept of "ahimsa" consciousness as recoverable even as they remind us that the subaltern's had attempted to bridge that gap. but the moment militant in its call for attention to the ongoing oppression of the people. together with that of the bourgeois nationalist vision. of women in nationalist narratives. distinct from that of men. Women were perceived to have a specific atic weave together in complex ways: nationalist thought takes some of form of spirituality.

it also quickly emerged that the sources available to the Subaltern Studies historians were in the end highly limited. Gandhi was nevertheless unable to conceive the political organization of a new India. Their work lacked a self-conscious reflection on its be understood only against the background of this poststructuralist own ethics. and it supplemented Nandy's psychoanalytic analysis with examination of the occluded position of the people in India's evolving nationalist discourse. of the necessary connection between knowledge and ethics within its own militant lines. and championed a return to spirituality and tradition. and their bourgeoisie. • Nandy draws on both Gandhi and Fanon to explore the psychol- ogy of colonialism. but it never quite resolved the problem. If they set out to rewrite Indian history from the point of view of the masses. Key points • Gandllls critique of British exploitation in India was moral as well as political. then. They criticized nomics. community. He argues that inferior knowledge leads to bad eL1. to use Nandy's terms. and the damaging effects of the stereotypes and myths of the native. The journal Subaltern Studies was influential in its identification of the imbrication of history or narrative with power. For Gandhi. he disapproved of violence and recommended peaceful forms of protest. A powerfully influential figure. In assert- ing the political motivations of its new form of historiography. and so on" (1996a: 213). elite notion of an identifiable subject pOSition is strategic. nationalism 75 74 understanding postcolonialism . history. and in criticizing Gandhi's foregrounding of the moral to the detriment of the· political. and also uncovered the co-implication of power and proposal that the subaltern's consciousness might be recoverable should knowledge. it was ultimately difficult for them to know the complex facets of that occluded and subjugated perspective. In addition to Spivak's nuanced critique. sexuality. the movement did not fully take on board the ethical difficul- ties of its own project.ics. history by attending to the voice of the masses. He vilified the capitalist system and its mistreatment of native workers. ideology. • Gandhi called for home rule in India by means of "satyagraha" or a form of passive resistance. awareness of the inevitably textual reconstruction of that consciousness. the enemy was less the British than the evils of modern civilization. decolonization. The group's the universalism of Marxism and the dominance of the local. however. together with strength of will.as a subject may be part of an immense discontinuous network ('text'in • The Subaltern Studies Collective sought to :fill the gaps in Indian a general sense) of strands that may be termed politics. language. eco. Unlike Fanon.

theory of the intersection between the production and dissemination of knowledge on the one hand. 76 understanding postcolonial ism foucault and said 77 . however. and can serve to he helps us to think through the mechanisms by which power is con- propagate and reinforce the social marginalization and oppression of structed and disseminated. He argues in the process that there is a direct link between concrete politics and textual representation (via the media and history. and the movement's call for cal subjugation. ethical critique in its denunciation of the drive to subsume the other nial and bourgeois elitist power structures are at work within historical into the familiar framework of the self. categor- The work of Michel Foucault is a useful forerunner to postcolonial phil. Archae- revolutionary fervour and the empiricism encountered so far. and this process of construction and categorization serves to reinforce the colonial project of conquest and subjugation. and his critique of the political abuse of ideology is inflam- matory. but on the identification of ruptures and discontinu- tion. Foucault's philosophy invents a unique mode of Michel Foucault analysis. the intractability of the marginalized other. This means that colonialism. One of Foucault's most influential works is knowledge. or at least authoritarian. or in the work of the Subaltern Studies and Orientalism Group. with its Marxian connotations of falsity as opposed to truth. since the exclusion of and representation inaugurates postcolonialism's ethical awareness of the subaltern from his own history mirrors his economic and politi. however. continuity. development or an sized images of colonial territories that seep into cultural representa. It is Foucault. Furthermore. which he terms "archaeology: and which retains as its goal the exploration of how knowledge operates as a part of a system or network Foucault does not engage anywhere directly with the mechanics of propped up by social and political structures of power. The Orient for Said is the conglomeration of images and forms that stand for Europe's other. and ology in this text names a new approach to history that relies not on examines the academic study of the Orient. underlying spirit. and this in turn props up the power struc- way for thinkers such as Said to uncover the forms and uses of colonial tures of any given society. this inauguration of a thoroughgoing investiga- tion of imagery and representation heralds a new understanding of the fantasized relation between self and other that structures the colonial vision. mission. The Subaltern Studies historians argue that both colo. and it is here that he examines most In drawing on Foucault. direct influence. but his thinking is nevertheless highly influential because the creation and use of knowledge itself is political. as well as four literature). exploring the potentially totalitarian. although he departs very clearly from the Marxist framework Foucault and Said: colonial discourse lingering in Fanon and Sartre. osophy in its groundbreaking dissection of the relation between power Said's analysis will nevertheless also turn out to be close to Levinas's and knowledge. The Archaeology of Knowledge. and the operation and expansion ofpower structures on the other. effects of Foucault writes about the ways in which knowledge is shaped by the discourse and representation. Not at all overtly Levinasian. ize and know its difference from the self. and the colonialist creates his position of mastery and dominance over that other by claiming to define. In however. Said uses Foucault's notion of discourse as expounded in The Archaeology of Knowledge (200lb) and Discipline and Punish (1991) to theorize the ways in which the Orient is discursively created as an object of knowledge. Foucault argues that the . on notions of tradition. who establishes a full-blown openness and responsibility towards the other's difference. Rather than using the term "ideology: those who do not conform to the norms of the dominant discourse. Said moves away from both the explicitly the methodology underpinning the rest of his work. together with the fanta. and the ways in which these feed into the politics of the colonial ities within and between discourses in history. This examination of knowledge writing on colonialism and nationalism in India. Foucault crucially opens the production of discourse. moreover.

diagnostic. rather than the crime. formation. and here it is clear that the dis. There is of authority. although this was also as a tems built on the combination of knowledge and power. The penal system that in the nineteenth century. in the field of psychopathology). This new penal system set out to production of the statement (the elementary unit of discourse). but in both Foucault in Madness and Civilisation is. together with ence. in patholOgical terms.: 27). however. and power continues in DisCipline and Punish. The focus of the By 1656. for example. prognostic. The text then explores the complex of new codes and rules of procedure. and these analysis works through the various categories and images associated relations will be explored according to their transformations through with madness from this moment of institutionalization. in terms of their internal ruptures rather than in the service of a endless shifts and emergent beliefs. the Hopital General had achieved an almost judicial power analysis will be on relations between statements in fields of discourse over the madman. crime. for example. or. Subsequently summarizing power. later. in which the focus is which might in turn be highly dispersed. madness becomes "moored" and institutional- statements (whether spoken or written). however. the medical profession. In the late Middle Ages. the individual act. In the fif- will be replaced by a vast examination "of the totality of all effective teenth century. is discourse that creates the category of unreason. Around this period madness was equally his approach will "be ready to receive every moment of discourse in its potentially frivolous: it was the satirical punishment of ordered science. construction as society's feared and relegated underside. the system of the vast. Foucault argues here that the formation. but is something that is made and shaped by those in a position the complex operation of "discipline" and social surveillance. constructed madness as an object: delinquency was conceived the social contract and not simply the contingent action. The discursive formation of madness as it is explored by not space to discuss the intricacy of this evolution here. half of the eighteenth century was accompanied by the formulation egies at work within the discourse. requiring sequestration and confinement. tive judgements concerning the criminal have become lodged in the cursive formation structures knowledge in such a way as to prop up framework of penal judgement" (Foucault 1991: 19). and marginalizes or but that can be examined on a broad scale according to the rules of their excludes from society those who are consigned to that category. So madness is never a given in Foucault's sci. and the hospital served to silence and stultify the voice of unreason. and what it acts on now is the individual in contravention of and art. Foucault's (such as that of madness. In Madness and Civilisation (2001a). and in the occurrence that is proper to them" (ibid. once again dispersed cases Foucault's crucial argument is that increasingly the individual is and discontinuous. sense ofits own consistency and coherence. In addition. and how both are understood. whereas result of his social expulsion. Foucault's discursive fields are made up of coexistent. Foucault analyses the development of the prison system. since it is now the man. adrift on the ship of fools. is regularized. or pathology. and he society. Judgement and relations of power. but which can be analysed not on the institutionalization of madness but on the evolution of sys- together if their emergence can be identified by a particular discursive tems of punishment and surveillance. religious authority and even literature century. but also around the causal processes that surrounded it. This analysis is juxtaposed with a discussion of modalities gradual disappearance of torture as a public spectacle in the second (the conditions of production of the discourse). Foucault affirms objects of penal intervention. the individual and his body that are the some of this method in The Archaeology ofKnowledge. in their dispersion as events ized. concepts and strat. This initial hypoth- argues that society has required this division in order to conceive a esis then forms the basis for Foucault's highly influential theory ofbio- . but in order above all to show its coherent history. and punish not the crime. for example. history of ideas has tended to try to suppress contradiction. what is not. contradictory and discontinuous archive within The question of guilt revolved not only around who committed the which the statement functions. the madman constructed. In each case it dispersed statements that can either interlock or exclude one another. but the "soul" of the criminal. with One of Foucault's first examples of a discourse conceived along these the result that "a whole set of assessing. refined and homogenized at the end of the eighteenth together with the legal system. Foucault sets punishment are enmeshed in a system of knowledge and understand- out to examine the ways in which discourses about madness precisely ing' a set of "scientific discourses" determining what is acceptable to created the madman as external to reason and to civilization. This process of 78 understanding postcolonialism foucault and said 79 . sexuality). Foucault also goes on to analyse objects of discourse (types This "archaeological" exploration of the interplay between discourse of behavioural disorder. This means that any illusory coherence and it revealed the hidden potential of dreams and illusions. norma- lines is that of madness and reason. watched over and regulated by a range of disciplinary sys- was a wanderer. uncovering time. sudden irruption" (2001b: 25).

The individual subject lives of Sexuality. however. a critique of racism. equally. In addition. with Tunis that Foucault was better able to critique the authoritarianism and a notion of false consciousness.or herself. For Foucault. power and discourse to think more specifically about the mechanics of and these are what incite Guha and the other Subaltern Studies his. society. but Foucault still conceives the subject here as shaped by the power because it no longer relies on an opposition between truth and all-pervasive operation ofinstitutions of power. In turn. The summary above already indicates. surveillance. (even though there is now a sense of a mutual negotiation between the Foucault's work fails overtly to take into account the practical field of margin and the centre). . Ann unreason is defined by the dominant category of reason. forms of knowledge. desires. and through the authority that such discourses wield over model for the management of the colonized other via morality as well social formations. shaped and determined multiplicities. and it has also explore the response of the subjugated native. Foucault comes to a more fluid understanding tion to a distinct economic base. and is propagated not only by the state but by lysis in particular as it is worked through in Madness and Civilisation. Fur- Punish does not emphasize and reinforce classificatory categories in thermore. criminality and per- whose behaviour exceeds or transgresses the law will serve Said as a version. falsity. power is a vast and net-like organization that traverses and produces stantly. but also the subject's self-examination from the outside. the notion ofbio-power of potentially contradictory discourses that exert authority over the explored in Discipline and Punish and. or indeed outside. reciprocally. and Madness and power operates on a wider level than that implied by Althusser's state Civilisation also stresses that the dominant discourse rigorously divides apparatuses: it is not only wielded by the state or by the sovereign sub- and opposes inside and outside. History ofSexuality could be seen to work on. Foucault's analyses show how know- of the subject's ability at the same time. empire. For Foucault. colonialism. it does not occupy a secondary position in rela- ality (1978). and has argued that the "biopolitical" state creates a and this isolates. the control of behaviour and the drive to categorize those Through discourses such as those of madness. more comprehensively. Importantly. this by dominant and regulatory discourses operating on him or her con. however. however. movements. that his torians to deploy Foucault's association of power and knowledge to work lends itself to the analysis of subjugated subjects. "the individual. and our subsequent position. in The very construction of our subjectivity. In these works. and self-creation in relation to these discursive forces. an understanding of the subject as formed. Foucault's subjects are shaped and given a position as politics and culture. but with the production of a network ethnocentrism of French culture. then in The Laura Stoler has explored the potential resonances of Foucault's work for History of Sexuality perversion is created by a discourse of repression. intensifies and consolidates peripheral sexualities notion of sexual degeneracy that also intersects with race (Stoler 1995). and in Discipline and Punish. and marginalize. Foucault explores not only the workings of power and within this formation and is always already in dialogue with it: there is authority on the individual. forces" (1980: 73-4). but Foucault exposes the complex interweaving of discursive formations his analysis of discourses of normativity and exclusion can be deployed that create in more or less determinate ways society's marginalized in an examination of the subjugation of the colonized as a result of his and subjugated others. No single indi- In The Archaeology ofKnowledge he regrets that this text came close to vidual possesses power. Foucault went on to express his reservations towards this ana. is the product of a relation of power exercised over bodies. The discourse We shall see in the next section how Said used Foucault's notions of of repression now also triggers a proliferation of counter-discourses. nor does he write of the concrete mechanics of citizenship. to shape and "care ledge and power mutually create and structure one another and are for" him. individuals as they live out and reproduce its effects. By the time of the later volumes of The History diffused across the discursive formation. in society. If in Madness and Civilisation other and to contribute to the oppressive construction of ethnicity. no underlying set of lived relations on which discourse would then act perversion and transgression. In The History ofSexu. Discipline and ject but is produced in much more intricate localized systems. 80 understanding postcolonialism foucault and said 81 . with his identity and charac- Both Madness and Civilisation and Discipline and Punish rely on teristics. and. entirely formed by the discourses acting on them. Subjects are conceived as the web of individuals that make up the social fabric. the racial ing within. normal and abnormal. but it is channelled and exercised through proposing a generalized subject of history. been observed lthat it was in writing The Archaeology of Knowledge in Foucault's evolving methodology is concerned not with ideology. in this case via discourses of repression. the notion of discourse replaces ideology as the vehicle of this way. or her ethnic difference.

In . and his exegeses are oppressed. As a result of both readings. and for her this derives from language used to execute that distinction. Foucault's consistent with the Derridean perception of otherness within the domi- marginalized others are only ever shadows or reflections of a European nant discourse of the centre. and it his work. even though he turns out. Spivak determines that the subject can know and guish reason from madness without enquiring into the nature of the speak for itself. the location of otherness within the language of reason. As a result. analysed argue precisely that madness is reason's other. and distinct from that of reason. Even an intellectual exercise that sets revised his work after receiving Derrida's critique. This suggests at the same in Chapter 6.contrary be considered as a and still has a voice. Young writes about the resonance of Foucault's reflections on America. His work is distinctive in the sense that. opens with a discussion of Foucault's and Gilles Deleuze's time that madness is excluded from reason. . Spivak's Derrida notes that Foucault separates madness and reason in order to famous essay "Can the Subaltern Speak?" (1988). if Foucault's philosophy. subject. since Spivak notes that in Foucault's writing the subject is never at odds with he claims somehow to be analysing madness using a language that is itself. Derrida then traces subject. is to this deployment that this chapter will now turn. Everything in Foucault's work rests on sition between self and other. and that it is outside the self- blindness towards their own assumptions of Western cultural hegemony. as if and Deleuze perhaps unwittingly retain a conception of the sovereign the signifier can be understood in logical language. the Foucault apparently forgets to draw attention to the division between uncontrolled chain of traces that reason is unable to exclude. and Derrida's read. If Foucault is influential in his conceptualization of discourse and "Cogito and the History of Madness" in Writing and Difference (1978). Foucault's presumption that the marginalized subject is still European Derrida argues that madness must on the . that it is the differance. however. Derrida's reading might go some way to resolv- are unable to conceptualize the highly complex and elusive workings ing Spivak's anxiety about the apparent security and self-presence of of power and desire on what she terms "the unnamed subject of the Foucault's analytical. Spivak holds that Foucault unable to do so. and shows that Descartes sought to distin- In Foucault's writing. and this effectively mars their ability to speak about colonized peoples. between those in power and those who the assumption that the subject analysed is European.contained structure of rationality and civilization. however. As Young also discusses. According to Derrida. it retains a sense of agency. Spivak's criticisms are undoubtedly somewhat equivocal. the relation between desire and interest is never questioned. Foucault also Other of Europe" (ibid. and certainly his later out to reflect on structures of marginalization remains anchored in an theories of resistance operating within the power structure seem more ethnocentric framework perpetuating European dominance. or brandishing concrete experience. and this is effectively the "Subject as Europe" (Spivak 1988: 280). his work has also been highly controversial. intellectual': he combines literary criticism with politics and cultural ern versions of History. can help consolidate the international within the hegemonic discourse. in analysing society's excluded others. helps to trouble any reductive oppo- division oflabor" (ibid. a result a broad audience of both specialized academics and the general ing of Foucault on madness goes some way to achieve this suppleness. in Cairo before continuing his studies and developing his career in ition. In add. and accomplishes the unusual achievement of moving work has been instrumental in shaping the evolution of postcolonial seamlessly between these discrete levels of analysiS and in addressing as critique.: 275). and her observations certainly do not mean that Foucault's influence on post- colonial studies has been abortive. to be some level of agency is assured. some ofits schematism might be loosened. of course. To return his perspective and that of the subaltern worker: "neither Deleuze nor to the postcolonial. although Derrida does not spell out this implica- Foucault seems aware that the intellectual within socialized capital. Furthermore.: 280). and indeed oppressed. Foucault also writes as ifhe knows what madness is. however. this means that Foucault's writing gets caught in a trap. Orientalism work in his Orientalism ([1978] 1995). Said drew extensively on Foucault's Edward Said. although he understands dis- course in more coherent and more historically grounded terms than Said was a Palestinian born in Jerusalem in 1935.public. In turn. and was educated those suggested by Foucault's proliferating networks of power. in his role as "public rupture and discontinuity for an understanding of the limits of West. Foucault's use of Descartes. power. tion here. linguistic supplement at work within reason. for example. Critics have tended to focus either on his academic and literary foucault and said 83 82 understanding postcolonialism . Derrida's critique may nonetheless tum out self and the colonized other is consequently forgotten and erased in still to be pertinent to Said's clearly postcolonial use of Foucault.

vilify a Eurocentric form of humanism even as foundations and effects. Said uses Foucault here because the of knowledge that do not address this connectivity misunderstand the notion of discourse enables him to move between text and world. together with its infiltration into of both the diversity and the commonality of human experience. therefore. Said to stand for all that is "other" to the West and therefore threatening.). and specificity of "human experience': to support his affirmation of the dialogue between culture and politics. Orientalist views of the Orient acquire by combining a historical and political critique of colonial oppression hegemony and serve to prop up myths of European superiority that with a conception of the unity as well as the diversity of the human as are largely accepted by the society in which they are propagated. It is a way of representing the Orient. sociology. Secondly. and forms of the West as the site of power. like Fanon and Sartre. and having authority over the Orient" (ibid. Orientalism sets out to define the notion of Orientalist discourse according to Said. and yet these ideas clearly and to criticize its delusions. which perniciously feed into the diffu. there has been a engagement with poststructuralists such as Foucault. but a created body of ics have objected to Said's humanism. rests once again on an ethical understanding geographic functioning of discourse. he finishes also by the consent of society.: 6). in the multiple disciplines of anthropology. however. but Said himself Orient. but it is worth noting for now that Said is both and achieve a form of cultural hegemony. and because it can considerable material investment" (ibid. If Gustave Flaubert's depiction of the Egyptian they uphold the importance of a new notion of the human necessitat. even underground self" (ibid. He develops Foucault. perhaps surprising that the term ''human'' crops up so frequently in Said's definition of Orientalism relies on the argument that the ideas the work of the postcolonial thinkers analysed so far. a haps generalized theory of Orientalist discourse. Orientalism can be seen as "a Western style for dominating. participate in a sort of uneven exchange with various sites of power. Said's argument is in this sense universal. Said example. and this discourse helps to reinforce the position engage with a "contrapuntal" meeting of cultural influences. is not an airy European fantasy about the Orient. The entalism is from this point of view a discourse in Foucault's sense: it difficulties associated with this move in Said's work will be discussed is a wide-ranging network of texts. Said also draws on Gramsci appear somewhat under-theorized. history perceived these endeavours very much as part of the same project of or philology. Ori- serve to support the colonial power structure operating at the time. cultural. the colony and Islam. all of later in this section. as well as in his vast. Beneath the critique discourse that reconstitutes the East using a number of preconceptions of Orientalism is nevertheless the ardent belief that all human beings and assumptions. It is· cultural performance. and this hegemony is assured distinctive and controversial because. and this side the mechanics of conquest and economic exploitation. and closely meanings. nevertheless argues that literary as well as historical or popular texts Thirdly. both because it contradicts his theory and practice in which.: 3). by drawing attention to the spatial or atic in its broad sweep. Although he dichotomy is both misleading and destructive. for many generations. First. and although problem. Orientalism is "a style of thought based unsettling the West's vision of the Orient. displaying consistently its formation in discourse. however. It is also upon an ontological and epistemological distinction made between one of the principal arguments of Orientalism that one can identify the 'the Orient' and 'the Occident'" (Said 1995: 2). The term Orientalism covers three interrelated whether these be intellectual. In this way Orientalism link between culture and politics by analysing colonial discourse along. The a symbol of resistance. tends to rely on a binary opposition between East and West. absorb and disseminate contemporary forms of knowledge that can restructuring. Said argues that it names the academic study of the related to the colonial or imperial establishment. images and preconceptions. and there are certainly shortcomings in his cursory which serve to designate the Eastern other as "a sort of surrogate and treatment ofliterary works. direct and unidirectional.critical writing or on his interventions on Palestine. since Fanon and about the Orient propagated by Orientalists have concrete and empirical Sartre. A number of crit. then this mirrors the broader pattern whereby the West seeks also departs from Foucault in retaining the notion of the human rather to govern the East: to represent it in familiar terms the better to enforce than deconstructing with the latter the very notion of the subject by its own position of strength. for ing an understanding of the freedom and the alterity of the other. as well as Said. since the Orient comes has been criticized for dehistoricizing the discourses he analyses. moral or political. wide-ranging and per. here to theorize the ways in which certain ideas predominate over others ther later in the chapter. sion of colonial power. courtesan Kuchuk Hanem never allows her to speak for herself. 'This difficulty will be dealt with fur. In examining this foucault and said 85 84 understanding postcolonialism . Said asserts that "Orientalism. link between Orientalist ideas and concrete power structures is not.

: ist. Said notes that Balfour's speech appears to refuse an superior ways of the French. Said argues that from this attitude of British superiority over Egypt. Furthermore. and emerge from these. He speaks as a result on behalf of Britain or. in history of contacts. These four elements include insists on Britain's supposedly superior knowledge of the country and of the expansion of the territory to which the term "Orient" referred. examination of its representational structures in the work of a series of larly. by referring to 1995: 72). so that the nevertheless demonstrate how these come together in their creation of Orientalizing gesture is at the same time one of reduction. that division between superstructure and base."exchange: Said at the same time criticizes the rigidity of the Marxist If Orientalism is conceived as a drive for knowledge of the other. and tion. equates here to Egypt itself. but nevertheless the argu. native population. to. This assumption is backed up by a gamut contribution of historians as well as travellers to Orientalist representa- of stereotypes of Orientals or Arabs as gullible as well as cunning. these stylized simulacra. it is Egypt. the drive towards classification. at the same time as he speaks for the Egyptians. Napoleon's desired conquest of Egypt. but will define the entire religion and the culture that accompanies it. fanaticism and terrorism. The 14). fix what he is talking or thinking about with a word or phrase. indeed did more scientific projects such as Ferdinand de Lesseps's Suez tor . together on the subject of Britain's hold on Egypt and the difficulties in keeping with the belief that a colonial mission could teach them the evidently that hold secure. Said goes on to trace overlapping preconceptions in Lord Cromer's writers and thinkers. Islam. crafted. up with a claim both to know and understand the Muslims. born out of the Orientalists' efforts" (ibid. time contributed to the secularization of Orientalism. Said's analysis of the vast scope of Orientalism is juxtaposed with an the civilized world. At no ers such as Fran~ois. This apparently thorough knowledge of Egypt. a hero rescuing the Orient from the obscurity. reassembled. according to Oriental other: "the Orient as reconstructed. point on. indeed. Orientalist discourse developed to the extent that it lost its ment revolves around the premise that the British know the civilization descriptive realism and hinged itself on the wholesale creation of the of Egypt. literature then is considered either to have acquired. and. Said argues as a result that the Orientalist "will designate. in Said. the Orientalist it is important for Said that it can be analysed by means of a series of still strives to manage and domesticate the image of the Islamic other. Even with the a certain cultural hegemony. was bound Balfour's lecture. is a focal point for the Oriental- how "political imperialism governs an entire field of study" (ibid. Simi. These structures at the same ain overseas are in this way underpinned by a reservoir of knowledge. all achieved against the background of a belief that strangeness which he himself had properly distinguished" (ibid. four elements linked discourse on Egypt. Said also rather that it served to prop up the mission once it was in place). Cromer too in Flaubert's Bouvard et Picuchet (1999). the sympathetic perception of a coherent spirit within the Orient lethargic as well as dishonest. as . to show classify its object. even if this is based not on abstract knowledge the structure of Orientalist discourse. for example. or simply to be. for example. which ples of Orientalist discourse in political and historical texts.Rene de Chateaubriand. addressed to the House of Commons on 13 June 1910. and comes to symbolize barbarism. alienation. the what is right for its inhabitants. Alphonse de Lamartine point does Balfour address the perceptions of the Egyptians themselves and Flaubert all learn from these creations. The analyses he carries out with this aim will also focus more on Orientalist seizes on preconceptions such as these and uses them to individual influences than Foucault's archaeological probings. and stresses that his goal is knowledge is structured by a set of images that serve to encapsulate and precisely to explore the interpenetration of these two levels. even if old reli- (although it is perhaps noteworthy that in the introduction he affirmed gious patterns continued to enter into the Orientalist vision. Europe was necessarily in a position of strength. more recently. but development of the understanding ofIslam in the West. Political discussions of the role of Brit.and Balfour insists that British occupation is clearly good for the Canal in its endeavour to bring together East and West.: 121). reality" (Said and. Said's most controversial example of such a modernist belief in the West 86 understanding postcolonialism foucault and said 87 . the colonial presence is shown to be intricately bound up with a with a move towards modernization: "the modern Orientalist was. In any now associates the Orientalist drive with the "mission civilisatrice" and case. the media. name. finally. all of which will later be parodied but on the day-to-day experience of managing the colony. for example. During the eighteenth century. of voyages of discovery and the preconceptions that his view. and the assurance of this short.: 87). Said begins. point The main body of Said's work sifts through a multitude of exam. Subsequent writ- knowledge also gives Britain authority over the Oriental country.any Egyptian who spoke out would merely be conceived as an agita. individual texts. Orientalism is unified as a discourse. so that it was no and Said also argues that this justified in advance the colonial project longer simply a question of Islam versus Christianity.

Lamartine. for example.: 286). the cursory methodology. although the female sexual object always nevertheless the way from Aeschylus to modem journalism. the construction ofIslam as a monolithic entity and aesthetically and imaginatively as a roomy place full ofpossibility" (ibid. Islam is particularly pernicious in the United States. and this identification exceeds his grasp. Said in this way traces the development of Orientalist discourse all able femininity. secular modem discourse. the Orient was "not so Islam as propagated by the media. Said notes that the Orientalist study ofIslam lags behind the Said's reading of Marx. even more. Lamartine surveys the Orient from virulent attack on contemporary Western representations ofIslam is also a similar position of assumed knowledge and portrays Oriental terri. his gated by academics. in Orientalism is now conceived not just as a discourse prevalent at the which he locates a contradiction between repugnance towards the treat. what it permits him to reveal about himself. Said moves away from literary operate. is precisely that his and the actual discovery of "decrepitude and senescence" (ibid. works such as Salammb6 set discussion glosses over differences between distinct types of Orientalist about reconstructing the image of Oriental glory. the in Afghanistan and Iran. Even more. Texts such as Rene and Atala. and contains a multitude of the Itineraire de Paris it Jerusalem. Nevertheless. Said superficial appropriation of multiple and distinct others into the broad notes Flaubert's self-consciousness and complexity. again an obstruction in the creation ofIsrael in 1948 and "a shadow that dogs the Oriental's voice and experience are of little importance. but Said nevertheless finds within of what Nandy might have dubbed "inferior knowledge': One of the it the repeated confrontation between the search for an exotic spectacle frequent criticisms levelled against Said. stereotyped. For Nerval. The critique of Flaubert. but underlines the exoticism of his the more recent cultural context.: journalistic text railing against the reductive and ignorant perception of 179). of continuity creates a powerful polemic against the destructive effects plex as to be difficult to summarize. Arabs. 88 understanding postcolonial ism foucault and said 89 . Said's at times to absorb and consume what he sees. the wars experience these limits as a source ofseduction and allure. to the author's desire misconceptions about the religion as well as its history. ages a synthetic view of how various types of Orientalist discourses In the final section of Orientalism. Flaubert's writing on the Orient is so rich and com. vision of the Orient and fails to draw attention to his subversive irony. but as a tradition ment of the exploited natives and the persistent belief in the historical and a doctrine affirming the superiority of the West that continues to necessity of Britain's transformation of Indian society. since the Second World War and in example allows Said to reveal the creeping of Orientalist beliefs even the wake of the Arab-Israeli wars.as the harbinger of progress can be found in his discussion of Marx. and it is seen as a sign of The exoticism ofnineteenth-century discourses on the Orient is con. erotic energy and discovery. Orient is a place of sexual intrigue. the locus of a mysterious and desir. Here again. and terrorism. or codified as lived in. It is none- to underplay the irony that pervades his writing: his knOwing depiction theless true that the overarching framework of Orientalism encour- of the Orientalist vision as both seductive and reductive. his expectations" (ibid. for example.: 185).: the association ofthat entity with hostility and fear. Equally. where the religion ism because they are far more aware ofthe limits of their knowledge. but is connected for many Americans solely with issues such as oil. a rather more tory as "'waiting anxiously for the shelter' of European occupation" (ibid. concept of Orientalist discourse is vast and generalized. Ahmad criticizes hold sway. For Chateaubriand. on the other hand. For Nerval and Flaubert. the Arab is increasingly and repeatedly into non-Orientalist. and that the If the notebooks betray disappOintment. but tends schema of the superior West pitted against the inferior East. particular historical moment of colonial expansion. Said criticizes the use of much grasped. reduced. what preserve of popular culture. developed just a few years later in Covering Islam (1981). exploited cliches and labels. however. At the same time. distinguishes him from criticism into a discussion of the prevalence of Orientalist discourse in Chateaubriand and Lamartine. Arabs are blamed for oil shortages.: 173). however. like discourse. and "what the Jew" (ibid. testify. appropriated. Said does trace shifts and variations as he works through his Nerval. but his argument is precisely that Orientalism is a associate the Orient with sexual desire. In this sense Nerval and Flaubert depart from orthodox Oriental. Even The Cambridge History ofIslam published in ideas. within both academe and the media. but continue according to Said to be propa- it allows his spirit to do. Orientalist images now are not only the matters about the Orient is what it lets happen to Chateaubriand. Flaubert and his characters Emma Bovary and Frederic Moreau series of examples. as well as 1970 is vague and methodologically flawed. arguing that the former paints a dismissive and rest ofthe human sciences in its retention of retrograde assumptions and reductive portrait of Marx's complex writing on India. This ignorance about 181). The Arab is also "the disrupter ofIsrael and the West's existence': Gerard de Nerval and Flaubert. injustice that many countries with oil reserves should be populated by jured most colourfully in Said's readings of Chateaubriand.

and it is the broad. however. "East" and 'West" are not silence the voices of the exploited and subjugated.The text of Orientalism tends to subsume its intricate examples into an that he describes and. however. it is not clear that and the Caribbean. and argues that Orientalism "examines the history of Western textualities about the non-West quite in isolation from how these textu- alities might have been received. However. This difficulty in turn problematizes the ques- ples of unreason. since Foucault's point was precisely to ity troubles his concept of an anti-colonial response. that does not really exist. subtleties and dislocations within individual instances of Orientalist Finally. homogenizing framework at the expense of potential drive towards occlusion as those he takes as the object of his critique. Said does not only can be seen to be representative of one thing. work. Moreover. and its or authentic feature of the Orient. challenged or over. "Orientalist" at once occludes some real that Derrida's critique of Foucault's Madness and Civilisation. identifiable culture or place. India. It is for this reason outside its own construction. whole chapter on narratives of resistance and proposes a subtle and talist discourse without discussing how those misrepresented by that informative understanding of "contrapuntal" textuality. and this ambigu- discourse theorized by Foucault. that it deforms and distorts a place and a people that actually what is far more striking is the persistence of outworn structures and exist. By the time of Culture rians drew our attention to the risk that academic discourse can speak and Imperialism. and he reminds us at the beginning of Orientalism talism. Culture and Imperialism thrown by the intelligentsias of the colonized countries" (1992: 172). Orientalists and their dissenters propose structures and modes of writ- A further difficulty with Said's analysis in Orientalism is that it does ing rather than mimetic representative forms that can encapsulate the not accord space to the natives' response. but Said himself criticizes Orien. as Orientalism did. This criticism discourse. indeed. approaches in modern forms of Orientalism. but examines a larger pattern attained a comfortable. Orient. an idea with no foundation tinuous sweep of the Orientalist vision that prevails. in 1993. although Orientalist discourse does mutate and develop. Said is clearly extremely well educated and on the Middle East. modified. that Said at times suggests that Orientalist discourse misrepresents the conversely. Nevertheless. Furthermore. con. then any suggested alternative would also be a construction of Orientalism's false unity can also be linked to the objection levelled and. and resistance is figured as a colonized country's elite. this later work no longer focuses exclusively of the book. this construction could and empirical. Bhabha denounces this false Orient. then some reference to an alternative. If Orientalism misconceives a real with ambivalence. the discourse of Orientalism is permeated representation that Said denounces. Orient as a single. and theorizes have been helpful. might equally be applied to Said. In this sense Said's Orientalism differs from the forms of ism concerning the notion of the "Orient" at its heart. At others. and risks occluding specific contextual differences in the not be taken necessarily as an accurate representation of the real. By now no work discourse might have answered back. with internal dissent. his analysis might be accused of the same all-consuming. accepted. Said addresses these questions. accepted position within the Western academy. and fabricates an image of a locus tendency to homogenize and separate discourses of reason from exam. As a result. corrected version might unity and smoothness in Said's portrayal of Orientalism. however. The and his identification with the marginalized and the disenfranchised can study includes writing on Africa. in discourses and representations of Europe's overseas territories. Australia be seen to have become a little tenuous. parts of the Far East. but also those of the configured into a stark binary opposition. The Subaltern Studies histo. Said implies that there is no "real" Orient. Said notes that 90 understanding postcolonialism foucault and said 91 . if the Orient is only ever a product of on the contrary the dislocations within Western culture. and sets out at once to expand and develop its scope. First. in his pOSition of exile Said appears to set himself up as a Culture and Imperialism was published a number of years after Orien- privileged observer. Just as reason cannot tion of whether or not there could be an alternative to the forms of exclude the irrational other. Young points out analyse discontinuities and ruptures within the larger system. although it would be significant and informative if this were pro- by more materialist critics that Said's analysis is insufficiently historical duced by a native rather than by the colonizer. Ahmad denounces this omission from Said's process of discursive negotiation and exchange. For Said. Both discourses examined. since the signifier applies only to a fantasy. that it was his experience of racism in America that fuelled the writing and to fill its gaps. and traces persistent tendencies to conceive these Said can distinguish himself from the producers of coercive discourse lands as the other of the metropolitan centre. there remains an underlying ambiguity in Oriental- discourse. Secondly. includes a in the place of the colonized other.

Similarly. who kept it going. colonialism was and reshape the imperial process of which they are necessarily a part the dominant ideology at the time of Kipling's upbringing. certainty Said found in Orientalist discourse. Said shows that Conrad's narrators are self-conscious: they For Said: worry about colonialism rather than buying into it without question. in his discussion ofJane Austen's Mans- is once again vast. records to be at once critical of and complicit with colonial discourse.estimonyto how imperialism functioned in British society at the foucault and said 93 92 understanding postcolonialism .rn with the The range of texts examined by Said in Culture and Imperialism utmost benevolence. Written at the quasi-official period of empire in gested. implies that it will at some point come to an end. who had the right to settle and neous complicity with and undermining of colonialism. Furthermore. While culture on onies. for his own part. the resistance finally won out" with itself. on another level Said asserts that narrative nevertheless shapes and reflects back ideas on material conditions and empirical events. is significant for Said because his work is time a t. politics and social Africa might be. and argues in The World. but when Conrad offers Said a particularly subversive example of a simulta- it came to who owned the land. and set out to blame those authors who reproduce aspects of colonial dis- even for a time decided in narrative. (Ibid. whereas the other would stress that its historical specificity also tan representations of the colonies. (1993: 28) issues. and at once progressive and reactionary. but turns out to be at war in the overwhelming majority of cases. but this is at the same proj ect. The text cannot help but empire as it is constructed in metropolitan society. In depicting Marlow's African journey in Heart ofDarkness. but a few arresting examples will be worth noting field Park Said argues that structures of domestic authority mirror the for their demonstration of a certain ambivalence towards the colonial colonial relation between Britain and Antigua. reproduce tions in its affiliation with both Indians and British. Said again departs from Foucault in this renewed atten. who won it back. Conrad emphasizes not only his adventures but also his telling of the tion to movements of resistance. Kipling genuinely considers context in which they are produced. but many of work on it.these issues were reflected. the main battle in imperialism is over land. course in their texts. and he had (ibid. and the contingency of the narrative suggests Critic (1984) that one of the deficiencies of Foucault's thinking is that that despite the impression given ofthe power of colonialism. Kipling's Kim expresses great affection for the native Indians but sup- Cultural narratives are in this sense not entirely divorced from the ports the colonial mission unquestioningly. and treating the. shows its contingency. the mechanics of empire depend on the idea of inevitably absorbed it as part of the status quo. tromo). nations themselves are narrations. As one critic has sug. (Said 1993: xii). and it is by means of reproduce this ideology. Conrad. In addition. of course. and who now Said's less provocative readings in Culture and Imperialism also do not plans its future . the Text. for example. and in this instance argues other than an Africa carved up into dozens of European col- specifically for the political inflections of narrative.he omitted to address the question of resistance in Orientalism. the story to British listeners. the British presence in India to function in the interests of the Indians tically quarantined from its worldly affiliations': and the novels that themselves. its illusions and tremendous violence and waste (as in Nos- Said at the same time develops his argument from Orientalism con. he permits his later readers to imagine something cerning the link between culture and politics..: xiii) India but also at the moment when its demise was becoming apparent. culture should not be "antisep. and becomes more one would perceive in it a depiction of sovereign imperialism at its attentive to the uncertainties and ambivalences operating in metropoli. While in Orientalism the implica. height. This awareness is limited to the specific situation and moment of the telling. His vision does not have the smooth affirms now that "there was always some form of active resistance and. he had little notion of what that one level retains relative autonomy from economics. Said argues of widespread resistance means that in this work Said both spends time that there are two possible postcolonial responses to Heart ofDarkness: reading the colonized's responses to colonialism. in Culture and Imperialism key figures such as Joseph Conrad are revealed since Conrad dates imperialism. even if. committed to living alongside the natives. In Said's words: tion was that a writer or thinker was either Orientalist or was not. and although his work appears to be riven with contradic- Said takes as his focus are shown quite manifestly to absorb. contested.: xv). even though its author was at the same time culture and narrative that that idea is developed and disseminated. and this anxiety hints at the unconscious presence of creeping doubts. that power the system of power it proposes is so all-encompassing.

the places of exclusion and invisibility.. Said states that "in having to take up animosity towards the colonial presence. which if followed into actual experience for end of the colonial epoch. and in the necessity ofunderstand. the kind this context to Chatterjee's observation that even as it set out to specify oftestimony that doesn't make it onto the reports" (2004: 81). Said notes Fanon's ambivalence towards nationalism. failed to see it as human experience" (Said [1978] 1995: 328). is not about separation and distinctiveness (1993: 408). and yet Camus continued Said's embrace of cultural mixing is rooted in his ethical resistance to to believe paSSionately in harmony and communion with the Arabs. but the works are necessarily attention to the human experience of Palestinians. even though the novel tries at a position of irreducible opposition to a region ofthe world it considered the same time to underplay signs of a deeper conflict between colonizer alien to its own. in The Question ofPalestine (1979) retains as one ofits goals the call for tive of the colonized and the oppressed. This complicity becomes highly fraught with only a moment are quickly left behind" (Said 1993: 407). since ostensibly anti-colonial writers at times model their clusion of Culture and Imperialism similarly suggests that "human life" works on colonial and metropolitan texts. part of the natural order of things. and surely himself. Orientalism failed to identify with human experience. At the end of Orientalism. Writers such as that is constantly overlooked (1981: 135). or Muslim.time. however: it suggests the restoration of an unde- ing the porosity of cultural frontiers in the wake of colonialism. or American are no given.usten reveals her. and perhaps. in both senses of the word) subaltern while their work is conditioned by their upbringing within the importance ofan empire to the situation at home" (Said 1993: 106). Other forms of ambivalence are found in texts by indig. as Guha. More militantly. He formulates the ethical requirement it theorizes the production of narratives of resistance. The humanist perspective is also denounced of agency. whereby the dominant self defines the other by was for Said "a moral man in an immoral situation': utterly defined by means of the hegemonic discourse and uses that definition to tyrannize France's mission in Algeria and lost when the validity of that mission the other and restrict his or her freedom. nationalism borrowed its ethic from the to the notion of the human clearly has an ethical function here. Said's endeavour Algeria because it is his homeland. indeed. E. like Kipling or even· in this work is to demonstrate precisely that "no one today is purely one Austen. since in influence of the power it set out to overthrow. Controversially. again. Tayeb Salih's Season ofMigra. must excavate the silences. and he does note the paradoxical role of intellectuals such for its evident androcentrism: it is a category that tends to be equated 94 understanding postcoloniaJism foucault and said 95 . Said constructed subject position. The con- enous authors. Even the more militant analysis these subversively rework the original in order to represent the perspec. from Derrida's critique of Foucault). and its universalism has been perceived as does not examine how the subaltern might come to achieve a position somewhat empty and banal. is a problematic one. Labels like Indian. even though he lived at the tail more than starting-points. to the other not only testimonies oflocal anti-colonialism but signs ofdissent within as internally multiple and hybridized. and also refers in barely surviving groups. M. and yet 'i\. Camus of resistance as working both within and against imperialist modes of inherited uncritically beliefs that the French belong in North Africa. the world of memory. 1his argument serves not. Forster's A Passage to India portrays Indian humanity.: 210). Said was thrown into question (ibid. Finally. recognizing the humanity of the other. and colonized. then distances himselffrom any passing de constructive influence even as One of the distinctions of Culture and Imperialism is nevertheless that he draws on some of its methods. Camus clings to (perhaps. who simultaneously want to attend to the self to be assuming (just as Fanny assumes. Despite these difficulties. or woman. Austen's depiction may contain irony. and conceives opposition between colonizer and colonized and the establishment of a anew form of humanism based on openness to other cultures: "human- new form of history that would bridge the gap between black and white. and in this sense his work learns from poststructuralism even though history was beginning to overtake him. representation. in terms of a belief in a common metropolitan texts. born in Algeria. The term beliefin ongoing cultural interaction. the posthu- "contrapuntal" in their engagements with both sides. ism . mously published Humanism and Democratic Criticism argues that it is Fanon is heralded as a thinker who calls for the destruction of the binary possible to criticize humanism in the name of humanism. He an ontology of mastery. This return the difference of the colonized. of itinerant. the start of the Algerian War of Independence. and Said explores that we remain open to the other's difference and. he grew up believing that the colonial presence was simply a thing. Said's aim is to outline a broad notion Said's reading of Camus equally shows how. an elite. and in Covering tion to the North mirrors Conrad's Heart ofDarkness. however. and Gesaire's Une Islam Said laments that it is specifically the "human dimension" of Islam Tempete is evidently a rewriting of the Shakespeare play.. the self no longer conceives that to undermine the gesture of resistance but to support Said's overriding other as an object but as self-creating and endlessly developing.

Said's ongoing privileging of writers such as Austen do not take into account sufficiently the ways the intellectual equally accords the latter a special status that could be in which women writers related differently to the dominant discourse seen to be at odds with his claimed emancipatory universalism. There of imperialism. is a ethics" implicit in colonialism's "inferior knowledge". Said does not dwell on this on the human is necessarily inseparable from his comfortable POSI- at length himself. Although philosophers such as Fanon and tion and reification.ds notion of human. anti-colonial writers such He has been criticized for not himself examining colonial discourse. nevertheless. the drive to penetrate the uses the examples of madness.with "man" and excludes "woman': The human is a notion that has been necessitates an understanding of the other in ethical terms. it is worth noting in passing that his work has in fact had a a common humanity demands an awareness of the basic requirements considerable influence on gender studies within postcolonialism. and implies an understanding of the residue or Nandy emphasized the colonizer's image of the sexually potent black the excess that lies beyond the scope of those gestures of oppression man or the virile Indian native. but reta:n~ a c~ous Despite the risk of androcentrism in Said's use of the notion of the merit here in its desperate call for an ethical response. Orientalism is the academic study of the Finally then. In addition. exploration of the native's resistance. the prison system and SexualIty to colony via its seductive and alluring females. and later of unveiled women in erotic Key points poses often displaying their breasts for the pleasure of the viewer. Sru. as a result at once of this sexual violence and of this fetishized mode of • Said draws explicitly on Foucault in his exposition of Oriental- representation. The conception of Oriental other. and the advantages of the term are indeed that it difference. collection of colonial postcards of North African women. The analysiS is also dis~c­ but in Said's use of this concept there is also. a more developed examination of the position of women in colonial • Culture and Imperialism expands on Orientalism by examining a discourse and postcolonial theory. Said's humanism lacks the militancy of that of Fanon or subsequent thinkers to develop their understanding of the particular Sartre. 96 understanding postcoionialism foucauit and said 97 . is hinted at in Said's work show how discourse can serve to prop up relations of subjugation. an urgent tive because it draws out the ambivalence towards the colomal can for recognition of a shared freedom and a shared communality in project of writers such as Conrad: Kipling ~d Camus. and Alloulas analysis explores the colonizer's overt obsession with the Oriental harem. The postcards of veiled women. crucially. but it is clear that his work has prOvided a theoretical is nevertheless in his persistent and daring tenacity with regard to the backdrop against which the representation of colonized women can be concept of the human a crucial and influential alternative to the ''bad assessed. testify to the male colonizer's desire for sexual as wen as territorial possession. but his thinking is also deeply humanist. his work paves the way for Orient that supports the West's dominance over the East. Ori. and it has been observed that his readings of female tion within Western academic discourse. but it is also a set of images or a way of thinking about the Said's retention of the notion of the human. as Assia Djebar set out to recreate the image of the colonized woman but his methodology is highly relevant to postcolonialism. and further explored by Alloula. but also the exoticist fantasy of the Oriental woman's the other as human functions as an antidote to Orientalist objectifica- mysterious sexual allure. " defiance of colonial structures of power and knowledge. for example. Circumspection is undoubtedlynec. His pos~­ his demand for universal emancipation together with his celebration of colonial humanism calls for an ethical awareness of the other s "contrapuntal" mixing. Malek Alloula's The Colonial Harem (1987). • Foucault explores the relation between power and knowledge: and The role of sexuality in the colonial project. ject constructed and disseminated in language. despite the risk of a latent androcentrism lingering in Orient. and he perhaps never solves the problem that his perspecti~e oppression of women by the colonial gaze. A deeply flawed Said recommends constant attention to the contrapuntal meet- concept. ist discourse. broader range of colonial territories and. the human still serves Said as a basis on which to construct ing of cultures. This human- criticized for its dissimulation offeminine experience beneath the mask ism remains oddly unheeding of deconstructive conceptio~s of the ~ub­ of a discourse that refers ostensibly to men. Said's concept of Orientalism allowed and tyranny. For Said. of freedom and of the ability to create oneself independent of imposed entalist discourse involved not only the reductive drive to "know" the structures of mastery and imperialist knowledge. by including essary in regenerating the concept of humanity as an ethical category.

encourages us to ask how postcolonial philosophy might both accom- sop~cal ~adition and its configuration of self and other may have a plish the philosophical gesture of abstraction or universalization. the achieve- ment of these thinkers is not only the application of Levinasian ethics The postcolonial thinkers discussed so far have all articulated a clear set to postcolonial debate but a deeper questioning of the nature of post- of political goals and have tended to tie their writing to some form of colonial philosophy. tation of particular reginIes. but the creation of a postcolonial ethics. and acceptance of.. Derrida exceed the boundaries of established discourses: those of colonialism. Derrida and Bhabha do not analyse the specifics direct political activism. conceptualize differently the creation of that relation tlrrough language. Bhabha also sketches a new concep- any case write after the decolonization of many overseas territories in tion of "theory': and suggests that marginalized subjectivities precisely the 1950s and 1960s). Indeed. language and the "politics" of representation. they interrogate the structure of thinking behind ~gures. and Bhabha invite their readers to question assumptions of Euro. moreover. Yet within the series of think. unlike the work of militants such as Fanon and attend to the singularities that were occluded precisely by that gesture of Sartre. the objective is not political liberation (Derrida and Bhabha in assimilation in the colonial context. other although Bhabha engages only fleetingly with Levinas. They deconstruct the mastery of the subject and the assimilation or rejection of the other by the dominant discourse. but be both historically grounded on some level and. Derridean philosophy is deeply indebted to Levinasian ethics. and it for the specific experiences of Algerians. Derrida and subordinates other cultures. and IS to this more "textualist" postcolonialism that this chapter will turn for the infinitely singular responses of distinct subjects. the philosopher himself This means that pean hegemony. his thought learns from the latter's conceptions of Infinity and alterity in turn and postcolonial ethics via Derrida. respond to violence by undermining the totalitarianism of a certain type of metaphysics and by conceiving the relation between beings as the necessary confronta- tion with. but postcolonial critique must ~~rrounding theIr degree ofpolitical efficacy will be examined later. and in this sense their work is more properly Jo~alism. and they insist on an ethical relation of openness to mobile and potentially intractable forms of difference. These latter ventionally involves abstraction from the concrete and the construction philosop~ers do. This analysis of the Western philo. indeed of Algerian Jews. philosophical than that of those who investigate historically the explOi- tonography a militant political agenda. crucially. denounces is one that subsumes the other into an apparently universal- ics of colonial exploitation in Algeria or India but the structure of the ized framework. which positions the European subject at the centre the belief that colonial culture can assimilate native practices. the very ethnocentric gesture that Derrida of Western metaphysics. In moving away from militant or activist postcolonialism. plurality or the unknowable. and Foucault and the Subaltern Studies Collective gave his. potentially. Derrida raises ~rs ou~ed so far it is nevertheless possible to discern an increasing the question of whether such a universalizing analysis can account both ~terest III culture. and political dinIension but. and the colonial mission also in practical terms rests on Western episteme. In this sense they help to think tlrrough the shift identified by David Scott in Refashioning Futures (1999) between the moment of five . Philosophy con- via an-exploration of Jacques Derrida and Romi Bhabha. a heterogeneous process 98 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 99 . like Levinas. although the controversy of universals that transcend the specific. and Derrida and Bhabha: self. Both philosophers. to rethink the relation between self and other and to "theory" itself must be a force of questioning. not overlook the political. however. nationalism and. decolonization and postcolonial ethics. Sartre and Said both combined academic work with political colonialism in general. At the same time. Derrida and Bhabha target not the mechan. engaged It IS nonetheless indisputable that their postcolonial critique is directed with the singular marginalized subjects that colonial thinking precisely not so much against individual reginIes as against the ethnocentrism set out to oppress. Fanon and Gandhi were major revolutionary of any given reginIe.

in the collapse of colonial ideology as ple is Levi-Strauss's Tristes tropiques (1976). It is important. (1976: 10) his most sustained treatment ofthis subject matter is The Monolingualism ofthe Other. 1. on a separation of speech and writing that is ethnocentric. although he presence. ethnocentrism and colonialism ated and perfectly captured. but that scepticism towards apparent hierarchies and institutional divisions was . and "the West': and excludes and denies the cultural others that it cannot passed the agregation in 1956. as a result. This phonetic writing assumes that speech is primary. and immediacy. moments of disturb~c~ th~t uns~t­ that "the West" ignores or leaves out. until much later in his career. technological. Eventually returning to school in 1944. unravel a certain myth oflanguage as the Signifier of presence. into a family ofAlgerian and writing then mimics or follows speech.c~ntrol ov. This gesture is associated with the dis. that Logocentrism offers an illusion of presence. the Nambikwara of Brazil. and economic adventure of the West. He visited Harvard University. ''other'' allusions within them.er despite this initial reticence about Algeria. near Algiers. when the Vichy government from Plato to Hegel. is not only to World War. He then went to the Lycee to show that this is an ideology that both predominates specifically in Louis-Ie-Grand in Paris. clarmmg ~ turn. but do not upset his pnvilegrng o! Its cept that must be undermined and denounced for its false self-presence rule. rather than a claim for "Western" concept oflanguage as associated with the voice.by th~ colom~ that could be conceived as "postcolonial': Here Derrida explores the presence and its distribution of printed texts but. with its reach. completed contain. Derrida's the supplementary traces accompanying the main thrust ofphilosophical endeavour will be to supplement logo centric philosophy with an ethical discourses. and passed his baccalaureat in 1948.1' of ethical and potentially political contestation. unassimilable meanrngs that lie beyond beginning. Derrida asserts that in Saussure's work. finished his thesis and went on to publish an intro- duction to Husserfs The Origin of Geometry in 1962. in which he s~arly s. Indeed. These interruptions are unruly traces of an otherness that reSIdes and assumed security. and with a demand for increased attention to the other phonetic are seen as interruptions. Derrida locates this privileging of the logos ill phil~sophers was traumatically excluded for two years. Of Grammatology and Writing and Difference entific. and escaped it. sci- Speech and Phenomena. tle the transparency of the logos. it can be argued that poststructuralist beyond the reach of a clearly "Western" des. as if to signify . for example. His purpose. rn spIte of Itself. and the decentring of those discourses through attention to call for attention to the Infinity it claims to totalize. Derridas next exam- already rooted in postcoloniality. and goes on to trace its development ill Saus- deprived Algerian Jews of their French citizenship during the Second sure. the medium of the great metaphysical. this 100 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 101 . He went to school at the local college and then lycee. then on to the Ecole Normale Superieure. and he reveals this as both deluded and ethnocentrIC. For Derrida: his military service. The major works phonetic writing. however. self-presen~e secure knowledge. but precisely an Strauss analyses the "society without writing" (Derri~a 1976: . Derrida was born in 1930 in EI Biar. and the process of importing its laws upon the cultural areas that indeed his own upbringing in Algeria. Logocentrism is the affirmation of presence ~ l~guage: it names ~e privileging of phonetic writing. To translate this into the terms of Levinasian ethics. he read French phil. but ~y traces of the non- ethnocentrism. were published in 1967. but also osophy. Derrida's work has always been concerned with alterity. Deconstruction is not a privileging of a specifically "Western" conception of wnting. but Derrida argues that this analySIS relies its conceptual and cultural alterity. published as recently as 1996. LeVl- just an unravelling of"philosophica1 thought" in general. to Signify Jews.109) . Derrida did not explicitly address the question of colonialism. itselfa con. in which meanmg 1$ apparentlyunmedi- Derrida. since it depends on the controlling ~r~sen~e of the sp~ak~r. "The West" is. and Margins ofPhilosophy followed quickly in is limited in space and time and limits itself even as it is in 1972. Levi -Stra~ss Of Grammatology is lone of Derrida's first works to offer a critique argues that the tribe's authentic oral culture is occl~ded. however. Levi-Strauss and Rousseau.e~s announced by the atrocities of the Algerian war. the spoken mantling ofthe hegemony of "Western" philosophy and its self-deluding language is coupled with phonetic writing. but Derrida argues that this ideology fails ~o admit I~S own Slt- decentring have nevertheless been "central" to Derrida's thought from the uatedness and the intractable.ire for p~es~nce. notions of excentricity and meaning.Saussure is at pains to relegate to the margrns.of overturning of "Western thought': its denial ofits hidden supplements.

rigorous political critique. This process is then itself subject "to reduce difference to a play through which the subject of Western to mythologization. ference. differance. Levi-Strauss refuses to conceive of "drawing lines" as a form of Derrida's implication here is that anthropology. Derrida again speech. while devoted to the study of the other. and singularities. writing. is to begin to think the lure. tivity" (2000: 158). and consequently. Levi-Strauss also relies Furthermore. to its intricacies by naively distinguishing it from the supplementary structure ofwriting. denies no ethics without the presence of the other. and that his practice as an anthropologist instead resembles prevents the marginalized from forming a distinct community as a "bricolage": the use of various instruments of analysis without the posit. Derrida begins by identifying the persistent "centre" that of critics to backfire. the work is seen to be structures the "Western" episteme. which is itself beyond the reach of the links between Derridean philosophy and actual colonial regimes. has relied on the "West. has difficulty in remaining open to that other. although this centre is always in tension to the colonial policy of assimilation. the collapse of empire and the effects of that collapse on metaphysics. makes all forms of oppres- two ways: it can continue to pursue its own centre. a play constituted on the basis of a fundamental colonial thinkers such as Parry have little patience with the convolutions immobility and a reassuring certitude. without its difficulties. Haddour complains that ing of an originary ground or centre. and will emerge expli- citly in my discussions of Bhabha. I shall return to this question of Derrida's cept of centred structure is in fact the concept of a play based on a politics shortly. investigations of other cultures. Khatibi and Spivak. ParadOxically. of play" (Derrida 1978: 279). of the alterity.critique hinges on the very privileging of the logos central to Western search entirely in favour of an embrace of the play of signs. Dissemination is even. Sign matology and Writing and Difference can be read as a new response to and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences" in Writing and Dif. "the con. and the universalism ofDerrida's with the "play" that escapes it. and although it grounds thought it disengaged from colonial politics and inadequate to the demands of a also remains outside the structure it creates. without absence. akin ern" construction of a centre. and postcolonial critique and. the first thinkers to explore the links between Derridean deconstruction tutes a denial of the trace. Young is one of An adherence to a narrow. or relinquish that sion appear the same. Interpretation as a result can proceed in thinking at the same time. detour. the self-supporting fabrication of its idiom. by a specifically European privileging of mastery and self-presence in in the "White Mythology" (in Margins of Philosophy). to deconstruct the very structures that shape and define "Western" however. the very science of the writing. but the analysis allows Derrida to show that anthro. and also conserves the immediacy and self-presence of speech other. This erosion of specific differences then an illusion. and has repeatedly relied on foundations conceived The upshot is a fantasized vision of the Nambikwara's innocence fuelled by the ethnocentric anthropologist and not the object of enquiry. restricted conception of speech consti. metaphysics is constituted is to deny difference its agency and subjec- pology. in so doing. develops this charge of ethnocentrism and broadens it further Derrida's early intervention into the question of postcolonialism is not. ever. a fixed origin. Once again. and has been conceived by a number thought. "Structure. problematically. and suggests that the insistence on play obscures specific differences. There is the originary and centred status of its discourse and. This centre serves to give thought excessively "textualisC in the sense that the reflection on language is a point of presence. symbol of resistance to the imposed culture. how. asserts that the inauguration of This ties in with the "Western" myth of the certainty and hegemony of poststructuralism was not the upheavals of May 1968 but the Algerian the logos. Derrida argues that "Western" metaphysics has systematically effaced the eth- to recognise writing in speech. thought. dissemination. In the course of his researches. 102 understanding postcoionialism derrida and bhabha 103 . indeed. but for the moment it is worth noting that Marxist post- fundamental ground. Up to a point. according to Haddour. The impact of Derrida's initial deconstruction of ethnocentrism on (1976: 139-40) postcolonialism is significant and wide-ranging. War of Independence. White mythology claims the absence of speech. Levi-Strauss later finds that this mythical "centre" is necessarily such as those of the colonized. In the most general terms. From this point of view. texts such as Of Gram- Derrida's other important reading of Levi-Strauss. Later. that structures all writing. Azzedine Haddour offers a detailed critique of Derrida's on this concept of a centre as he persists in seeking to systematize his deconstructive gestures in OfGrammatology and Dissemination (1981). Derrida's conclusion is that: undermines the self-created security of the "Western" episteme. that is to say the differance and nocentric origin and myth on which it rests.

: 23). And he does not have exclusive (2002). that is. is it unique in its brutal institutionalization of a generalized experience? nialism operates within the very language of philosophy. Language always that Jewishness is at no point conceived as the name for an identifiable suppresses without extinguishing alterity. Derrida signals that the colonizer ops this critique in The Protestant Ethnic and the Spirit of Capitalism too is alienated: "the master is nothing. and secondly that Derrida retains a rather facile association possession when the Vichy government forced them to perceive that between logo centrism and the West. Derrida on one level sets out to ences serve as an example of a broader conceptual phenomenon. At the same time. it is not "writing" risks elevating the term to the status of a transcendental mine" to evoke the Algerian Jews' specific sense of alienation and dis- signifier. to the imply sameness. Postcolonial philosophy demands both that specific colonial experi- In The Monolingualism of the Other. which tends. the ideogram" (Chow Jews during the Second World War.if Of Grammatology contains a persistent blindness towards Eastern relation between language and sovereignty. their culture and language did not belong to them. just as Western metaphysics blindly occludes non-European alienated. is seen in the apparently self. Consequently it cusses Chinese writing in the first part of the text. The universalism of this argument serves IfDerrida discusses the specific experience of Algerian Jews in The to undermine the colonizer's claim to mastery. in spite of its shortcomings. and related to popu. Derrida may be drawing attention to the "sovereignty whose essence is always colonial. however. those who claim hegemony. to reduce language to the One. Derrida repeats the refrain "I only have one language. lar stereotypes surrounding the "inscrutable Chinese': Consequently. The hegemony of the homogeneous" (1998: 39-40). since it reminds us Monolingualism of the Other. experiences of a particular group of people. the text deliberately asks more questions thinking but. however. con- nial culture brings material violence. used his position to deny his own alienation and to concretize difference. for the most part may never be possible to "inhabit" or "possess" a language and. The tyranny of colo. moreover. and Derrida denounces the and determinate community. it is at the same time important that no speaker possesses his language and culture. Moreover. Derrida argues that this dispossession in a traumatic manner when the Vichy government Chinese is not phonetic but ideographic but. repres. Derrida's analysis here is clearly grounded in the specific con. Derrida however. explains that if he has not frequently mentioned his Judaism in his text of the Algerian Jews and explores the community's loss of French philosophy. that that example announces itself as distinct from the law it never- ines the alienation in language experienced by all speakers. And although he fleetingly dis. although fundamentally the other. But the Algerian Jews experienced ing a certain boundary between East and West. he fails to consider the role and position of the East. fautre" (2003). possession of anything" (ibid. the critique of ethnocentrism than it answers: is Algeria only an example of a universal difficulty. In short. In moving between these dimensions of the universal These observations and criticisms add useful nuance to Derrida's and the particular. the determination of a resistant cultural collective. Spivak notes first that Derrida's conception of ism. Derrida is guilty of categorizing and glossing over to consider the ways in which the colonizer. this is because he belongs without belonging to both Jewish derrida and bhabha 105 104 understanding postcolonialis. beings to language and a historically grounded discussion of Algerian coincident or transparent form of the graphic. Derrida's text shifts nervously between the universal Derrida retains "a rhetorical essentialism whereby the East is typecast and the specific. In a more form the oppressiveness of any language and culture.m . In exploring that shift. that of the other. or is that extrapolation a cultures. but it also reveals in condensed taminated by Christian culture and internally fragmented. according to Chow. and argues that Of Grammatology oddly insists on maintain. In this way. guage they had thought was theirs. he asks us 2002: 63). between a conceptual reflection on the relation of all as difference. Algerian Jews were at the same time cut off from Jewish culture. Can the philosopher extrapolate from Algeria to theorize about the . despite their monolingual- translator's preface. including theless helps to elucidate. the later exploration of colonialism in The Monolingualism betrayal of Algeria's uniqueness? How do Algerian Muslims fit in with of the Other appears as more acutely self-conscious concerning the Derrida's discussion of Algerian Jews and colonialism more broadly? difficulties of its own urge towards philosophical universalization. a difference that. indeed. but this sharing does not sively and irrepressibly. and deconstruct the ethnocentrism of any "sovereign" language and exam. Rey Chow devel. as we saw in the discussion of Sartre. recent essay on Jewishness entitled 'i\braham. Spivak offers a more specific critique of Of Grammatology in her citizenship under the Vichy government. or remains influential to postcolonialism because it suggests that colo. this demonstrated in practical terms their non-belonging within the lan- conception of the Chinese language is mythical.

by a knowable individual.: 73). this further troubles the notion that the with the result that that singularity once again. the spe- The Jews were the community who were specifically excluded under cific and the singular. so as to trouble his urge the Algerian· Jewish community a false determinism that would once towards universalization. however. The turn to this raises further questions about the status of the universal. paradoxically. and his 1998: 70). authorial voice. The singular ''1'' ofDerrida's own autobiographical project. The text is haunted by singular traces of the writer's "self': but include discussion of the French oppression of Algerian Muslims and which the writer can never catch up with and encapsulate. although he To return to The Monolingualism of the Other. Derrida subverts both the gesture of philosophical generalization and tion of postcolOnial critique. moreover. he who appears to be the of an authorial subject position that would over-determine him. exemplarity is nevertheless an exemplary characteristic of Jewishness. specific historical moment. but universal. the one text in which Derrida does signals its traps. The text demonstrates in this way the contradictory demands the "I" also. so that least Jewish is in fact the most Jewish. autobiography is an anxious expression of resistance to the universaliza. traps of totalization and determinism that colonial discourse set for the cal statement. Derrida here too uncovers at the same time the aporia between the need to present that problematizes and moves beyond both the universal and the specific experience as unique and its exemplification and concretization of the with a call for attention to a singular autobiographical subject. In drawing attention to the alienation brought about at a undermines the gesture of philosophical neutralization by incorporat. Derrida pinpoints the specific in his reflection on the situation of Algerian Jews at the same particular experience of the Algerian Jews in being dispossessed of time problematizes and disseminates that specificity. endeavours at self-exploration. however. reveals instead the master's hidden contingency and alienation. Indeed. and the statement suggests once more that all speakers fail to pos. In its curious and irresolute shifting between the universal. the work begins with the confession "I Monolingualism ofthe Other displays the tension between "theory" itself only have one language': but the first person is already distinguished and the necessity for a form of writing that does not fall into the same from any authorial voice because the quotation is set up as a hypotheti. analysed and unravelled in turn by a second apparently colonized. Jewishness cannot be manifested the text is condemned to a constant and paradoxical movement against or claimed in an exemplary way. Finally. explores the traumas the marginalized but culturally diverse speakers of that language. Derrida broader law. their citizenship and of a sense of belonging in language. then. The Monolingualism of the Other provocatively colonialism in Algeria.culture and religion. Once again. moreover. this raises the question of back into the universalist structure that the fleeting autobiographical the dynamic interplay between the law and the example. Derrida's singularity. is necessarily depersonalized. The In a further twist. '1et all my specters loose" (ibid. Derrida's recourse to the Signalled this universal dispossession. but express the intermittent anxieties of a Although revealing for a reflection on the open-ended community of fragmented. Derrida's postcolonialism undermines the colonizer's explore his own Judaism. It is "an account of what will have of individuation that refuses positionality or the location of a theoretical placed an obstacle in the way of this auto-exposition for me" (Derrida norm. Nevertheless. but Derrida also refuses the identification by diaspora and dispersal. the fragmented musings of "Circonfession" erroneous claim to possess his language and either to assimilate or reject (Circumfession) (in Bennington & Derrida 1993). becomes singular ''1'' of Derrida's persona can be pinned down in language. ghostly "1': which in turn theorizes its evacuation from the Judaism. sess their language. What might have been read as an autobiographical narrative ofDerrida's own experience of disp0ssession turns out to fall derrida and bhabha 107 106 understanding postcolonialism . but this resistance to the claiming of each stance it adopts. and of the mother's death and of circumcision while making the identifica. Derrida also refuses to accord ing scattered musings on his own singular past. For this reason. Having tion of a clear subject position impossible. however. these musings are not produced again tyrannize and totalize the singular differences of distinct Jews. of postcolonialism and the tensions inherent in the philosophical con- ity. Derrida's analysis somewhat problematically does not exegesis. however. since Derrida references set out to problematize. The analysis of colonialism requires argues that Jewishness is defined by a resistance to communitarianism. On one level. templation of the limits of colonial or totalizing thinking. but the text also never fully encapsulates the examination of a historical specificity further in his pursuit of a form the singular "I" of the enunciation. but their specificity lies in the absence of questions the practice of postcolonial philosophy and self-consciously any claim for specificity. at the same time. acquires a certain philosophical general. a resistance to the universal.

since it perceives the text's closure at the same time as it ethically sible: Levinas's attempt to write an ethical philosophy dellles the ethICal searches beyond that apparently enclosed framework of meaning. precisely because it troubles any poten- is divided against itself in both belonging to logo centric conceptuality tial systematization and uncovers the Saying beneath th~ see~g~y and achieving the breakthrough beyond that conceptuality" (Critchley rational philosophical account.erges ten- ing and Difference. philosophical propositions. Derrida discovers that Levinas's "infinitely other" fol~s ~ on reading practice carried out across Derrida's works consists in an ethical itself. If the Said names the text's ostensible content. physics turns out to presuppose the transcendental phenomenology~at with the chains of associations that proliferate beneath the work's arti. however. it set out to overturn. this ethical writing remains at one remove 108 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 109 . smce ifbemg of the writing. in interrogating would reduce the text to the rule of the Same). The Monolingualism of the Other and "Violence and MetaphysICS Derrida offers several specific readings of Levinas. "Violence and Metaphys- and colonialism is undertaken in the name of ethics. perceived. Levinas's own meta- This conception of an encounter with the text's openness or Infinity. or an opposition at odds with the original thought. Derrida's own reading is in a sense Simon Critchley. voc~bul~y with the potentially infinite meanings that linger beneath the surface of "scission" or division between the Same and the Other. and in an interview in Alterites he affirms: "before ordinary gift lies in his meticulous.os- ing. attentive readings both of himself a thought like that of Levinas. » content and the traces that exceed that content. proposals. Ethics emerges performatively m thIS 1992: 30). The text is conceived as a discourse in the Levinasian is divided it must also be at once Same and Other. my translation). I am ready and of the other. "a cl6tural reading analyses a text in terms of how it still faithful to Levinasian ethics. Derrida nevertheless goes on to explain that this does not mean that he thinks in It is perhaps already apparent that Derrida's critique of ethnocentrism exactly the same way as Levinas and. Derrida explores Levinas's rejection physics but also in his very reading strategies. Importantly. he proceeds to argue that Levinas in fact himself relies on a traces. and Heideggerian being does not have the mastery Levinas appear to work against its apparent assertions is called cl6tural read. Rather. For precepts it supports. It IS not confrontation with the other's discourse and a rigorous engagement infinitely other. For Derrida. but performs that ethics in the other. Nevertheless. I never have any objection. Deconstruction is not of the metaphysics of Heideggerian ontology and its neutralization of just an engagement with Levinasian ethics. This reading practice devoted to the aspects of the text that violence. Levinas's own language turns against him in forcing a rupture space of encounter and a forum for the pursuit of multiple allusions. Derrida rejects Levinas's. then. then Levinas. the traces of meaning that linger behind Levinas's overt ethics not only by means of the deconstruction of ethnocentric meta. nor a method . however. This philosophy attentive to otherness IS also not cates Levinas's position in Totality and Infinity and works against the a critique. since 'oeing other than itself. Levinas's relation with Husserl and the former's insistence on the Infinity ers text meanings produced and imposed from the outside. First. that an ethically aware philosophy does not set up secure famously with the essay "Violence and Metaphysics" published in Writ. It is clear that. and the opposition sense. Dernda fice. ethics in purely Levinasian te:ms is imP. Derrida's reading practice is precisely concerned neither simply certain ontology in his understanding of the relation with the other. Heideggerian ontology does not lillply ethical of the Said. this reading itselfboth expli. indeed. the ceived by Levinas and that. Having worked through this engagement with Heidegger. that being is not in Heidegger the anonymous prmople per- Derrida works away at the proliferating possibilities of the Saying. on one level. IfDerndas extra- by Levinas's thought. Derrida's readings in this way explore both the text's primary reading encounter rather than by means of philosophical expositio~. indeed. implying a process of judgement. then argues that Heidegger's thought is in reality not so far ~ro~ that of ments of the Said. the of alterity. beginning most suggest. its careful attention to the other's text and in its teasing out of hidden however.or . text's grain.system. then. Next. tatively via reading. Derrida is wholly persuaded but a sort of unfolding that must remain incomplete. in that it is not the communication of a specified message but a collapses. Moreover. Derrida's ethics and politics to subscribe to everything he says" (1986: 74. ontology commands ~e respe~ of traces of meaning that are not controlled and determined by the grasp the other for what he is. etc:' (1978: 185). nor to read into the oth. Therefore. Derrida ics" also explores what might be conceived according to the later notion has always been committed to exploring and developing Levinasian of the Saying. it is not what it is. Returning to the relation with Heidegger. can also be seen as an exploration of the Saying behind the state. but either self-consciously ques~ons itself or em. to repeat the premises of the original (this would not be ethical since it The face of the other is also a body and a being.

Ethics names the rize the aporia clearly in this context. In Adieu offers an ethical critique of ethnocentrism. but that. Levinas obliges us to continue to requirements. and yet they must be thought alongside European memory and a sense of communal identity. ta philon). Ethics and politics are radically distinct. even though he insists that they be seen to inform Derrida's postcolonialism. but some conception of a has been the subject of much controversy. of rationality is indispensable to the politi. Derrida's work contains an impasse but there is no democracy without 'the community of friends' (koina and fails to negotiate the treacherous path between ethics and politics. modes of reflection. sover. Politics. the formation of a working community. and would work riers.. For Critchley (1992). but politics rests aporia-fracturing concepts such as hospitality and democracy. conceive this unconditional ethics even as we contemplate the political ing of the European community but severed by the contrasting demands position of the stranger. This absence ity (2000). Derrida's analysis of Europe of hospitality contains an aporetic split. Ethics. More broadly. anti-colonial resistance strategy. In this way Derrida suggests that Levinas's concept In The Other Heading (1992). Once again. Derrida for stabilizable. In On Hospital- that he conceives as the foundation for colonial thinking. even of ethics and politics. unthinkable for him. representable subjects. engagement with infinity in discourse and an open-ended confrontation but a political resistance movement at the same time would rely on the with alterity. even ifhe does not theo- must nevertheless be thought alongside one another. Such a coherent absolute. An ethical anti-colonial critique commitment to the form of reading summarized above: it is the patient requires an awareness of the singularities that exceed the colonial law. According to Morag Patrick shared culture and. citizenship and the in turn can help to inform our understanding of his postcolonialism. and for Derrida works attempts to engage with both levels. or practical conditions and functioning ethics that he retains as his priority. on the other hand. (1997). to Emmanuel Levinas Derrida further elucidates Levinas's concept of eign language. and that every decision glosses over Derrida goes on to argue that democracy works as an (ethical) critique the singular possibilities excluded by its remit Geoffrey Bennington of totalitarianism because it privileges the differences between its par. demands infinite openness. but it also relies on a political notion of community: "there achievement is to inscribe alterity into the heart of political reflection. without identifiable. (2000) concedes that Derrida is not an activist but insists that his ticipants. but the disjunction between them against the openness necessary for ethical thought Returning to the is one that the analysis struggles to smooth over.imself. So an ethical notion of Europe is one that The aporetic structure of Derrida's thinking on politics and ethics explores its permeability and incompletion. question of Derrida's contribution to postcolonialism. then. Derrida separates the ethical "law" of hospitality. become irrational (1992: 79). we find that he Derrida's later Writing on Levinas similarly displays this leap. all equal" (1997: 22). This duality can this reason separates politics and ethics. Responsibility requires both that we conserve opposed. Many of Derrida's more politically oriented works explicitly theorize whereas the laws of hospitality are built on workable codes and practical this division between ethics and politics and consequently uncover the principles. but perceives this as a process entirely distinct from the hospitality. political assertion or position. far from losing himself and of the conception of European hegemony ends with a series of dual in an abstract and impracticable ethics. and notes that for Levinas hospitality is unconditional and creation of a practical. Derrida helps to reinvent the political because he shows that cal functioning of Europe. A conception of tality can serve to theorize also the duality in postcolonialism between Europe necessitates "this double contradictory imperative" that we open an awareness of the singular migrant subject and the potential. necessary ourselves to all that exceeds reason without allowing politics itself to integration of that subject within the state. moreover. but that its demands would run counter to the and the "laws" of hospitality. it also negates itself in its insistence on absolute openness and the against the rigorous undermining of metaphysics and ethnocentrism absence of a need for consensus or commensurability. from the practical demands of politics and the creation of an active. and that Europe one another. is no democracy without respect for irreducible singularity or alterity. and of the colonial. a set of paradoxes necessary for a responsible understand. conversely. for example. without the calculation of majorities. 110 understanding postco!onialism derrida and bhabha 111 . of a political strategy in Derrida's thought does not mean that this is the unconditional demand that we accept and welcome any stranger. Following Levinas p. While the concept of hospitality relies on the existence of bar- strategy remains beyond the boundaries of his project. norms. indeed. granting of asylum. this double bind within the concept ofhospi- be conceived as open to all that exceeds her borders. requires decision-making. in The Politics of Friendship political thinking is not self-same. which on concrete issues arising from immigration law. The law of hospitality allows for the singularity of every visitor. The Monolingualism of the Other creation of a specified standpoint and argument.

He even. which minority voices trouble the hegemonic cultural and national dis- thinking is evidently never territorial. more than once he criticizes Der- in apparently prioritizing ethics it does not help to theorize the reclaim. and argues that this Homi Bhabha movement establishes a transition between the ethical relation and the question of multiple others. but it is University of Bombay. Simi- nevertheless crucial in its careful consideration of the contrasting ethics larly. for example. if much Derrida. between these two levels remains uneasy. Critchley concludes his chapter on Derrida's politics by returning to Levinas's movement from the ethi- cal relation to the intervention of the third party. but for littered with references to the work of Derrida. but the discussion of the specific of territoriality and national belonging. fixed and assertive subject position. Bhabha's essays are excludes totalitarian politics (for Levinas. rida for remarking on colonialism only in passing. the ethical critique of totalitarianism. and he has more than once emphasized that his was a minority culture. National Socialism. of the "supplement': by chains of meaning that it cannot possess. in Derrida's work. His separation and construction of a national identity always covers over traces and patches juxtaposition of ethics and politics perhaps helps us to think again why of discrepant cultural meanings produced by that nation's heterogene- Fanon's militant call for decolonization in Algeria chimes discordantly ous and plural people. an awareness of Algerian multiplicity and the engagement with the mechanics of colonial power and with the ways in self-creation of each oppressed singular being. exclusion of Algerian Jews operates on another level. he also frequently slips into prescription and stresses the ethical closer to an understanding of the complexity and multidimensionality requirement that we "elude the politics of polarity and emerge as others of postcolonialism. and courses operating on them. . having received his undergraduate degree from the (then) tiate between its divergent ethical and political requirements. It is not possible. leading in turn to the contemplation of The work of Bhabha is perhaps best known for its explicit endeavour justice towards those others. Derrida's own political . he went on to do graduate work at Oxford Uni- this dynamism that prevents the field from becoming programmatic versity. Reading Fanon through Derrida. Sartre or Gandhi. as I have suggested. Derrida shows that postcolo. and for not paying ing of the land from the hands of the oppressor. This way of shifting from ethics to politics to combine poststructuralism and postcolonialism. the direct translation of ethical phil. concepts are taken from the latter's philosophy. Derrida's innovation is sufficient attention to specific and determinate systems of oppression. and many of his key our current purposes this could also be colonial sovereignty). Bhabha's more consistent attention to colonialism scarcely plicity between a conception of something like territorial politics and makes his thought more militantly politicized. Indeed. to address the political and the ethical by the same means. Nevertheless. according to like that ofDerrida. Bhabha uses the concept of "dissemiNation" to explore how the and politics that might inform postcolonial thought. as Fanon's intermittently is. is conceived as structured in spite of itself by the movement and difference. on another level. Bhabha adds to Derrida's explora- nitarianism of Fanon's vision as a practical response that simultaneously tion of the overlap between ethnocentrism and logo centrism a further includes. iffleetingly. taught at Sussex and Chicago. His discussions of colonialism and resistance with his universal humanism. but of Bhabha's work is descriptive of the workings of colonial or migrant by tending to them at the same time on different levels we might come culture. we can conceive the commu. and There can be no doubt that Derrida's contribution to postcolonialism both colonial and colonized cultures are "deconstructed" by means of is not as clearly politicized as that of Fanon. and the relation Bhabha was born into the small Parsi community of Bombay in 1949. nialism cannot be a holistic critique. Colonial discourse. and cre. for ates the foundation for a politics based on the acceptance of multiplicity example. The Monolingualism of the Other teaches us that a of our selves" (Bhabha 1994: 39). and now occupies the illustrious derrida and bhabha 113 112 understanding postcolonial ism . but it is attention to their complex and deferred significatory processes. Nevertheless. draws on Levinas universalized deconstruction of claims for linguistic mastery reveals and argues that the notion of ethical proximity helps to unsettle notions colonialism's ethical transgression. nevertheless his understanding of the simultaneous division and com. and stops the critic from falling into complacency when contemplating osophy into anti-colonial political critique is not attempted anywhere an evolving and still traumatized field.and certainly. and his focus remains. but it also encourages us to share with Derrida's work a resistance to binary oppositions and a attend to both aspects of the work and to try to think them through meticulous attention to the ambivalence underpinning any apparently together. it must continually shift and nego. ethical or at least "ethical political': Indeed. Nevertheless.

The Third Space is not. however. which with a reflection on "theory" itself. through dialogue. Bhabha criticizes Said for presenting colonial deconstruction oflogocentrism and ethnocentrism an emphasis on the discourse as :fixed and for configuring West and East or colonizer and resonance of this self-conscious theorizing for political representation. Theoretical discourse. as he recalls highly knOwing and at times abstruse philosophy is not concerned with John Stuart Mill's argument that political knowledge has to come about the conditions affecting colonized or migrant people's everyday lives. as in Derrida. together with the abstraction of work. inside and outside.: 27). "at once the 'recall' of political representation is a strong. and he draws on Freud important insights into political knowledge. with all its contextual con- philosophy itself the ambivalence of colonial discourse is "a necessary tingencies. Rather. but its success an identifiable alternative position to those of colonizer and colonized. process. theory nevertheless offers reveal the anxiety at work in colonial narratives. whereby the philosopher deconstructs philosophy from within. and Bhabha conceives this knowledge of the world is most urgently needed" (Bhabha 1994: 214). Such an intervention quite properly challenges 114 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 115 . authority by producing knowledge of the other. since both rely on classify- and national discourses rely nervously on the notion of a collective past ing and dividing self and other. because it opens up the and Lacan in order to analyse the neuroses structuring discourses on space between the political objective and its slippery representation. otherness at work in the creation of knowledge. Bhabha goes Critics have argued that his assimilation into the American academy on to champion the sorts of double movement performed in Derrida's and membership of the cultural elite. destroys this mirror of representation in which cul- leged" (1994: 19) and asserts that he is alert to the dangers of assuming tural knowledge is customarily revealed as an integrated. and it that claim to know and assimilate the other. or his writing style. the drive (falsely) to lence of colonial discourse. it is clear that Bhabha's then adds to Derrida's approach a more politicized angle. must resist both logo centrism and essentialism. notion of a postcolonial philosophy or theory. this argument reveals an understanding of the presence of postcolonial politics than to show how colonialism operates within dis. while failing to catch up with the multiple narratives and practices that Bhabha then conceptualizes this slippage in language by inventing make up their disjunctive present and future. Colonial colonial assimilation and racist determinism. course itself and to draw attention to the delusions of modes of thinking similarly. and undermines colonialism by focusing on its authority. or East and West.and its performative anticipation or expecta. principled argument against political a situation . distance him disastrously from the marginalized and uses the language oflogocentrism to undermine logo centrism. separatism of any colour.its memorial. and the "uncanny" that the colonizer sets out to occlude. as a locus of cultural ambivalence as well as productivity: The opening chapter ofBhabha's famous collection of essays The Loca- tion of Culture prefaces the ensuing analyses of colonialism and culture The intervention of the Third Space of enunciation. In defence of the very expanding code. "denying an essentialist logic and a mimetic referent to Anxiety in Freud is a temporally ambivalent state. Bhabha's aim is instead to it is concerned with language and discourse. define and categorize its subjects. even as it inevitably claims a new guage over its subjects.position of Professor of English and American Literature at Harvard. Bhabha's purpose is to confer on Derrida's loopholes and blind spots. A theoretical understanding of temporality to argue that culture too can be seen as anxiously hovering the slippage between discourse and referent works directly against both between sedimentation in the past and a future reinvention. at the very moment at which a transnational. as it sounds. must attend to alterity in its pursuit of knowledge. it names the gap in enunciation between course of assimilation. In self and other. the Derridean movement of traces circumstance. is nevertheless this inscription of doubt into the production of any dis. Indeed. and cuts through the moralism that usually tion" (Bhabha 1996: 192). open. 'migrant' of meaning along the chain of associations. and Bhabha uses this notion of a borderline accompanies such claims" (ibid. In reading Mill. the limits of the grasp of the colonial lan. his achievement is perhaps less to conceive a rationalism. Bhabha notes the frequent criticism makes the structure of meaning and reference an ambivalent that theory is "the elite language of the socially and culturally privi. debate and dissension. approach here is evidently far removed from empiricism. or conceive differently the potentially assimilatory drive of theory or between the production of the statement. and the other to which the statement refers. and suggests that despite Mill's Like Derrida. however. And again. He uncovers the ambiva. black and white. If colonized as reified in a binary opposition. It names the caution against generalizing the contingencies and contours of local interstices between sign and referent. Bhabha's terms. Bhabha's psychoanalytic his own theory of the Third Space. this helps us to rethink the subject of a proposition and the subject of the enunciation: that is. Bhabha oppressed subjects about whom he writes.

IfLacan teaches that identity is constructed in the gaze of the other. determinism and separatism. for Bhabha not merely a caricature or :fixed image. another place of enunciation that will not allow through the lens ofLacanian ambivalence. which is inSight lies in his perception of uncertainty within processes of identifi. Bhabha knows that Fanon summarizing the most influential of these here. indeed. our sense of the historical identity of culture as a homogeniz. but argues that his the stereotype. It is also perhaps significant ture is troubled by this ambivalent doubling and splitting created by the that theory itself might contain this sort of anxiety or slippage. never really. discursive temporality. the shadow of colonized man. is a form fear and desire of the colonizer and the splitting of identity as a result of of knowledge and identification that vacillates between what is the meeting of black and white. for example. however. The first of these is ardently desires complete political transformation. has perhaps not surprisingly the argument to expand into an unproblematic generality" (ibid. but the colOnizing mission is referred to only subsequently in moments in his work where he shies away from what Bhabha sees as passing. "fixity': it seeks to know and define the other. to which I shall turn later in the chapter.. as ifthe essential duplicity of the Asiatic the image of post-Enlightenment man tethered to. authenticated by the originary Past. rather than to elucidate core of his subversive intent. This strategy of reading Fanon selectively. breaches his bound- ing. in discourse. as well as his anger (Ibid. be proved. repeats his action at a distance. and "bears the mark of the splitting in the Other place from Theory is necessary according to Bhabha. that splits his presence. presumably of the thought.: 66) 116 understanding postco!onialism derrida and bhabha 117 . his dark reflection. his existentialism and of theory. but we construction of the self through the image of the other. This movement. In other words. but an idea whose cation and self-creation. Colonial discourse desires "the Negro is not. which is its major discursive strategy. Bhabha's Fanon reveals the colonial Many of Bhabha's essays in The Location of Culture propose culture's fetishization of black identity and locates a force of resistance new definitions of key postcolonial concepts. (Ibid. (Ibid. He applauds in Fanon's work: always "in place': already known.: 45).: 37) towards him. Bhabha argues that: pinnings of Fanon's work.. then. and the violence and delusion of claims to cul. and Bhabha's language stereotype betrays the absence of proof and the real precariousness stresses this displacement and anxiety and not Fanon's more militant call of that :fixed image. his call for revolutionary action. Bhabha explores the psychoanalytic under. In commenting on the colonial search for fixity. His analysis turns on the enigma of Fanon's Freudian question: what does the blackman want! Bhabha examines the the stereotype. not con. or the bestial sexual licence of the African needs no proof. but the repetition of the form the rupture and dispersal of racial identity. Bhabha's com- productive expansion. itself opens up "the space for a new his most provocative insights. draws out its anxieties and Bhabha also famously reads Fanon in such a way as to highlight the locates in Fanon's allusions to psychic alienation and uncertainty the ambivalence of colonial discourse in his work. can fronted by. This reading of can use our theoretical knowledge to make ourselves better readers Fanon deliberately glosses over his humanism. the very time of his being.: 196). for agency. kept aries. Furthermore. distorts his outline. The very disjunction ofFanon's famous phrase iteration masks its producer's uncertainty. Bhabha openly confesses that his "remembering may initially omit to comment on the role of colonialism in Western Fanon" paradoxically requires a certain forgetting. and it will be worth in the exploration of cultural interstices. Any more than the white man" is conceived to per. colonizer and to maintain his difference from him.. The gap in Foucault's discourse is precisely what allows his theory's Faithful to his own understanding of "theory': however. and something that must be anxiously repeated . his militancy. the alienation that arises from it. because its attention which it comes" (ibid. serial time. then Fanon's colonizer and colonized also to language and representation allow us to understand properly the identify themselves on the basis of this doubling of self and other and ambivalence of culture. Fanon's apparently Manichaean struc- tural purity. Bhabha argues later in the work that Foucault. mentary on Fanon reads between its lines. one of the central tropes of colonial discourse. disturbs and divides the alive in the national tradition of the People. the native too is split: he wants both to occupy the place of the describes as being written in homogeneous. generated much controversy. unifying force.: 44) disruptive temporality of enunciation displaces the narrative of the Western nation which Benedict Anderson so perceptively Similarly.

by virtue of the act of repetition that the dominant discourse of colonial power. more. Further. but further analysis of the function of the stereotype reveals regulate and control his subjects. The colonial literature of writers as diverse as Kipling. As a Signifier of authority. In the chapter "Signs taken for course. Forster. peopled with "mllnic tion. Bhabha's prescriptive ethics emerges here in in Mexico long after the end of the colonial period. This is for Bhabha beautifully demon. dissimulation and irony are "traits of. and the act of imitation always includes slippages and traces of tural or racial. Iffor Freud mockery. Bhabha points out that mimicry in fact exposes colonialism's excess and expansion. S.: ing after the traumatic scenario of colonial difference. (Ibid. and questions the identity of what might over that anxiety by providing an illusory wholeness. according to Bhabha. and play within the colonial discourse. however. On the one hand. they reveal the limits of the colonizer's drive to authorize. Bhabha's stereotype is a fetishization. between colonizer and colonized and to draw attention to movement also proposes mimicry as a sign of the ambivalence of colonial dis. however. returns the eye of power to some prior.nor "identical" .. Said's writing alludes in passing to the simultaneous recognition and because it hides no essence. where the stereotype that means to deconstruct colonial discourse. it is noteworthy that the Latin American thinker Octavio Paz. Such men are the fruits of the mission. White Masks. but in quoting partial alterity into a discourse that had conceived itself as self-same. him Bhabha opens a sequence of questions relating to the projection. it announces the falsity of the colonial discourse of anxiety of castration and sexual difference. and the awareness of what are experienced as disturbing racial and a subjected people who tremble and disguise themselves in the presence cultural differences (ibid. metonymically" {ibid. conceives it much more as a sign of between the assumption that "all men have the same skinlracelculture" emptiness and self-loss. mistrust and suspicion still present of the subject from itself. have been taken for the "original': If for Bhabha mimicry borders on vows difference and sets out to restore an original presence.: 75). conceived 1994: 105). but a form of resemblance. Mimicry lies at the limits of what is acceptable and familiar: it plays fear and desire that subtend the colonizer's discursive gesture. but on the other hand. in 1817. Bhabha goes on to use Lacails under- it as another indicator of the ambivalence of colonial discourse. cul- 86). much-celebrated concepts is that precisely liberates it from the fixation of the stereotype. Mimicry is not sameness. displaying in part. to create a class of "interpreters'" who that the English book is not accepted as "a plenitudinous presence" but would mediate between the colonial authorities and the masses they that it is received in a context so far removed from its production that seek to govern. disavowal of cultural difference through the stereotype. in their mimicking. originally the result of the Like the stereotype. archaic alterity. however. If. mimicry. but inscribes a subtle. and could function as a powerful force of subver- the fetish plays between the affirmation that "all men have penises" and sion. that differs from or defends presence by talism. attitudes and beliefs to create "a culturally and linguistically homogeneous India" (Bhabha of the colonial culture. of the master" (Paz 1967: 62). mimicry appears to ensure the control and image or identity. in the colonial context the fetish vacillates whom Bhabha does not engage. his concluding recommendation for a recognition of difference that Another of Bhabha's related. The fetish disa. that the Indians should accept the sacrament and help men': natives by birth who have taken on the tastes. Paradoxically. and it functions to smooth certainty and self-presence.: 90). It is disturbing precisely ity.by virtue of the difference that be "authorized versions of otherness': but in mimicking the colonizer defines it. however. it inserts difference into neither be "original" . the English book acquires its mean- but" a subject ofa difference that is almost the same but not quite" (ibid. The standing of mimicry as camouflage to stress how it functions in the same uncertainty of the stereotype is what Bhabha accuses Said of neglecting way as metonymy: it is "not a harmonization or repression of difference. Wonders': Bhabha discusses the Indian catechist Anund Messeh's asser- Orwell and V. Bhabha conceives mimicry as a potential strated by Fanon's Black Skin. Naipaul is. The mimic men seem to constructs it . such an image can regulation of the native. they appear to reinforce the power it is altered by the transfer: of colonial discourse. Building on the analysis of mimicry. in his discussion of the correlation between latent and manifest Orien. Bhabha . Bhabha argues by Thomas Macaulay in 1835. no clear identity. jugation. which again serves to undermine the fixed opposition In addition to this uncovering of the stereotype's uncertainty. by the rules of the colonizer but at the same time works against them.: 107) 118 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 119 . only in part. whereas in Paz it is a symptom disavows difference by means of the "white mask" only splits the image ofa hermeticism built out of the fear. of hybridity. which for Bhabha revolves around an unproblematic intentional.The stereotype is used to justify and prop up the colonial project of sub. with the anxiety ofa potential lack.

"a ngure of prodigious doubling" (1990: 3). It is both the horrilic violence of the colonial enterprise and the force of not an alternative identity. for exam- collection Nation and Narration (1990) contains essays by a series of ple. living principles of the people as lematic connotations of the term "hybrid': Young traces its nineteenth- contemporaneity. occludes the real horror of armed struggle. This duality is also conceived by Bhabha as a split between not occupy a simple place" (ibid. and explores potentially ongoing anxieties with the loss of racial purity. and the focus on anxiety The last of Bhabha's reinvented concepts is that of the nation. in part. but she that the nation is "Janus-faced" because it is caught between progres. dilution and degeneration. Antony Easthorpe 120 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 121 . Bhabha's Bhabha may be right to question the division of colonizer and colonized essay "DissemiNation': printed in Nation and Narration and again in The into a binary opposition. The This means that the narrative of the nation claims to root itselfin the past study is in no sense a critique of Bhabha. the narrative not posit a simplistically unitary and closed structure to the adversial of the nation must be thought of in "double time": forces" (Parry 2004: 56). which means that the imagined unity of the nation with Bhabha's thought. is that it "dispenses with the notion of can never catch up with the discrepant "shreds and patches of cultural conflict. and displacement of all sites of discrimination and domination" (ibid. but contra Bhabha. giving the discourse an authority that is based on the that means little to the genuinely disenfranchised (ibid. but in fact it recreates the colonial culture as hybridized Bhabha's highly abstract theorizing. argues that this does not mean that the colonial situation did not pit sion and regression. One of Bhabha's most rigorous critics is Parry. Young is largely sympathetic to Bhabha. but perhaps a reminder that of its people. which certainly does infer antagonism. Furthermore. Bhabha's introduction argues often "hybridized" or criss-crossed with multiple identifications. and tracks an evolving awareness his revolutionary ethos. moreover. but his erase any prior or originary presence of the nation-people to Colonial Desire (1995) nevertheless reminds us of the lingering. the natives. and his extensive use of decon- and different from itself. Bhabha's edited of the role of concrete resistance. Furthermore. it is. quoting Derrida 1981). that is the creation and propagation of a shared past. Bhabha's con. pre-given or constituted historical origin in the past. as if to assure a shared origin. The difficulty subject to a time-lag. but it must also erase that the term "hybridity" is not necessarily a celebratory figure for cultural past if it is to grant its people the ability to narrate their culture in their enrichment. he stresses that his endeavour is not so much to explore the process of and the performative. Again. Parry also concedes that subjectivity is indeed of the nation's multi-layered construction. which and the uncanny within colonial discourse replaces any understanding emerges as a plural site of dispersed cultural meanings. but also because its rhetoric distances it from its communities against one another in an acutely antagonistic struggle. The discussion oflanguage effects a ruse against the authority from which it is. but in so doing his thinking also glosses over LocatIon of Culture. who laments towards the cultural assimilation of the colonized. then. then.: 7l). but at the same time that the extensive focus on ambivalence in colonial discourse obscures it subverts the authority and self-presence of the imposed culture.: 108. people. makes the latter into a "premature poststructuralist" and tempers major philosophers of nationalism. prob- demonstrate the prodigious. alliances" that might be conceivable for the "privileged postcolonial" but gogy. (1994: 145) century associations with corruption. Rather more acerbically than Young. is to evoke the process of here. but an effect that can in turn be deployed as the colonized's counter-insurgency. as he conceives the performative as a "supplementary movement" hybridization: the dissemination of the text was supposed to assimilate at work within the writing of the pedagogical.cept of hybridity has been challenged by are also the "subjects" of a process of signification that must more than one critic. Bhabha's reading of Fanon. of the people. does signification" produced by its plural people. or the self-renewing cultural practices and acts interpretation as to question the propagation of power through texts. although the pedagogical. argues above all that the narrative of the nation is the real tensions brought about by colonial imposition. Hybridity is the effect of the drive peoples. it names the expansion of the colonial culture beyond itself and of engagement with the material effects of colonialism on colonized outside its much treasured borders.: Many have objected to his convoluted writing style and to its lack 112). Bhabha's thinking is deeply indebted to Derrida The upshot of the analysis here. Hybridity "displays the necessary deformation struction. derived. Parry reads into Bhabha's ethics a somewhat facile "recommendation of coalition politics and rainbow the people are the historical "objects" of a nationalist peda. have been much criticized by other postcolonial thinkers. the people In addition. Bhabha again uses Derrida here to explore how the colonial text "does own terms.

their 'wholeness' represented by a long. If. are no longer testifies to an understanding of the difficulties of any drive for secure pitted against one another. outside the discourse of human rights: rights are only accorded to His aim. but the implication is that there is no room in his thought for the specificity Taylor's implication is that these groups are somehow not worthy of or the agency of the colonized: concrete policy and action are occluded the same rights as those assimilated into the national community. of failing to consider the particular (Bhabha 2003: 166). necessarily the case if the group had been in residence for a long period ist postcolonialism. Bhabha goes on to read a poem by Adrienne Rich as a call that he knows his own thought might contain blind spots. Nevertheless. uncertainty and incompatible goals. in describing specifically postcolonial experience. His writing does not use form to rather than accorded any permanent essence and sovereignty. Bhabha's writing suggests that it is either in 1946 (where peasants demanded to reduce the proportion of their possible to have a complete identity. but this means that it is not clear how useful the term is its deployment. singularity and solidarity. Bhabha is societies. which means that although it is and negotiation continues to have resonance in a society still run by grounded in a moment. and one might conceive of the theory of colonial of time. tinuity': and even more. Solidarity and collective identity to narrate": the right to affirm ones cultural reinvention and for that can be invented in the name of emancipation. more on the complexity of its construction than on the mechanics of tures are hybrid. Bhabha alludes to an amendment to article 27 of the International the workings of discourse. political theorist Charles Taylor implies. These "partial milieux" are hybridized cultures. and in the process he implies nation. Subjects explore the same dynamic between universalism. Bhabha Fanon is another example of a thinker who proposes a notion of culture does raise the question of native agency. Covenant on Civil and Political Rights based on a similar exclusion. theoretical. This an awareness of the contingency of those constructs. all cul. role of gender in the construction of a postcolonial identity. Bhabha's writing slips Bhabha's recent work on minority rights is also more clearly politi- into a universalism that is not necessarily productive for the invention cal than the essays of The Location of Culture.' that requires continual questioning. even at times universalized. These new minorities are between state and and stable knowledge of the other in his own work. Bhabha "right to narrate' is also integral to Bhabha's vision of democracy: 122 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 123 .argues that the problem with Bhabha's concept ofhybridity is that it is notes that Guha's own concept of agency stresses "the hybridised signs constantly opposed to non-hybridity. and this affirmation of movement is created in a context of contingency. like that of Derrida. or no identity at all. do not necessarily belong to either one group or another and. but Bhabha's self-consciousness nevertheless the individual and the group. and even worse. it is not totalized by that process of ground~ discrimination and hierarchy. Even by an excessively generalized. that "all cultures deserving of respect are whole his over-inflated beliefin the efficacy of the philosopher's role. historical con- accused of overlooking historical contexts. it had been held that unassimilated minorities presented a of armed struggle. ing. then the amendment stated that this was not claimed that his own style of analysis should replace a more material. gularity as Derrida's does. minority groups in the interstices between national identities. the implication is that interstitial groups are somehow ambivalence as another level of critique but not as a holistic programme. crops taken by landlords). frequently psychoanalytic idiom. indeed. non-state. is also to uncover the anxiety underpin. but this might be with reinvention to be recognized in the discourse of human rights. indeed. Indeed. for example of the Tebhaga movement in Bengal unhelpful binary opposition. of blurring different experi. In each case. A thinking of agency is compatible with an Easthorpe asserts that he treats hybridity as a "transcendental signified" awareness of ambivalence and hybridization. even if Bhabha's focus is (1998: 345). but that Bhabha's ethical political recommendation here is for the "right moment is also one of indeterminacy. for Bhabha. Once again. His own argument is that agency . lecture "On Writing Rights': Bhabha notes that in his discussion of the These points are often linked to a general unease with Bhabha's highly recognition of equal rights. and it is certainly true that Bhabha has little to say about the mechanics formerly. discussion of more. deep. Again. and create affiliations across various milieux. In his Oxford Amnesty of a specific anti-colonial political strategy. in his engagement with thinkers such as Guha. specificity and sin. it should be remembered that he never challenge to the nation. those who "over a long period of time" have enhanced the life of the ning claims for knowledge and mastery. and to a frustration with perhaps unwittingly. Taylor excludes what he calls "partial milieux" ences of colonialism and. and this in itselfbecomes another and sites" (1994: 187). moments of for attention to subjects whose differences are constantly negotiated. Moreover. Insurgent agency responds strategically to its moment. Bart Moore-Gilbert (1997) notes that. These criticisms are in many ways justified.

Bhabha returns rians in The Monolingualism of the Other. or supernatural. moreover. silence. thoughtful. It is clear that Bhabha's thinking here is very much based on the notions although the practical implementation of Bhabha's recommendations of ambivalence and hybridization sketched in The Location of Culture. what he calls Said's "slow humanist reflection': which takes into account • Bhabha's postcolonial theory is deeply indebted to that ofDerrida. the constant mediation between part and whole. according to Derrida. because it raises questions about the very nature Despite his earlier criticisms of Said. for it is only by acknowledging surprising in a thinker as vehemently poststructuralist as Bhabha but. if this is politics as guided by the ethical rather than by concrete policy. the term does function in postcolonialism as that our democracy is based on dialogue and conversation. denunciation of sovereignty in any language. remains sketchy. and a personal memoir. rather than cultures. this is not the Eurocentric humanism rejected alienation of Algerian Jews. ing. but with a practice. Sartre and Said. it is intriguing that. It may • Derrida criticizes the ethnocentrism of Western metaphysics remain unclear quite how Bhabha proposes to ensure this equality. and his belief in Key points subjectivity as fractured and evolving. like Fanon. but a more modest call for attention to the • Derrida draws explicitly on Levinas in his elucidation of an multiplicity and diversity of human experience and an awareness of the ethics. are now expressed in terms of the politics of human rights and the achievement of social equality. and worthy of respect as a result 124 understanding postcolonialism derrida and bhabha 125 . The tenn enables him to think outside the borders of "whole societies" and offers . a conception ofsubjectivity as evolving. This retention of the notion of humanity is. in his essays on rights and democracy Bhabha repeatedly elude any unified postcolonial category. such cultural resources as a "common good" that we can ensure despite its flaws and risks. 'how and how not?' ence. cultural hybridity: by multiple fragments of cultural practices that In addition.: 181) on the basis of that respect. (Ibid. Bhabha shows how nationalism is always underpinned by in the face of contingency. a reflection on the ethical humanism. in his encomium to Said's work of postcolonial critique. the violence of the imposition of the colonial language on Alge- Finally. Bhabha finishes by an insistence on any reductive and enclosed national framework. invokes the notion of the human to express a "strategic" call for the • Bhabha turns to the question of minority rights in his later work. Bhabha applauds although they need to be thought alongside one another. For upholding his humanism as a way of celebrating the dynamism Bhabha. between the uneven and unequal levels ethical in its call for respect for the potentially "infinite" other. a task" (Bhabha 2000: 3). cultural and regional diversity. Derrida shifts here between a universal after his death what Bhabha pauses on is the latter's careful. and it is of development and privilege that exist in complex societies. and mortality" (Bhabha 2005: 376). even tentative articulation of a political ethics and an ethical politics. the achievement of this curious return is precisely its but in essays such as this he gives them a clearer political mission. then. dif. such as citizenship. and which "strengthens our resolve to make difficult and and draws attention to the "supplement" of the native's differ- deliberate choices relating to knowledge and justice. political in its demand for the accordance of rights. It is ficult though it may be. It is with this return to the ''human': then. recognition of all subjects. Again. He also explores of a transition into the political. a means to think through both ethical and political emancipation. The term necessitates an understanding of and argues for the attribution of rights to those who live between the negotiation between the singular and the collective. [it] assumes that there is a commitment to creating "spaces" of of that evolution. by Foucault and Derrida. between the individual as he deconstructs the apparent mastery of colonial discourse and the group. Although frequently critical of Said. This text is challeng- to the notion of the "human" in his attempt to unite politics and ethics. but and draws attention to the exclusion of the other in the work his attention to the discourse of minority rights marks the beginning of thinkers such as Saussure and Levi-Strauss. Bhabha strives now to think ethically and politically at the same time: his fundamental principles of respect for difference. Ethics is also separate from politics. "the 'human' is identified not with a given essence. tensions and conflicts that still govern that experience. that Bhabha proposes to bridge the gap left open in Derrida's work and. be it natural and mobility of cultural identity.

Koranic and French schools. this specific engagement with the effects of colonialism in the Maghreb or I shift constitutes an uneasy movement within the corpus. and by arguing that any thought of the Maghreb must take into account its plurality and internal differences rather than relying on an essentialized notion of a Khatibi and Glissant: postcolonial ethics traditional past. but has continued to 126 understanding postco[onialism khatibi and glissant 127 . This attention to the conditions affecting spe. Morocco in 1938. Reflection on the Maghreb requires a "pensee autre" or and the return to place "other thought": an alternative conceptual structure privileging also the region's multiple languages and their mutual interpenetration. the bilingual literary review ways. Khatibi was a member of SovfJles. If. and the relationality created by colonialism. Derrida and Bhabha swing away from politics in their universalized Khatibi was born in EI-Jadida. its origin is the Glissant both combine the use of deconstructive philosophy with reflec. rupture and displacement of the slave trade. Rather. Khatibi and Glissant pursue the ethical opening associated with those He completed his thesis on the Moroccan novel in 1969. this specific history engenders a and Foucault. Creole fusion of interlocking they write. Le"vinas have however. Highly indebted to the work of figures such as Derrida cultures and identities.. Khatibi and for globalized ethical. but nevertheless root their analyses in the concrete locations of the Maghreb and the Caribbean even as they Abdelkebir Khatibi derive from these analyses a broader ethics of relationality. and its present is at once tion on the history of the specific postcolonial places within which francophone and a complex. Nevertheless. Glissant's work calls for a similar opening out of Caribbean identity. resonance. changing. Khatibi and Glissant explore the cultural plurality and new understanding of global culture as dynamic and relational. Khatibfs work is diverse and eclectic. and the later the French Caribbean. nor does it lead to a grounded form of Derrida's The Monolingualism of the Other on this matter. aesthetic and cultural renewal. The French Caribbean The Moroccan thinker Abdelkebir Khatibi and the Martinican Edouard is the result of a particular combination of cultures. dlfferance and cultural ambivalence. entail a political and empirical study of cific Caribbean context. Glissant's writing lacks the self-consciousness of an individual colonial regime. even though this resonance is bound up not with militant action but with ways of conceiving local history that serve to promote freedom and to account for multiplicity. although Glissant goes further than Khatibi in stressing not just bilingualism but a chaotic melting pot oflanguages and cultures relating the specific place of the Caribbean with the rest of the world. Khatibi explicitly draws on Derrida six by aligning deconstruction with decolonization. and has been activism. and he attended both reflections on linguistic mastery. until it was banned in 1972. emphasis on globality appears to contradict earlier references to the spe- cific places does not. In his most recent work. but its resonance for post- colonialism stems above all from the conception of a "plural Magh- reb" in the wake of decolopization. Glissant spend less time exploring the disjunction between the univer- sal and the specific than Derrida. Glissant apparently relinquishes his goal of political activism. Deconstructive ethics is given a more grounded geographical founded in 1966. In Glissant. but recommendations for a gen. ethical opening proposed by Derrida and. Khatibi and Glissant show how the sorts of universal criticized for its obfuscation of the political. and went on reflections but re-anchor ethics in the particular context of regions that to publish his autobiography La Memoire tatouee (Tatooed memory) have been ruptured and fragmented by the colonial presence in distinct in 1971. political conditions of the French Caribbean in the end necessitate a eralized ethical awareness of multiple differences are here tied to a broader ethical call for the embrace of global diversity. before studying sociology at the Sorbonne. by extension. then. however. particular resonance in their own regions of the world as a result of although he continues to use the example of the Caribbean as a figure the colonial presence and the region's patchwork history.

since it too insists on a strict division also a "tattoo" or graft whose shapes cover without obliterating both the between itself and the other (ibid. he is also for difference in that region should not be a straightforward affirmation an acclaimed authority on Islamic art and on the condition of modern but a mode of identification that continually calls itself into question. and that renews autobiographical narrative La Memoire tatouee figures its subject as torn itselfby exploring the continuously developing and multiple differences between cultures and exiled in the French language in which the text is that make up North Africa. Quoting Fanon's call for the definitive termina- protectorate only for the short period between 1912 and 1954). ting. La . His philosophical precur. and although one tions with other languages. a definition of the Maghreb that leaves behind the quest for roots. his perspective is not narrowly ality and plurality to propose an alternative understanding or "pensee defined by the history of colonialism (Morocco was. and Morocco by the French presence. "metaphysics that has become technicaf' (ibid. Secondly. Khatibi argues that a claim is a provocative and sophisticated postcolonial thinker. Khatibi's first name. as if the narrative persona carries the wound of the violation of school of thought upholding the early days ofIslam as exemplary. it nevertheless resurfaces in the form of fleeting traces and fragments nialism on Magbrebian identity and culture.). such as Derrida and Foucault. and has become one of Morocco's leading intellectual and Cordoba. that have hindered its development. but also the precolonial that upset the rhythm of the French. however. ism': in this case the return to a rigid and immutable conception of Abdelkebir. will go on to inform his thinking in Maghreb pluriel (Plural Maghreb) since he has published both novels and theory. Stockholm raine (Contemporary Arab ideology) insists on a separation between the 128 understanding postcolonialism khatibi and glissant 129 . and in which Khatibi explores the interpenetration of one lan- as diverse as calligraphy and Islamic art. postcolonial thinkers is that he analyses not only the effects of colo. too as well as French writers such as Victor Segalen and poststructuralists theolOgical and patriarchal Khatibi recommends a "plural thought". London. Next.: 25). This hardened theology is fice by Abraham of his son Isaac and the day of the author's birth. The narrative finishes with a theoretical reflection that commentators. since this is in tum too rigid. since it contains the theological doctrine or. for Despite his academic success in both France and Morocco. after all. Maghreb consists for Khatibi in the rejection of three unhelpful schools this rupture is figured alternately as a source of self-loss and aliena. of his best-known works is his exploration of the "plural Maghreb" and In Maghreb pluriel. Ifthe ism. Abdallah Laroui. the limitations of the region's Western heritage and another that rejects sors are Arabic and Islamic scholars such as Suwahardi and Ibn Arabi. Khatibi rejects "traditional- tion and as a trigger for creativity and invention. Khatibi uses this conception oflinguistic relation- its bilingualism after decolonization. Thirdly. not at all a commemoration of the region's past but its denial or forget- Memoire tatouee opens with the revelation of this originary destruc. His reflections on Morocco are as a result not exclu. his Islamic upbringing. Expressions of disorientation and perplexity are nevertheless Khatibi's point here is to demonstrate the limitations of the work of the increasingly juxtaposed with celebrations of intercultural exchange. His distinction among persona's mother tongue retreats when he writes or speaks in French. bears the mark of a violent severing. This call for an alternative thought of the nevertheless written. and has treated subjects (1983). where colonial and republican values are grafted on to. a French autre" of the Maghreb. "metaphysics reduced to the- echo of "Aid el Kebir': the festival of the commemoration of the sacri. Khatibi's origins and an essential identity based on tradition. then. a broadly Sunni tion. Morocco both in the context of the aftermath of colonialism and in Thinking the Maghreb requires a "double critique": one that points out respect of more recent internal developments. the return to an archaic patrimony. oflanguage as the dynamic and constantly mutating product of its rela- sively bound up with the influence ofFrancophonie. my translation throughout). The French language is cope with the modern Maghreb. The scope of Khatibi's writing is notably wide-ranging. If he tion of the European society in the Maghreb. Khatibi reveals the defi- Arabic learned at the Koranic school and the Berber language spoken ciencies of rationalism. guage with another within the expression of the bilingual subject. Khatibi's autobiographical per· he qualifies this movement as "metaphysics that has become a doctrine': sona reflects on the disjunction caused by his education in a secular Khatibi at the same time condemns the use of that doctrine in the for- French school. whose Ideologie arabe contempo- the narrator travels jubilantly from Paris to Berlin. as ideolOgical thinker. Like much of the work on bilingualism. Orientalism and bilingual. Khatibi laments the failures ofSalafism. mation of political objectives and social pedagogy: Salafism is unable to but do not weld with. at home.write and teach. in Khatibi's words. as well as contemporary Moroccan politics. First. ology" (1983: 24. This lingering murmur of one past together with the traditions and complexity of modem Arabic and idiom within the tones of the other forms the basis for Khatibi's theory Islamic culture.

Khatibi also adds to the work of the former thinkers languages in which linger. he explores the example of the novel Talismano. in Berque is derived from Enlightenment thinking. ing a Levinasian sense of the openness and potential inaccessibility of politico-military violence was· as significant as economic violence. take into account disorder artifice underpinned. This call for freedom means that thought. which necessarily entails the "deconstruction" oflogocentrism and ethnocen. for example. and between technology. and encapsulates a diversity of traditions adopt a mode of thinking that is Western in origin. for example. He finishes by fixing the identity of the other name for this other thought. by Tunisian is constantly influenced and interrupted by Western knowledge. rather than retain- production. and decolonization: the silent ending Arab people. Orientalism for Khatibi that Marx was inspirational in helping countries of the Third World to should be bilingual. initial phoneme ' 1>:. For Khatibi. conversely. nevertheless. whereas for Khatibi "the other cannot be reduced and of Western metaphysics" (ibid. also by Louis Massignon. is itself Orient. Arab knowledge. and also by a form of humanism. Marx's thought is. The dramatizes exchange between languages. and reads into its French expression both this influence passes through a process of translation. The alternative "pensee examples of Arab culture. but his descriptions serve outside his assumed frameworks. since in Khatibi's words. and not the revolutionary' of bilingualism as an open-ended exchange and a movement between militancy of Marx. Khatibi's deconstruction calls for the philosopher to stand referring to particular customs and practices. and would "broaden our freedom of thought" (ibid. with blindness. by Western metaphysics. Berque goes on to draw on sociology. "to decolonize would be the the whole of the Arab world. and which.. This mode of thinking is at the heart of his mistake was to use that experience in Morocco to try to speak for decolonization. between the Koran and both modem and whose historicism or rationalism results in too neat and too schematic a classical poetry. Berque assumes an astonishingly neat continuity between since Marx's thought still rests on the notion that the colonized must classical and modem Arabs. sufficiency. In the essay "Bilingualism and Literature': printed in Maghreb sophicallanguage estranged from itself. as Berque also dreams. In so dOing. The son of a colonial offi- (such as that between reason and unreason) and to subvert the very cial in Algeria. but denounces his drive to unify the world by an exchange between cultures. to do away with binary oppositions only to reify and caricature the Arab people. Khatibi of Berque was to translate the untranslatable into a stilted rhetoric that also notes the insufficiency of Marx's concept of the Asiatic mode of immobilized and homogenized the other's difference. and argues that in the precolonial Maghreb. figures also the "eye': The result of this mistranslation is thinker and sociolOgist Jacques Berque's work on the Islamic world. The error form of Hegelian absolute knowledge. he gives it an ontology. three fields despite their interpenetration in Maghrebian thought. or philosophy.: 51). reliance on metaphysics. the undermining of the Western belief in self-presence and self. according to Khatibi. and dissymmetry. The or thought that takes place in more than one language at once. which of a sound that only exists in Arabic. In this way it intercultural exchange and the inevitable silencing of the original. another nevertheless always remain the trace of the untranslatable. Orientalism is for Khatibi to the work of Derrida and Foucault. Khatibi points out the brought back to an essence. Khatibi concedes into the framework of a homogeneous identity. (1983: 133). Orientalism of this sort. latable. propagated brought into the realm of social and political struggle. confers on the Orient specificities that result Khatibi conceives this new thought of the Maghreb with reference in an affirmed essentialism. that Khatibi Khatibi constantly champions through his work an understanding champions as a liberatory form ofphilosophy. warm and fragrant" difficulties associated with using Marxism to theorize decolonization. that the work is introduced by this effect of effacement: it ''opens with Khatibi notes that Berque attempts to establish links between an Arab ' an absent eye. Furthermore.' of the author's first name is already a mistranslation Maghreb pluriel also contains a chapter on Orientalism. pluriel. with the invisible and the unreadable" 130 understanding postcolonialism khatibi and glissant 131 . Furthermore. but writer Abdelwahab Meddeb. is the self-critical impulse of Derrida and Foucault. however. he creates a unified autre" of the Maghreb would. be it one of paradise. decolonization and multiple continuity in the history of that troubled region. but logic within which he writes.: This means that Berque identifies a determinate being that he calls the 33). in spite of itself. Khatibi's "pensee en langues" very title page of the novel inaugurates this study of hidden traces. "decolonization" accompanied by positivism. then. in a form of archaic consists in a somewhat devastating reading of the renowned French calligraphy. Berque was born there and later lived in Morocco. In addition to this trism. and present and an Arab past. however. Later on in the text. It that difference. merely hints of the untrans- a call for attention to bilingualism as a means of conceptualizing a philo. but Khatibi reminds us that there will means of his global system. in that it should. accomplish conceive a revolution.

(Khatibi 1983: 182). Writing in French, for the Arab author, in this way examined this can also become an invigorating and enriching encounter
at the same time evacuates the mother tongue. Nevertheless, Khatibi with alterity.
goes on to argue that Meddeb's text constantly uses the preposition"i/' Khatibi's tentative move towards a celebration of bilingual relation-
("to" or "at"), as if the accent on the "a' could transliterate the original ality is at the same time an aesthetic and an ethical call. In an essay on
Arabic sound excluded from the title page, and to make up for this Derrida and borders, for example, Khatibi concludes by enquiring after
absence. The work contains the trace of the author's name, but this trace the effects of an awareness of foreignness within languages: "in what
constantly undergoes a process of transformation: "it falls under the way is this impropriety, this hybridization and this troubling of identity
sway of a double genealogy, a double signature, which are as much the favourable to idiomatic and stylistic inventions?" (Khatibi 1994: 449;
literary effects of a lost gift, of a giving that is split in its origin" (ibid.: my translation). An awareness of otherness in language is also a way
186). In this process of translation, Khatibi suggests that the two lan- to seek new forms of writing, new styles and new sources of creativity.
guages signal to each other but at the same time exclude one another, Khatibi's celebration of bilingual writing can also be seen as Levinasian,
and this simultaneous interaction and withdrawal defines the narra- in that it calls for attention to the intractable and the untranslatable, and
tive that "speaks in languages': There is a bilingualism within Meddeb's makes of that attention an ethical condition of the use of any language.
French, which operates both a movement of transformation and a split- All language, for Khatibi, contains traces of other languages, and, like
ting or division. The narrative forms an example of a language existing Levinas's discourse, it is a site for encounter across differences, although
in relation to other languages, which by turns interrupt its rhythms and its proper understanding does not allow the reduction of difference to
lie dormant beneath its surface. the same. Khatibi's "pensee en langues" and Levinas's discourse are both
This bilingual writing is a source of both alienation and enjoyment. forums for an ethical encounter with an other that resists essentialism,
Khatibi locates in Meddeb's text a certain hermeticism, in that the lan- knowledge and metaphysics. In this way, Khatibi adds to Levinasian
guage becomes a sort of formal edifice that hides the memories that the ethics a further dimension in his exploration of bilingualism, and gives
author nevertheless seeks to translate. Memories and traces of the mater- that ethics particular resonance in the context of intercultural com-
nallanguage, conceived also in psychoanalytic terms as the language of munication between France and Morocco. There is nevertheless in this
fusion with the mother, are traumatically repressed and occluded even exploration of French and Arabic bilingualism in the aftermath of colo-
as they scatter themselves beneath the artifice of the French. These traces nialism a universal conception of relationality and ethical exchange
figure the Lacanian "fragmented body" of the narrator, the disintegra- within and between all languages.
tion of an irrevocably lost totality. In Khatibi's own novel of bilingual- Moving away from engagement with the context of colonialism and
ism, Love in Two Languages (1990), however, this alienation and loss postcolonialism in the Maghreb, Khatibi also writes about calligraphy
are constantly juxtaposed with jubilation and creativity. Love across and Islamic art. His analyses have resonance here, however, because
languages results in a confrontation with the incommunicable, but it is again they provide a means of imagining the open-ended process
also a trigger for desire and a quest for fusion. Bilingualism is a form of signification in language in a way that subverts the colonial urge
of separation, but the form also engenders a plural, relational form of to mastery and knowledge. In the commentary on Meddeb, Khatibi
writing for Khatibi, in which languages jostle against one another and notes that Arabic calligraphy, in its untranslatability, is the lost source
provocatively permeate one another with fragments of alterity. The language of the text. Yet in La Blessure du nom propre (The wound of
bilingual text contains silence, and yet, by the end of the text, it gives the proper name) (1974), Khatibi explores the richness of calligraphic
rise to a "folie de la langue': the chaotic accumulation of phonemes and art, as the calligraphic letters hover between emptiness and plenitude.
signi:fi.ers in the creation of a new, plural mode of expression. This dual Calligraphy confers dynamism on the sign, since calligraphic letters
attitude equally characterizes Khatibi's study of the stranger in French fluctuate between phonetics, semantics and geometric design. The cal-
writing (Figures de letranger dans la litterature fran~aise; 1987), a text ligraphic sign functions musically, pictorially and semantically, and its
in which analyses of writers such as Segalen, Jean Genet and Roland potential suggestiveness is heightened and multiplied by the operation
Barthes are capped with a champiOning of 'literary internationality': of these different levels of sense. Equally, Khatibi's LArt calligraphique
The figure of the stranger implies untranslatability, but in the works arabe (Arabic calligraphic art) explores the origins of Arabic calligraphy

132 understanding postcoionialism khatibi and glissant 133

in the Koran and its link with the belief that the language of the Koran in France, as well as in Morocco. Barthes famously produced a brief
is sacred or "uncreated': The writing of the Koran is the direct word of eulogy, "Ce que je dois a Khatibi" ("What I owe Khatibi"), to be used
God, passed down to Mohammed and transcribed, and must be treas- as the preface for La Memoire tatouee, in which he celebrates Khatibi's
ured not only for its meaning but also for its form. In both works, more- invention of a "heterologicallanguage" and suggests that French thought
over, calligraphy is conceived of as a way of writing that opens up the should learn from this decentring of the Western subject. It has been
space between the referent and the realization of the work of art in its objected, however, that Barthes's own response to Khatibi is Oriental-
appeal to multiple forms of sense. This exploration of calligraphy serves ist, in that it omits to consider the specific implications of colonialism
to develop Khatibi's portrayal of the complexity of Arab culture and the in Morocco in favour of a somewhat vague and formless celebration of
perhaps often forgotten belief in polysemy. Eastern culture. More recently, Derrida dedicated The Monolingualism
A final aspect ofKhatibi's writing worth mentioning here is his study of the Other to both Khatibi and Glissant, although Derrida's comment
Le Corps oriental (The Oriental body) (2002), which, similarly, uncov- that he himself is more "franco-Maghrebin" than Khatibi because he
ers the plurality of meanings associated with the body in Arab and experiences alienation or disjunction within the French language, rather
Islamic-culture. Khatibi notes in his commentary on this stunning col- than as a result of the confrontation between French and Arabic, can
lection of paintings and photographs that the Orientalist gaze of the seem a little tendentious. Nevertheless, the support of figures such as
European nineteenth-century painter seeks to unveil and denude the Barthes and Derrida is just one sign ofKhatibi's growing importance in
Oriental body, but also to tie it to its past. Indeed, Khatibi notes that for francophone thought, and his engagement with Tzvetan Todorov and
Delacroix, 'l\ntiquity is no longer in Rome but in the East': and depic- Jacques Hassoun, among others, in his collection of essays on bilin-
tions of Oriental bodies during this period return repeatedly to stock gualism further testifies to his inSightful participation in francophone
figures of the odalisque, the harem, the slaves at Constantinople and debate. As I have suggested, however, Khatibi's thought is provocative
various biblical memories (2002: 175; my translation). The section on because it succeeds in combining a highly focused study of Morocco,
Orientalism is fairly brief, however, since Khatibi's principal endeavour and ofIslamic and Arabic culture, with a critique of colonial and ethno-
is to explore how the body is used, interpreted, decorated and regulated centric thought. Knowledge of the supple traditions ignored by the West
in diverse ways through the history of Arab and Islamic culture. Indeed, is also coupled with an ethical call for attention to the presence of alterity
there are not one but three words for the body in Arabic: jism is the con- in any language, and this is both a form of Levinasian intractability and
cept of the body, badane designates the bodily constitution and jassad the trace of another culture or linguistic idiom. This broader ethical call
signifies sensuality and the flesh. Furthermore, Khatibi explores the art never becomes universalized in such a way as to occlude the specific
of reading the body by means of the "sensorium" or the flesh: geometric experiences of Moroccan bilingual subjects but lingers rather as a force
or physiological forms, gestures and whispers have suggestive connota- that contests the pernicious determinism of colonial discourse. Finally,
tions that need to be translated. The body is, moreover, central to Islamic this ethics offers a particular vision of poetic enrichment and literary
faith. Mohammed is respected and remembered also for his corporeal creativity that transcends borders and categories, and that promises a
presence, and the prophet's body and acceptance of his mortality serve mode of thinking freed from the constraints of both colonialism and
as a model for Muslims to follow in understanding their own physical metaphysics.
strengths and weaknesses. The body is also a focus for endless rituals
and rites: the posture of the body during prayer bears meaning, cleanli-
ness is a spiritual value and circumcision is a further way of marking the Edouard Glissant and Caribbean Discourse
body with the trace of society and culture. Again, Khatibi has moved
far beyond postcolonialism in this work, but his intricate study is rele- While Khatibi bases his vision of postcolonial ethics on bilingualism
vant here for its insistence on plurality and polysemy in a culture often and plurality in Moroccan culture, Glissant conceives Caribbean identity
reduced and misunderstood by the 'Vest, by the former colonizer. and the poetics of "creolization" as the catalyst for what can almost be
While Khatibi has not yet received the attention he deserves in anglo- read as a global cultural revolution. Writing about his native Martinique,
phone postcolonial circles, his work is becoming increasingly celebrated which remains a French colony having been accorded the status of a

134 understanding postcolonialism khatibi and glissant 135

"departement doutre mer" in 1946, Glissant tracks the oppression and the colonial project, in which the author explicitly compares the dehu-
silencing of the Martinican colonized subaltern, but proceeds as a result manization engendered by colonialism to the horrors of Nazism. Most
to propose not only the embrace of bilingualism but the celebration of famously, Cesaire now asserts that colonization is "thingification": colo-
a vast, open-ended network of cultural interactions operating across nialism deprives the colonized of their humanity, dispossesses them of
the globe and resisting the determinist forms of thinking propagated their land and resources, and saps the spirit and energy of the societies
by colonial regimes. Like Khatibi, Glissant too responds to the political under its grasp. Another revolutionary inspiration for Glissantwas C. L.
injustices of colonialism by advocating an alternative ethical and cultural R. James's The Black Jacobins (1938), which charts the revolt of the slaves
model of relationality; although the focus on place in Glissant crucially of San Domingo, inaugurated by Toussaint Louverture in 1791, followed
involves the denunciation specifically of the rupture brought about by by the creation of an independent Haiti in 1804. First published in 1938,
the slave trade in the Caribbean. Rather than remaining aware at once James's work narrates an allegory ofliberation and emancipation and has
of the distinction and the complicity between politics and ethics, how- served as an inspiration for many subsequent anti -colonial thinkers in
ever, Glissant clearly moves through his career from an emphasis on the the Caribbean. Both James and Cesaire are major influences in Glissant's
former to an embrace ofthe latter, and ofits expression through aesthetic rejection ofthe dehumanizing force ofcolonialism and in his exploration
production. Indeed, the political motivations of his early novels are still of the expansiveness of Caribbean identity and culture.
perceptible in Caribbean Discourse (1989), but by the time of Traite du Glissant's early novels tend to be seen as the most militant of his
tout-monde (1997d) and La Cohee du Lamentin (2005), politics is all but works in their search to depict some form of subaltern agency. It is in
dismissed for its conventional reliance on a territorialism and a deter- Caribbean Discourse, however, that Glissant articulates his critique of
minism that are anathema to Glissant's cultural ethics. While Khatibi colonialism in quasi-philosophical form, and it is also in this expansive
and, above all, Derrida theorize and maintain the tension between ethics tome that he starts to envisage the link between the political denun-
and politics in postcolonial criticism, Glissant slips perhaps rather more ciation of slavery and exploitation on the one hand, and an emergent
glibly from one to the other, giving rise to a certain unease among his "poetics of Relation" on the other. The full French text of Le Discours
readers concerning the limited efficacy or practicality of the later work antillais (Caribbean Discourse) is a weighty; even cumbersome, volume,
and its contradictions with the earlier militancy. Where Glissant can be structured by multiple sections, subsections and subdivisions as if in a
seen to be unrivalled, however, is in the dynamism and expansiveness of parody of French structuralist criticism and its claim to scientism. Its
his poetics and in his conception of the value of that poetics independ- underlying political foundations are perhaps clearest, however, in the
ently of the political requirements of the (post)colony. section on the relation between "History" and "histories': and in which
Glissant's thought is quiteclearlya development and extension of that official History with a capital H is denounced as a phantasm of the
of the poet and politician Cesaire, whose Notebook of a Return to My West that specifically occludes plural local histories. Moreover, Glissant
Native Land (1995), an extraordinary and powerful landmark in post- argues that "the French Caribbean is the site of a history characterized
colonial literature, constitutes an incendiary reclaiming of Antillean ter- by ruptures and that began with a brutal dislocation, the slave trade"
ritory from the colonizer's warped vision. The "return" performed by (1989: 61). Caribbean history is brutally severed from its origins as a
Cesaire's poem at once affirms the cultural values of negritude and the result of the transportation of slaves from Africa, and this discontinu-
traditions of a black African heritage, and eschews French exoticism to ity has prevented the people from forming a national solidarity; as the
confront the sickness and disease of Martinique at the hands of French African nations did, against the colonial power. Official History relies on
politicians and slave-owners. The work ends with an image of the slaves a hierarchy that privileges Europe at the expense of Africans or Ameri-
rising up and taking control of the slave ship in a compelling gesture of cans, but it is also structured by a linearity that fails to account for the
defiance (Cesaire 1995: 131). Far from redefining Martinique by means disjunctions and losses of Caribbean "non-history': If the historian can
of a new set of categorizations, however, Cesaire's return is crucially at create a continuity out of the History of Martinique, setting out a schema
the same time an opening out: it is an exposition of the dynamism ~d starting with the slave trade, passing through the plantations system
mobility of black Caribbean culture and experience. Similarly, Cesaire's and the appearance of the elite, to assimilation and more recently to
Discourse on Colonialism (2000) is another virulent denunciation of what Glissant terms "oblivion': then even this continuity is structured

136 understanding postcolonialism khatibi and glissant 137

and runs an colonial thinking. re-imagine that collective identity in terms that resist the sweeping uni- The non-history of Martinique turns out to be the basis for Glis. politically and culturally. "Reversion is the obsession with a single of global investment. accord- the basis for a national revolution. Intellectual maroons. its this does not lead to any form of collective progress. and the consequences of this include in turn an absence of the returning self Indeed. While for later thinkers and writers lack. "you wish to reduce me to childish babble. Clinging on to Creole would cause Mar- the stagnation and passivity diagnosed also by Cesaire.: 19). were then compromised by their reliance on that this babble systematic. and he twists and collective force and meaning. no accumulation of capital and a tendency towards origin: one must not alter the absolute state of being" (ibid. we shall see if you can make sense of it" (ibid. in order has been criticized for failing to see the rich potentiality of the Creole 138 understanding postcoionialism khatibi and glissant 139 . and Glissant fears that this "pidgi. indeed. "they quickly become the vehicle of official 20). indeed.: French education. making it difficult for the colonized to rebel. determinist identity complicit once again with Martinique and Guadeloupe lacks control of the market. What the Martinicans and to reclaim the idiom as his own. It is also a strategy or able to carve out a terrain that assures the upkeep of the family. In sketching this new concept of sant's economic analysis earlier in the book. but Glissant also argues that the colonizer in a reliance on a centred. of the sort that cannot lead to the national overthrow of the alternative identity. versalization of European thought. topographically. The detour cannot rely on the construction of a coherent . Glissant's conception Glissant proposes as a new form of contestation the notion of of the use of Creole as a strategy of detour requires that it in turn be sur- "Antillanite: an alternative vision of Caribbean collective identity that passed. then. Glissant people are thus encouraged to deny themselves as a collectivity. versely. Right up until tinican culture to stagnate. Glissant at the same time rejects Cesaire's use of the bring about the "dispossession" not only of local history but also of notion of a "retour" or "reversion". I will make primary education. The forms pitted against an enemy but that needs to conceive its resistance sur- of resistance that have occurred in Martinique are also. culture to be affirmed and maintained. Fanon's revolutionary fervour and will define history and culture in terms that are not structured by West. then. the isolation of Creole language. Glissant argues that "French Caribbean a language in which Martinicans can express their creativity.: 38). since he identifies within that term the land and resources. Glis. but Glissant's sant equally asserts that this structure engenders a lack of collective argument is nevertheless that the concept of return assumes the stability responsibility.but again. but "to the point to rescue local people from consignment to "non-history" and to fight of entanglement" (ibid. A more violent success determines that it ultimately transcends its own confines. but Glissant uses it as a starting-point ing to Glissant they also understood that the detour must on some level for the invention of an innovative form of historical thinking designed be mingled with another return . mode of resistance is that of the maroons . is a distinct and active nationalist project that would assure such as Patrick Chamoiseau and Raphael Confiant "creolite'" names a the repossession of their territory.'l" is not departmentalization in 1946. Cesaire's return no doubt refused this rigid identitari- economy of bartering: "he exploits on a day to day basis" (ibid. This exposition of the lack of local agency mir. This is admittedly unlikely in the end to provide of detour in order to envisage the world differently and._ Glissant.not to an origin. a class made up of appropriates it so that it symbolizes his difference and his resistance. my translation).by changes brought about by the French: they are a function of someone to achieve an illusory individual quality" (1989: 7) and he sets out to else's history. In using Creole. according to reptitiously. anism in its celebration of the expansiveness of black identity and in its This means that the Martinican economy is tightly integrated into the exploration of the active relation between the archipelago and the rest French economy. however. Colonialism and slavery Antillanite. however.escaped slaves who started Glissant's prime example of this strategy of detour is the use of the their own plantations on new plots ofland . of the world. Cesaire's poetic language brought concrete change: they used a strategy ern myths and ideology. In "mulattos" and sons of agricultural workers who benefited at least from Glissant's terms. Glissant recommends the invention ofAntillanite through rors at the same time the portrait of lethargy. Con- under-productivity. Creole becomes a ruse used by the slave to alienate the slave-owner thought" (Glissant 1997e: 119. passivity and stagnation "detour" or "diversion": the recourse of the culture that is not directly found in Cesaire's Notebook of a Return to My Native Land. The "economy of survival" means that the worker is negative forces that go unchallenged" (ibid. that it lead somewhere new. but takes the form rather of "an interweaving of colonial regime.: 26). but moment that should lead to its own "depassemenf' or development. the slave or worker embraces the the maroons meant that it was difficult for their rebellion to take on a simplified language imposed on him by the master.: 16).

culture and language, but it is nevertheless the argument of Caribbean poetics recommends as a result the insertion of the oral into the writ-
Discourse that it is not creolite but the exploration of a broader point of ten form, and the inscription of the dynamism of the spoken language
entanglement that will serve as a focus for Antillanite. This also means into the literary. Once again, Glissanfs celebration of oral culture does
that Glissant recommends the continuous and unpredictable process of not lead to the privileging of creolite or indeed folklore here, however,
creolization, through the embrace of interaction and exchange, rather and if Glissant conceives a role for folk culture this will be as a strategic
than the establishment of a specifically Creole identity. affirmation leading to its own necessary transcendence. The poetics of
This search for a "point of entanglement» at the heart of Antillanite Relation upholds the dynamic and changing interaction of the oral and
leads next to the elaboration of a "poetics of Relation": an exploration the written, and not just the retention and affirmation of an existing
of Caribbean identity that celebrates its juxtaposition and intermingling tradition of story-telling.
of diverse cultural influences and practices. This is not just "metissagl: Furthermore, the Diverse is expressed not only in the use of the
the simple mixture of black and white, but a more complex interaction Creole language or in oral culture, but through multilingualiSm. If
or creolization that produces the unpredictable and the unexpected. Khatibls conception of bilingualism served to foreground linguistic
This dynamic relationality recalls the transculturation celebrated by relationality and dynamism, Glissant goes even further than Khatibi
the Cuban thinker Fernando Ortiz, which, rather than describing and exalts the interpenetration of any given language with multiple
the adoption of a new culture implied by "acculturation: stresses "the changing idioms. Glissant rewrites Saussure's distinction between "lan-
highly varied phenomena that have come about in Cuba as a result of guage': meaning the language system, and "speech': denoting particular
the extremely complex transmutations of culture that have taken place instances of the usage of the language, in order to criticize the assumed
here" (Ortiz 1995: 97). Similarly, Glissanfs poetics of Relation promotes hermeticism of the former and to emphasize the multifarious creativity
"Diversity" over "Sameness" , and this conception of Diversity brings no performed by the latter. Noting that multilingualism through history
i new fusion, but "means the human spirit's striving for a cross-cultllTal has frequently fallen back on a belief in the separation and hierarchy
relationship, without universalist transcendence" (Glissant 1989: 98). between languages, Glissant suggests instead that the very concept of
While Sameness privileges Being, Diversity inaugurates relationality, language or "langue" can be opened out by examination of the creative
and whereas Sameness fuels the European expansionist project, Diver- inventions of particular languages or "langages': For Glissant, "language
sity emerges in the resistance of the people. In terms reminiscent of [la langue] creates the relation, particular instances oflanguage [Ie lan-
Levinas's work, Glissant offers an ethical critique here of the totali- gage] creates difference, both of which are equally precious" (Glissant
tarianism underpinning European universalism and argues that even 1997e: 552). It is through the inflexion of his written French with the
the French discourse of human rights is born from this "saturation of rhythms and idioms of his spoken Creole, for example, that Glissant
Sameness" and blocks the requirements of Diversity. It is in literature or creates his own symbiotic language, and it is with these very sorts of
! poetics that Glissant suggests that the ethics of Diversity survives and, singular but multivalent langages that the universalism and standardi-
as we shall see, it is this investment in literariness and aesthetics that zation associated with French, and instituted through colonialism, can
will come to dominate Glissanfs later thinking. be undermined.
Glissanfs beliefin the power ofliterature nevertheless does not entail Caribbean Discourse suggests that this contestatory dynamism can be
a privileging of the written word. Indeed, the relational culture he seeks created through the mixing of French and Creole, or of the oral and the
to reinvigorate is one that celebrates oral story-telling, and the oral form written. The later sections of the French text additionally introduce the
for Glissant performs the mutability and dynamism encapsulated by the notion of "verbal delirium" as a means of describing "deviant manifesta-
Diverse. Glissant goes so far as to attest that "the written is the universal- tions .,. which limit themselves to the practice of particular languages
izing influence of Sameness, whereas the oral would be the organized (written or spoken)" (ibid.: 625), although these by their very nature
manifestation of Diversity" (ibid.: 100). Printed forms, although poten- should not be taken as exemplary. Nevertheless, Glissant schematizes
tially protean in meaning, are nevertheless :fixed on the page, whereas some of the forms of this "verbal delirium" with a certain self-conscious
the oral form allows the speaker to adapt or revise what he narrates; irony, noting for example the use of repetition, formulae, evidence,
orality leaves room for digression, omission and recreation. Glissantiail. structures that proceed by proliferation rather than sequence, and the

140 understanding postcoionialism khatibi and glissant 141

vision of the self as determined by the transcendent vision of the other.
Relation expands on the philosophical discussion of the slave trade as
the inauguration of a non-history, this time through an intensely poetic
For the most part, however, this deviance is a dysfunction that may
subvert the norms of the French language, but that will eventually be evocation of the abyss across which the slave ships sailed on their jour-
neyto the Caribbean. The description of this originary exile nevertheless
surpassed by a more expansive and creative relationality. Glissant next
here gives rise to a new concept, that of"errance" or "errantry': suggest-
explores the theatre as a means for the seizing of consciousness, which
may pass through a phase of folklore, but whose dynamism should also ing not so much loss but wandering and discovery. The initial image of
the transportation of the slaves in this way leads not to alienation but to
seek t? reach beyond folklore. Crucially, however, these strategies are
conceIved as forms of contestation that might lead to national liberation the creation and narration of "shared knowledge':
Furthermore, the poetics of that relationality is conceived using a
and, ~esp~t~ its privileging of poetics, the text retains something of a
MarxIst VISIon of repossession. At the end of the study Glissant returns new set of images, derived from Deleuze and Felix Guattarfs A Thou-
to the "poetics of Relation" as the form that will explore both the com- sand Plateaus (1988), opposing the root structure with that of the rhi-
zome and building in tum on Derrida's rejection of origins as far back
plexrealityofMartinican culture and the diversity and dynamism ofall
cultures of the world, but the final pages nevertheless defiantly call for as OfGrammatology. Glissant moves away from a vocabulary of political
strategy and ruse in favour of a wholehearted embrace of "rhizomatic
the independence of Martinique via this revolution in cultural mental-
thinking": a model of cultural identity and exchange based on plural
ity. Creolization, conceived alongSide Glissant's more acerbic sections
connections rather than on the positing of a single, monologic origin.
on political and economic inequality, is championed here as a strategic
Paraphrasing Deleuze and Guattari, Glissant denounces root structures
tool leading to national liberation.
as reductive, even totalitarian, while celebrating the entangled web of
stems and roots that constitute the rhizome structure:
Glissant's poetics
the root is unique, a stock taking all upon itself and killing
all around it. In opposition to this they propose the rhizome,
In addition to Caribbean Discourse and the novels, Glissant produced
an enmeshed root system, a network spreading either in the
a series of essays or reflections, now published by GallinIard as a series
ground or in the air, with no predatory rootstock taking over
entitled Poetique and numbered sequentially. There is a large degree of
permanently. (Glissant 1997c: 11)
r~petition and rewriting across the series and, indeed, The Poetics ofRela-
tlOn (1997c) is also explicitly "a reconstituted echo or spiral retelling" of
If the root structure describes an identity firmly planted in the soil,
~aribbe~n. Discourse (Glissant 1997b: 16), as well as of EIntention poe-
tlque (ongmallypublished in 1969 but repackaged as Poitique II; 1997b). related to an identifiable and inlmutable origin, the rhizome, a term
originally used to name those types of plants whose roots form a com-
This spiral structure is evidently itself conceived as an alternative to D.1.e
linearity of official or European history; indeed, the individual volumes plex network, evokes a plural and interactive mode of individuation or
are themselves a subversively hybrid mixture of literary, philosophical self~creation. It also inaugurates a conception of being not as finished
product, but as process or, indeed, as singular "trace': Any specific iden-
and intermittently political language, structured not by linear argu-
ment but by overlapping fragments. The later texts of the Poetique series tity is necessarily now tempered and opened out by its connections with
are also markedly different from Caribbean Discourse, however, both other parts of the rhizome structure. Despite the biolOgical origins of
the concept of the rhizome, however, Glissant's use of it is above all as
in their privileging of aesthetics in place of politics and in their own
highly literary form. The Poetics ofRelation tells us that Relation not only a creative metaphor, as a poetic descriptor of Caribbean relationality
or "nomadic thought". The rhizome becomes a figure of resistance to
"binds" and "relays': but it also "recounts': suggesting it comes about
colonial thinking and its privileging of monolingualism, territoriality
through the creation and transfer of narratives. The creolization cham-
pioned in Caribbean Discourse is now the product of an open-ended and cultural determinism.
It is perhaps not surprising, after this poetic opening, that Glissant's
form of story-telling, where sections of narrative are «relayed" from one
narrator to the next. It is also striking that the opening of The Poetics of The Poetics of Relation proceeds by exploring literary examples of

khatibi and glissant 143
142 understanding postcolonialism

rltizomatic thought Glissant notes that the very foundational texts of and thinker Alejo Carpentier, who evokes the richness of "marvellous
community, the iliad, the Odyssey, the chansons de geste and African realism" and the Baroque in Latin America. For Carpentier, Baroque
epics, are frequently texts of exile or even erranCE. These are works in is indeed "art in motion, pulsating art, an art that moves outward and
which the possession of territory is questioned, and in which collec- away from the center, that somehow breaks through its own borders"
tive consciousness is created through the open-ended exploration of (Carpentier 1995: 93). This is also a form of art that arises specifically
travel and migration rather than through the establishment of borders. from the rapid meeting of cultures, such as in Latin America as a result
In addition, Glissant cites the poetry of Baudelaire, and argues that, in of Spanish and Portuguese colonialism. Postcolonial metissage, for Car-
exploring the poet's inner consciousness, Baudelaire reveals that inner pentier, leads to dynamiC forms of artistic transformation.
self as vast and expansive. The poetic persona discovers, according to Moreover, Baroque art, and the poetics of Relation more generally,
Glissant, that "the alleged stability of knowledge led nowhere" (ibid.: refuses to propose unequivocal and monologic forms of meaning, but
24). If Baudelaire's poetry remains within the confines of the French affirms the value of opacity. Glissant recommends forms of art that do
language, however, Rimbaud's famous pronouncement that "I is an not offer back to the West its own transparent mirror image, but that
other" becomes for Glissant the archetypal statement of the poetics give voice to the unfamiliar and the unknown. An adherence to modes
of Relation. Rimbaud seeks not merely to deepen his knowledge of of writing that remain anchored within the standardized form of French,
himself, but to transform that self, to transcend and disrupt tradition and that do not explore the contact between French and other languages,
and heritage. Segalen's work is then cited as a further example of an aes- will prevent the culture from developing and enhancing in new and
thetic that embraces the Diverse and, like Khatibi, Glissant recognizes enriching ways. As a result, Glissant goes on to argue that the promotion
the importance of Segalen's conception of a moral or ethical relation ofJrancophonie as a means of protecting the language and imposing a
with the other. Conversely, Glissant cites Saint-Jean Perse's work since standard form of French on the rest of the world repeats the colonial
it operates the reverse movement of returning from the periphery (from gesture of silencing other voices. Francophonie for Glissant must on the
his native land Guadeloupe) to the centre. Most importantly; the poetics contrary be concerned with the evolution of the language and its abil-
of Relation can be located across the history of both French and world ity to convey the idioms of diverse cultures and peoples. Furthermore,
literature, and at the same time, takes different forms when sketched French has since the eighteenth century been associated with myths of
by different poets. The poetics of Relation is precisely not a specific clarity and logic; it has been conceived as a potentially universal tool
mode of writing that can be pinned down and determined, but names for expression able to lend rationality to all speakers. In opposition to
rather more broadly a straining against boundaries, against territorial- this, Glissant recommends not so much the right of the colonized to
ism, and against monadic forms of identity. Indeed Perse, one of the speak their own language, but rather a principle of communication and
writers on whom Glissant dwells at most length, is explored not because interaction between languages. Opacity, then, is not "enclosure within
he privileges the Caribbean over Europe, but because his writing invests an impenetrable autarchy but subsistence within an irreducible singu-
in and desires both worlds. Rather more problematically; Glissant also 1arity,,; it names not the affirmation of a self-enclosed idiom, but the
cites Fanon's migration from Martinique to France to Algeria as an retention of singular but linguistically complex or relational forms of
example of Relation, although of course this overlooks Fanon's own expression (Glissant 1997c: 190). It is a sign of confluence and inter-
privileging of national identity in the service of the decolonization of change rather than of isolation.
Algeria. One of the most striking developments of The Poetics oj Relation,
A further example of this movement towards the poetics of Relation and indeed of the later volumes of the Poetique series, is the increased
can be found in Baroque art. For Glissant, "baroque art was a reaction emphasis on this relationality as a new form of totality. Glissant repeat-
against the rationalist pretense ofpenetrating the mysteries of the known edly criticizes the old Eurocentric universalism that imposes its own
with one uniform and conclusive move" (ibid.: 77). Baroque art enjoys restrictive values and cultural identity on the colonies. This universal-
the proliferation and expansion of aesthetic forms: it turns away from ism is deceptive: it masks its own particularity beneath the myth of
demands for uniformity and eschews transparency. Glissant's celebra- assimilation. Totality, on the other hand, is the vast, inclusive network
tion of the metissage of Baroque art recalls the work of the Cuban writer of relations and interactions performed in Glissant's poetics; it is not

khatibi and glissant 145
144 understanding postcolonialism

and into a world. the mutua:I interference. Peter Hallward argues that the of Relation. Glissant a:Iso conceives the more than a privileged figure for globa:I movement and relationality. The Poetics detour. so that the archipelago is nothing gling. spuriously on the science of chaos theory. in that in the earlier work relationality across the planet: Perse was condemned for not offering a sufficiently specific vision of the Caribbean. any assertion of opacity takes place in dia:Iogue Lamentin. and if fleeting disharmony between cultures. Indeed. totality of Relation as the "chaos-monde': not a fusion or confusion. for Hallward. was nevertheless clearly even then bound 146 understanding postcolonialism khatibi and glissant 147 . and to emphasize its potentially extensive but unpredict. still press- change. In La Cohee du Lamentin. conceives itself as both multiple and One. suba:Itern agency in Glissant's earlier work is thoroughly surpassed in I suggested at the beginning that Glissant's thought moves further the later texts by a reflection on singular self-differentiation. this speed. the politica:I bases of Caribbean Discourse: "there can be no nationa:I sudden way. opacity and the focus on place turn out to function only in the of Relation is the third volume in Gallimard's repackaged series. and yet any specific tions it recommends. investment in the specificity of Martinique and the construction of able effects. singular force of totalization. du Lamentin refers to his birthplace in Martinique. Glissant's concept of trembling privileges the agitation of forms ing in Caribbean Discourse. it is not absolute. Traite du tout-monde and La Cohee du or globality. The dia:Iectic is not totalitarian. but names the whole that is formed by a of artistic production over fixed systems. and this new process is characterized by references to specificity can still be found in The Poetics ofRelation. Glissant uses the model of It is this effective dissolution of Caribbean specificity. disengagement from politics. over tradition and determin- diverse and pulsating web of connections. and the specificity that might have been repre- earlier adherence to place. the shocks and juxtaposi. or even (inadvertently) subsume. Ultimately. this shift is a disastrous rejection of the very concepts that founded which. Glissant further sented by opacity is diluted and transformed through that dia:Iogue. seem a little weak. The call for the liberation of Martinique. Glissant specifically notes that the danger of evoking the Caribbean as but the chaotic and unpredictable combination of movements and a unique site of metissage is preCisely the potentia:I occlusion of forms interactions taking place all over the world.a monolithic generalization. travel and cu1tura:I inter. and repossession. and are continually evolving. the upshot of is given to all of us to live through today. by self-consciousness and by the cultures' "has little to do with relations-with and-between particularities as such" mutua:I va:Iorization.: 124-5). Drawing at times a little of interaction taking place all over the world. clearly develop this embrace of totality at the expense of the with other cultures. Beings and further away from a focus on the specificity of the Caribbean. and adds to the former discussions of relationality the implication a latent Hegelianism in this championing of a: dia:Iectic that would of an infinite if at times imperceptible mobility. that chaos to describe the contingency and entropic energy of the poetics has troubled some of Glissant's critics. Hallward notes in particular that the change in ity is coupled with that of "mondialite'" or "globality': distinct from the Glissant's reaction to Perse from Caribbean Discourse to The Poetics neo-imperialism of ''globalization': and deployed to evoke diversity and of Relation performs this problematic shift. so truly and in such an immediate. Glissant describes the totality of relations as a trembling. Already in The Poetics of Relation. Glissant's title La Cohee embrace. the vocabulary of tota:I. elaborates and even systematizes the thought of the chaos-monde or the Any conception of nationa:I agency lingering in Caribbean Discourse is "tout-monde" as the meeting. (Glissant 2005: 15) of Creative reality itself" (ibid. and service of their own extinction by the totalizing force of the chaos-monde the fourth and fifth volumes. In Traite du tout-monde. for dispossession is now the condition (and opportunity) inextricable. by unpredictability. and the ca:I efficacy offered by more positive critics such as Michael Dash can bUZZing movement produced by migration. totality is constant and interactions between certainly the concept of the chaos-monde can be seen to trigger this particular groups are dissolved in this all-encompassing whole. Glissant's thought retains ism. The relinquishment of a specified poetics grounded in location. for the first time. Hallward may well be correct in his diagnosis of Glissant's startling In addition. however. the harmony or now disabled by the larger. (Hallward 2001: 123). the defence of Glissant's politi- this evokes both the trembling of peoples in the face of disaster. in the whirlwind of this trembling. reference to Martinique or the Caribbean in this work is soon subsumed but nevertheless names a globa:I force of movement and intermin. indeed. whereas in The Poetics of Relation he is lauded for his this globa:Iity projects into the unprecedented adventure that performance of relationality.

Glissant Glissant do not have to function in the service of a specified anti -colonial explicitly champions the role of aesthetics before ethics and politics. the division in Glissant's work can be seen to recall the schism Key points ofDerrida's reflections on politics and ethics. however. Nevertheless. Caribbean Discourse offers a vision of ethical and political criti- bold among postcolonial thinkers in that he does not promote a banal cism rooted in the experiences of Martinique. Glissant's celebration ofpoet. and the seeds of "globality" lie in that early ofBhabha's later affirmation of the rights of minority cultures. Glissant moves from the at once ethically and politically impas- Globality" (2008). Furthermore. (Bongie 2009) that responds to postcoloniality and sets out to liberate thought from imperialist metaphysics. The poetics of Relation insists on the liberation of the imaginary before the overthrow of political oppression. and yet it is perhaps useful that Bongie nevertheless sioned treatise of Caribbean Discourse to a much more literary and aes- concludes by conceding that: thetic vision of infinite cultural relationality. are provocative above all as a result of their mentation not necessarily linked to the concrete demand for political defiant search for an unprecedented postcolonial aesthetics. independence. although there is no doubt that Derrida for the most part retains a self-awareness and rigour at Khatibi allies decolonization with deconstruction. especially investment in "depassement" or development. The Poetics ofRelation and "cultural politics" but conceives a role for aesthetics as a site of experi. the poetic forms recommended by gathered in the volume Une nouvelle region du monde (2006). but ungrounded. the dynamism of relation is associated with aesthetic beauty. He also evolves for the necessity of thinking each alongside the other. Arab and Islamic cultures. Indeed. opacity loses its politi- duction unconstrained by militancy. In The Poetics ofRelation. Glissant's championing of opacity is also reminiscent their eventual surpassing. Bongie articulates the difficulties of Glis. an anti-colonial politics capa.up with ruses and strategies that were conceived only in the interests of political altogether. cannot in this way advocates a form of literary and linguistic experimentation help but continue to envision. and it is perhaps in that opens up the relation between sign and referent in challen- the text's creative and evocative whirlwind that it loses touch with the ging. and recom- times lacking in Glissant's cultural utopianism. and although this is clearly related to cultural experimentation. then this may political right" (1999: 25). and the latter's ambitious sweep undoubtedly undermines its political resonance in the place from the work of the late Glissant provides a valuable reminder of which it was engendered. however uncom. it might be argued that Glissant is unusually change. if politics when conceived by a critic such as Britton as "an ethical value and a and poetics do to some extent diverge in Glissant's work. When conceived merely as part of the infinite serve the purpose precisely of creating a space for forms of cultural pro. Derrida nevertheless argues thought") that would attend to cultural differences. that is distinct from that of concrete independence movements. 148 understanding postcolonialism khatibi and glissant 149 . and movement. and suggests that poetics has a role ble not merely of dissenting from but of combating the impe. in the recent musings on aesthetics the denunciation of colonial thinking. and in its exploration with detailed exploration of Moroccan. Clearly. however. of writing across two languages. fortable or uneasy a process this might be. but that is not subservient to the goal of regime From this point of view. if He criticizes Berque for conceiving Arab culture in generalized Glissant's work recalls that ofDerrida. trembling of the poetics of Relation. ways. Glissant rial aspirations of the thuggish proponents of Empire. Finally. and the creative potential. and investigates calligraphic art as a form of representation role not only of ethics but of poetics or aesthetics. territorialism and borders. immediate political engagement. Glissant cal force and becomes more of a focus of energizing. sant's political disengagement in his essay "Edouard Glissant: Dealing in then. Yet that latter stage remains provocative and the distance between culture and politics. the later works. of singular self-differentiation and being as a "trace". a theory of bilingualism that explores both the alienating effects. argues for a liberatory aesthetics. Like Hallward. ics is also largely ethical. he also invests much more in the terms. Despite separating the mends (with Derrida) the affirmation of a "pensee autre" ("other demands of ethics and politics. moreover. and is reminiscent of Derridean thought in its Khatibi's general postcolonial theory of bilingualism is coupled rejection of origins. even if its serene enriching perhaps precisely because it imagines an aesthetic and cul- composure cannot help but create a nostalgia for the "rough tural ethics that liberates artistic production from the requirements of futures" that a resistant politics. and ethical.

Such contradictions are never fully resolved in Spivak's work. Mudimbe and Achille Mbembe. Glissant also incorporates Ethics with politics? Spivak/ Mudimbe/ the Caribbean into the "chaos-monde: a bUZZing. and that which insists above all on an ethical or cultural agenda. since at times she calls for a renewed understanding of subaltern political agency while at others the subaltern is a more intractable figure signi- fying the resistance of the other to concrete forms of representation. a distinction between writing that is first and foremost politi- cal. but that identity does not necessarily acquire permanence or "truth': Nevertheless. the eclecticism of Spivak. and in Said's movement between Palestinian politics or Islam and literary criticism.• Glissant's Caribbean Discourse calls for the liberation of Martinique as well as for a celebration of cultural relationality not unrelated to Khatibi's ''pensee autre: Glissant presents Caribbean culture or "Antillanite'" as multiple and diverse. although she comes up with the notion of "strategic essentialism" in an effort to argue that specific claims for agency might rest on the assertion of an identity. Fanon and Sartre's militancy is under- pinned by an ethical call for freedom and subjective self-invention. but theIr first objective is the decolonization of Algeria. Glissant's later work is less political than Caribbean Discourse. one can detect in Glissant's evolving trajectory. This later divorce between culture and politics is a useful sign of the distinct roles played by each in postcolonial criticism. these different modes are both necessary for an 150 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politics? 151 . It is Spivak. this duality can lead to contradiction. whereas for thinkers such as Derrida and Bhabha it is the ethical awareness of the other's intractability that initially provides the basis for political lib- eration. Mudimbe and Mbembe finally suggests that. and affirms the creative potential of "detour' or "diversion" rather than the straightfor- ward return to roots. The work of many of the postcolonial thinkers discussed in this book has both ethical and political implications. seven and concentrates on the cultural and aesthetic productivity of "Antillanite'" as a site of relationality. who engage most explicitly throughout their work both with Marxist political theory and with a form of ethical thinking derived from deconstruction. yet most tend to privilege one approach over the other. Moreover. while politics and ethics do indeed require differ- ent modes of thinking. however. Particu- larly in the work of Spivak. trembling global network of multiple connections capable of bringing cultural Mbembe innovation and change.

explores the slippery construction of the notion of value in Marx. Gayatri Spivak One of the major strands of Spivak's work. entirely "idealist".they all draw at once on Marxism and on poststructuralist ethics. Unusually.: 116). and of representation inherent in Marx's model masks this ambivalence or confessions of perpetual anxiety about her own work repeatedly serve to slippage. and with . While Bhabha on the relation between value. and the work of "Theory': as with the other. which she argues is unique and provocative as a Spivak grew up in Calcutta. The implications of Spivak's anxiety will be discussed at the end of this section. as a differential: singular other alienated in language. and from the voracious grasp of Western ple. Spivak also pinpoints the ambiguity of the notion of use-value. It has been objected more than once that tion. Secondly.understanding of postcolonialism and. and although earlier in her career she to explore the mechanics of postcolonial or neo-imperialist oppression. rupture" (ibid. then. Spivak then shows that value is knowledge. inadequation. She reads Marx in English. she herself is engaged. The process work is unusual in its constant.open-endedness of postcolonial critique as necessarily always feminist. she examines specifically the double subjugation ofwomen by demonstrates that in linking labour to value and money via representa- imperialism and by patriarchy. and certainly and Mbembe write specifically about colonial and postcolonial Africa at times her work seems as much concerned with the self. Spivak at the same time focuses on the intricacies her prolific writings on postcolonialism have more recently led her to of Marx's texts and strains against readings that conceive his thought as become one of the field's most cited thinkers. Spivak draws not only on Marx's theories of economic exploi. moreover. Marx's thinking masks several discontinuities. money and capital that "at each step of scarcely mentions gender anywhere in his work. because despite the differences in their focus . For many critics this recurrent self- the programmatic use of either. and goes on to use some of his concepts Columbia University in New York. In this way her thinking is clearly aligned with that question the inequalities subtending the very academic activity in which of the Subaltern Studies Collective. ethics with politiCS? 153 152 understanding postcoionialism . but also on Derrida's explorations of the inaccessible and conceived in Marx as a representation. she next subaltern. "what is represented or represents itself in the commodity differen- tive for its focus on gender: when she writes about the oppression of the tial is Value" (Spivak 1996b: 114). In order to answer this. was perhaps best known as the translator ofDerrida's OJ Grammatology. the challenge is to keep warn the reader of the loopholes and obstacles obstructing the process both in play without falling prey to the shortcomings associated with of forming a postcolonial critique. Yet having established this. Spivak argues of Marx's schema consistently to analyse the suffering of subaltern women. Spivak conceives her the dialectic something seems to lead off into the . out to rescue the "subaltern" both from the structures of imperialist and "Scattered Speculations on the Question of Value" (1996b). is her championing of the work of Marx. then. She now teaches at it functions across the globe. Spivak's work is distinc. Spivak's work broadly sets deterministic and reductive. like that of Derrida.: 115). she goes on to identify the First. academics whose discourse newly occludes and silences the subjugated and also expands Marx's critique of the bourgeois ruling class so as to non-Western other. One of her most famous essays on Marx. such as the fact that a significant failure in postcolonial studies is the lack of attention par. These three thinkers are treated together doubt borders on a crippling narcissism that gets in the way of Spivak's here. even excessive. and she went on to complete her graduate work at Cornell for his generalized political and economic understanding of capital as while also teaching at Iowa in the United States. money is "separated from its own being as commodity': or that money ticularly to female oppression offered by its major representatives. Spivak's textuality: indifference. and even more. and it is a sort of "vanishing moment facilitating the exchange between two is perhaps true that Spivak is one of the few renowned voices in the field commodities" (ibid.Mudimbe attending to the real mechanics of colonial oppression. self-consciousness. Spivak's self-consciousness is in so doing demonstrate the inevitable multivalency of postcolonial nonetheless highly provocative since. Spivak starts by raising the question of how to icles to the journal. Thirdly. and she regularly contributed art. where she took her undergraduate degree result ofits revolutionary exegesis of global capitalism. although she is treated separately here because her conceive the subject in terms that are neither wholly "materialist" nor work reaches beyond their remit in a number of ways. it forces us philosophical reflection. to ask the fundamental question ofwhat postcolonial philosoph~ is and does. for exam- neo-imperialist oppression. potential flexibility and openness in Marx's writing on value and to stress tation and on Foucault's analyses of the complicity between power and the "textuality" of his materialist writing. indeed. As a result.

: 119). neo-colonialism. also misunderstands the notion of surplus-value as an abstract signi. and yet the (1994). tic indeterminacy that nevertheless characterizes those analyses. because it is not part of the circuit of exchange. This endorse his ethics. and it is also here that she displays most overtly her simul- as is testified by Spivak's application of notions ofvalue and the division taneous affiliation with both Marx and Derrida. and leaves fier of an infinite excess of value. In addition. Furthermore. and it is perhaps ironic that she uses a deconstruc- stand processes of canon formation. Finally. On one level. only for action. oflabour. but its resonance is also more far-reaching than expected. thougpt is deterministic. of the production of technologies on which we rely. for example. economic analyses. at the same time they are . Derrida's reading in this way posits the subject as "ideal. and the problematic confiation. rather than as the specific difference the subaltern subject with no voice. he blurs distinct types of value and fails to com- lematizes Marx's notion of value in order to reject accusations that his prehend "the connection between industrial capitalism. of two forms of representation. he than a 'materialist' predication of the subject as super-adequate to itself' exposes the ways in which this form of political representation is elided (ibid. suggesting that it is both inside and outside the system of value deter. and the result is that etors 'cannot represent themselves. but she also goes on to use it to show that so-called postindustrial capitalism. Spivak's careful engagement with Derrida's Specters of Marx tninations. Not only is Marxist think. Spivak oflabour to the sphere of academic and literary study. electronified capi- the literary academy too supports the international division oflabour. is that the subaltern has no place in it. with representation as depiction.value needs to take into account the exploitation carried out in the name to Spivak. and she suggests it would be fruitful tive strategy while criticizing Derrida's own use of Marx. Vertreten involves ing the notion of value. Derrida that in stating that there is no place for representation. together with exploration of the linguis- as the evaluation of style as such" (ibid. talism.: 129). and the current financialization of the globe. again draws on Marx. concedes that there are valuable political lessons to be learned from The purpose of this further "textualisr' reading of Marx is to demon- Derrida. Once again. Spivak quotes Marx's comment in The Value': Spivak notes that Derrida conceives capital as "interest-bearing Eighteenth Brumaire ofLouis Bonaparte that "the small peasant propri- commercial capital" rather than industrial capital. and notes that while Marx specifically uses the term Vertreten. displays an inadequate grasp of Marx's concept. persuasion': or a more political form ofrepresentation. Her writing on "to pursue the evaluation of the pervasive and tacit gesture that accepts Marx testifies to an extraordinary amalgamation of support for his highly the history of style-formations in Western European canonical literature materialist. whereas "Vertreten" names "rhetoric-as- criticizes Derrida's reading of Marx for its excessive confusion surround. and Spivak argues that any theory of Most disturbingly. (1995).also occluded by the forms of in the essay "Limits and Openings of Marx in Derrida" (1993). Spivak's ing more complex in its textual formulation than has previously been essay "Can the Subaltern Speak?" is arguably her most often cited piece recognized. While the peasants described have no ist': as consciousness. in "Ghostwriting" self-conscious philosophers for failing to think through the two senses 154 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politiCS? 155 . this time in order to explore the difference. Deleuze and Guattari Other Heading of the polysemy in Paul Valery's use ofthe term "capital" are unwittingly guilty of this same slippage. as phenomena of migrancy and ecolOgical disaster" (Spivak 1995: 68). and as insufficiently materialist. tual indeterminacies. she nevertheless tion in the sense of a depiction. with the attendant Developments in telecommunications further entrench this division. they must be represented'" (1988: surplus-value for him becomes "the super-adequation of capital rather 276-7). Spivak continues to acknowledge her debt to Derrida and to notion of exchange-value nevertheless relies on the notion of use. of writing. while developing previous observations that he fails reading of Marx is "textualist': in that it explores the hidden confusions to attend to women's suffering as a result of the international division of Marx's writing even as it celebrates their pertinence. Spivak also complains that when he pinpoints the ten plagues Spivak's "Scattered Speculations on the Question of Value" prob. the upshot of Derrida's reading of Marx. Spivak shows. Spivak The innovation of Spivak's readings of Marx is her emphasis on tex- stresses that Marx's materialist notion ofvalue should be used to under. of the modern world. She chides these otherwise highly between labour-value and exchange-value. Spivak depiction or understanding imposed on them from outside. political voice. and If Spivak finds a suppleness or ambivalence in Marx's writing. Deleuze too finishes by blurring Darstellen and Vertreten. well as the oppression of women. according . colonialism. but she nevertheless suggests that Derrida's reading in The strate how French philosophers such as Foucault. The German uses his understanding of the international division of labour with an "Darstellen" designates "rhetoric-as-trope': or the process of representa- awareness of the slipperiness of his founding concepts. In "Scattered Speculations on the Question of substitution or "speaking for".

it is Significant that Spivak's argument in world in representation . The first is when it arises out exceed both the sovereignty of all language and the colonizer's drive for of "the knowledge of truth': when "the knowing subject comprehends deterministic knowledge. fact rests on her understanding of subtle slips in the process of represen- simulates the choice of and need for (heroes: paternal proxies.). in immolating herself on the husband's funeral of labour in its very ignoring of the economic underpinnings of the pyre. slips outside the European conceptual framework. hidden shift of meaning in the women's mimetic act of self-immolation ing to the DharmaSastra. and in its attribution of agency to widows (who were World issues. Secondly.Vertretung' (ibid. Deleuze and Guattari. or can immolate (ibid. when conceived in relation to and indeed the Subaltern Studies Collective. and the imperi. with mimetic performance. and asserts: "they must note how the staging of the discussions of sati. can mean something dif- the Hindu law on sati as it is formulated in the Dharmasastra and the ferent from originally intended. but there are is also close to Derrida's ethical call for an awareness of singularities that two types of suicide that are permissible.: 279). premarital status). and it is in this blurring that the women's again academe itself supports and entrenches the international division voices lie hidden. the own practice. However. the subaltern's voice herself in the specific place of her husband's funeral pyre. Reading Of Grammatology. need to reflect on their the sanctioned suicide of the subject who knows his insubstantiality.dis. but as "that inaccessible 156 understanding postcoionialism ethics with politics? 157 . the glimmer of a possibility. The two positions dissolved because the supposed free choice is just an imitation of a code serve to legitimize one another. this agency is fragile. when repeated. suicide is usually reprehensible.Veda is in fact modelled on suicide laws created for men. fests itself.its scene of writing. Yet for Spivak. and indeed. agency. Event. and ask "Can the subaltern speak?': or does their work widow's suicide can be seen as a secondary act of mimicry. Spivak reads Foucault's omission of the nar. Marxist politics is here inscribed into Spivak shows that the two forms of sanctioned suicide for widows both the heart of French intellectual work. On the one hand. Intention here becomes blurred with imitation. Spivak notes too deprive the oppressed subject of a voice? This lapsus is all the more that the DharmaSastra makes an exception here both in its permission astonishing in the work of thinkers who nevertheless touch on Third of women's suicide.: 299). Women are permitted to kill themselves. of representation. earlier in the same essay Spivak the insubstantiality or mere phenomenality (which may be the same had already established the usefulness of Derrida's work for this sort of thing as nonphenomenality) of its identity" (ibid. As in the colonial discourses on sati. but both exclude the women's voice and created for men. on the funeral pyre. its Darstellung . or the self-immolation of widows. Moreover. on this secondary level both in the woman's Developing the political strand to the essay. if they the Other as marginal to ethnocentrism and locates that as the problem mimic these laws that were originally destined for men. given that it mani- further example of this silencing. Foucault. in order to justify rative of imperialism from his discussions of institutions of power as a self-immolation. to be used in other contexts. both ignorant and fragmented. Even more. but it is also that "the women actually wanted to die" (ibid. Spivak's attention to this potential but Rg. power .: 297). as Spivak complains that once blur imitation with intention. unlocatable. here dearly recalls D errida's understanding of iterability. the widow performs a sort of displaced suicide: she kills herself philosophical statements it produces. according to Spivak. brown men': while on the other hand. Context" in Margins of Philosophy. Police reports included in the records of the East India Company Spivak's identification ofthe blurring between intention and imitation are. Accord.: 293). Furthermore. as she shows. the Indian nativist riposte was Agency is a lost potential here. First. expounded in alist attitude towards the practice suggests that the woman is conceived the essay "Signature. The widows' intention is only a model or a copy. possibility that a statement. in which tice of sati can be read as a case of "white men saving brown women from it is ultimately impossible to locate any individual's authentic intention. then. by taking her husband's place. colonial officials seeking to abolish the prac. Spivak next uses the acting out of her husband's phenomenality and in her taking his place example of the Hindu practice ofsati. agents of tation akin to the sorts of ethical awareness subtending Derrida's work. and is as a result in itself unidentifiable and sentation. Spivak shows how suicide that is permitted is when it is accomplished in a particular place Derrida's text uncovers the European subject's "tendency to constitute of pilgrimage. uses Derrida to conceive the Other here not so much to denote a spe- en's absence of political representation in both colonial and native cific and identifiable non-European subject. to demonstrate the practical effects of this elision in the process of repre. relegated permanently to a passive. as the as an "object of protection from her own kind" (ibid. This means that with all logo centric and therefore also all grammatological endeavors" the woman can "act out" her husband's insubstantiality. The second form of postcolonial reflection. Spivak Part of Spivak's endeavour in this analYSis is to trace the wom.

Spivak avoids the question of psycho biography. In addition to the "History" section. much tion remains unanswered. a young girl who hanged her- Spivak's "Can the Subaltern Speak?" was later rewritten and published self at the age of sixteen or seventeen because she was involved in the again in her monumental A Critique ofPostcolonial Reason (1999). so self-conscious about the ethics of the theorist's own writing. the widow's response appeals to the "tout autre" or "quite other': a singular. and stresses that these ethical critique of Kant and Hegel's blindness to the Third World Other 158 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politics? 159 . with archives on the sati with the aim both of unearthing past forms of oping the resonance ofJean-Frans. the space left open by the differ- ence close in conceptual terms to Levinas's Infinity. also includes a chapter on "Philosophy" comprising subtle readings of tude to the subalterns silencing. colonial subject normalizes the notion of "woman' in this context and In this way. then. in its certainty it silenced the very paragraph containing this assertion is absent from the version printed in other whose voice she was trying to rescue. as I suggested. as to problematize the make such bold claims for her strategy. position of the "native informant': and again. armed struggle for Indian independence. the terminology of space connotes a chink that of the specific subaltern subject. but did not want to commit ever. however. she moves from a more nial benevolence by quoting Lyotard at length. Spivak tracks the troubled patriarchal admiration of the womens free will and the rhetoric of colo. A Critique of Postcolonial Reason tions. and the expansion of this analysis indicates a less dogmatic atti. For Spiv~ however. and although she is it to ask the question of psychobiography?" (1999: 291). She omits that it was clear that it was not because she was pregnant as a result of a number of sections in the later version. and contains more leave the text open enough to reveal the ambivalence of her gesture. If. and she goes on to as~ "what emerges as a careful reader ofherself and also of others. in order to emphasize our ethical obligation towards the subalterns This potential field of analysis then relates to Spivak's discussion of singular intractability. but indicates that her analysis will end with a specific subject position prevents the postcolonial philosopher from reflection on "an idiomatic moment in the scripting of the female body': over-determining her or speaking in her place. in the later version Spivak inserts a further section devel. to discussion. suggesting that she no longer wants to reinforce the effacement of the subalterns voice. no does not as a result invoke '1etting the other speak for himself': but terms in which to negotiate. Even if this space is one of hand Spivak uses Marxism to criticize the politics of the representation impossible negotiation. a section on "History': and hinges. and her own challenge to the construc. rather than outright effacement or ignorance.ois Lyotard's concept of the differend political oppression and the collusion of these with unethical silencing. the suicide of Bhubaneswari Bhaduri. This later version is clearly more endeavour to respond in her place. Spivak goes on to underline the impossibility for the woman to tion of the subaltern as this "inaccessible blankness" rather than as a overcome this differend. and introduces a further level of injustice. Spivak attempts not to stress the foreclosure ofBhaduri's speech. and it is perhaps significant that the later version is even more an assassination. intractable pres. An ethical concep. blankness circumscribed by an interpretable text" (ibid. speak': In the revised version. Derrida are two perspectives between which there is no common ground. but indicates the impossibility of telling the of the work consists in attentive readings of both political and ethical subaltern womans biographical story. Spivak describes the aporia between the particular details in Kant. as a signifier of the impasse or block between two incompatible posi. then. In the earlier version. doubtful about its broader resonance and impact than the earlier text. Here. about its own practice. She killed herself while menstruating. still shifts erratically between affiliation with Marx and Derrida. history concludes the discussion with the stark statement: "the subaltern cannot and SOciology on the one hand.: 294). such as her comments near an illicit affair. lies in the space between these poles. Hegel and Marx. however. Spivak allow the uncertainty of the act to emerge through the lines of her own precedes her analysis of the DharmaSiistra with the observation that the reading rather than to speak in the other's place. The ques. of course. The inadvisable remark since. and more ambivalence. by the time of A Critique of Postcolonial Reason. on careful engagement In addition. she admits that this was an tion of a subject position that underpins such work on the other. In the later version of the essay. The revised version of "Can the Subaltern Speak?" is printed in methodolOgical unease absent from the earlier version. The aim was not so much to A Critique ofPostcolonial Reason. on the one not the same as total effacement or silence. she also in the same essay cites Derrida can be analysed. and Spivak shows how reports and accounts of the story the beginning of the discussion of the sati stressing the relationship again gloss over her actual motivations. the revised version is less trenchant. how. Spivak between information retrieval in anthropology. political science. and this prevention is which will remain in the space of the differend. but which is nevertheless privileged over the achievement of political agency. but to Furthermore. end.

This failure to conceive be the soul of ancestors': as an impossibility whose portrayal is also sepa- the other or the "native informant" as human is exemplary of the very rated structurally from the frame of the story. must retain a notion of the centred subject. Finally. Spivak argues that the work deliberately constructs the colonized from Tierra del Fuego cannot be the subject of speech or judgment in as subaltern rather than citizen. deconstruction too of the section suggests a call for ethical attention to the violence of impe. (Ibid. 'There will not be rather different versions of the manipulation of the question of history space here to discuss each of these readings in turn. in order to offer further evidence and an absence of the push into history" (ibid. Mahasweta Devi's story "Pterodactyl. Constantly vigilant about her own position. strategy is once again to uncover the ways in which the subaltern is Finally. Spivak then goes of imperialist ideology even within writing that is conceived as oppo- on to show that in fact the representation of time in the Bhagavad Gita sitional. again. that it can become transparent at will (even when belonging tion. Jane refers from time to time to her desire to free women of the Third World from their ignorance throughout this book. and yet The distinctiveness of much of Spivak's work. however. although this will again be based on the latent with imperialism. to uncover the repeated assumption of a neutralized European the white Jamaican Creole. examples from the fashion industry. in which the "native" is this time also an agent. First.sion of Frederic Jameson's conception of postmodernism and late capi- troubled representation of the "native informant" and stresses in par. in which the figure of Bertha Mason. Wide Sargasso Sea. Spivak begins by discuss. including literary texts by Baudelaire. 'The final section of A Critique ofPostcolonial Reason does function as a useful. my point has been that the subject- and servitude. is described in terms that blur the border "1" that forecloses the native informant: between human and animal. M. Spivak returns to Marx and notes that despite the apparent stasis not only politically subjugated but also unethically marginalized within and generalization of the concept of the Asiatic mode of production. Spivak notes that Jameson's theory at once attempts to obliterate ticular the occlusion of the female subaltern. a deliberately marginalized figure.: 140). and Spivak also draws out Rhys's use of metaphors of mirroring to argue that the text depicts the colonial subject 'The culture of the native informant. Spivak analyses Kant's treatment of a history" (ibid. non-empirical figure for difference in Marx. to a regeneration of Marx. however. stems from the only one capable of judging and analysing Rochester. Kant suggests that "the New Hollander or the man text. moreover. including Barthes's Empire ofSigns ing Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. Coetzee's does follow a Hegelian model: "'Hegel' and the 'Gita' can be read as two Foe. which "may the world of the Critique" (Spivak 1999: 26). This contradiction emerges in part from Jameson's subjugation of the Third World woman and. This deliberately mimics forms of postcolonial exclusion against which Spivak's work tirelessly the marginalization oflocal history by dominant colonial discourses. for the apparent disclosure of the Law" (ibid. the concept of "man" in the three critiques. talism. A section on "literature': the notion of a secure subject position and continues paradoxically to made up largely of previously published essays.: 58). its confronted with the image of itself as other. She notes in addition that constant self-singularizing eludes the European discourses that repeat- the colonized other of the text is less Bertha!Antoinette than the black edly but fruitlessly seek to grasp it. Spivak's next her awareness of her own complicity with the discourses she sets out example is Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.: 44). "they still finally point culine" texts. it literary discourse. and the site of the imperialist conquest is conceived as Hen. however.: 343) Mason's humanity is left intact. rails. In to the indigenous postcolonial elite turned diasporic like the Jean Rhys's rewriting of Jane Eyre. explores the double rely on its presence. is "always on the run". the textual emphasis use ofDerrida. revolves slightly more loosely around "culture': and contains a discus- 'The rest of A Critique of Postcolonial Reason continues to track the . since in order to decentre the subject. 'These are then contrasted with exploration of J. and Puran Suhay" shifts the discussion to the postcolonial con- gesture of dismissal. but nevertheless one where "the master alone has "textualism" of his writing. Hegel's aesthetics contains comments on the Bhagavad Spivak's chapter on "literature" also contains readings of three "mas- Gita but. (1983). Bertha present writer). Spivak 160 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politics? 161 . in a passing Pirtha. Spivak also invokes several rialist forms of representation and silencing. plantation slave Christophine. indeed. and figures the pterodactyl. although Hegel's remarks are benevolent. a text not explicitly concerned to undermine. and notes that. Spivak's in a political interest. Kipling and a paper at the mindless gift for making shapes [verstandlose Gestaltungsgabe] laid before the East India Company. Spivak also discusses a passage in which Mr Rochester position of this I is historically constructed and produced so recounts the return to Europe from the West Indies as a divine injunc. Equally.

her constant revision a more pragmatic. and that her deconstructive conception of the intracta- master discourse. then. some her difficulty. rather than claiming the transparency and neutrality of faith of her own writing that she fails properly to address the political the Western discourses that Spivak denounces.: 283). Spivak's acuity is most apparent in her readings of other think- (eliminates?) the space in which the colonized can be written back into ers. Postcolonial theory must avoid either that she does retain a classical Marxist position. with perhaps more nuance. "Spivak in her own writings severely restricts tainly. Where her provocation. however. with established. She critiques the assumed able. All It is difficult to resolve Spivak's eclectic engagements with Marx these features of the writing perform an ethical resistance to mastery and Derrida and to extract from her work an overarching or at least a and an openness to the alterities that the critic cannot capture. including the political and the economic. In White Mythologies (1990). Furthermore. Her prose is frequently criticized for engagement with Marx. Spivak's engagement with materialism in Derrida and Marx that Spivak exaggerates the importance of the work of the postcolonial also seeks to undermine facile oppositions between empirical practice female intellectual. Conversely. dominant approach to postcoloniallsm. Her fluctuating and rewriting of her work suggests that she does not conceive her argu. "the position of the investigator remains unquestioned" Against Young. Spivak also peppers her work with autobiographical reflec. and suggests altern defines what Spivak will quite appropriately name an 'impOSSible that this very division makes of Theory an artificially distinct category ethical singularity'" (2001: 30). It would seem that Spivak persists in wanting to quickly retracting her autobiographical voice before it hardens into an combine the use of deconstructive ethics. although it is significant that even these are groups.ts Hallward criticizes Spivak's concept of the subaltern for positing her of postcolonial oppression. is the theoretically untouch- their immediate questioning or withdrawal. in other words. Yet Spivak herself ultimately levels and impertinent readings': her "obtuse angling" constantly in dispute many of the same objections at Derrida's work. but Spivak's difficulty stems from her ability constantly analysis of global praxis and opens up the Marxian text to reveal its to refine. Derridean thought might turn out to be useful for marginalized cultural tial partiality or blindness. As Michael Syrcitinski mechanics of colonial oppression. For of anxious self-reflexivity. determinist discourse that occludes the subalter- perpetuating the structures she criticizes. her poten. Equally. attentive reading as a means of understanding all the face. Ultimately. and her desire to hidden slippages. "the possibility of these connections remains dubious as long usually fleeting and often ironic or self-contradictory. to A Critique ofPostcolonial Reason suggests that there are ways in which tions. the altogether-beyond-relation: the attempt to 'relate' to the-sub- opposition between positivism or essentialism and Theory. Young discusses strategies. "Theory': with a capital T signifying a grand narrative or ethics backfires. voice as singular and inaccessible. "the subaltern. explore and interrogate her own arguments. and at others it is ethics with politics? 163 162 understanding postcolonialism . and while her appendix with itself. is undermined in favour of Spivak's own "implausible bIe subaltern is politically ineffective. and for failing to think through Spivak at times seems to privilege politics over ethics. and what her work recommends is this form SOciety" (Parry 2004: 23). in which. or for The success of Spivak's writing strategy remains nevertheless a sub. its ambivalences and its resistance to determinism. again. present her standpoints as part of an evolution. Spivak wants both as the 'setting-to-work' mode remains caught within the descriptive to emphasize that her discourse is necessarily subjective or incomplete.characterizes her theory not as a source of knowledge but as a form the means by which she might consolidate her identity and voice. In addition. empirical and economic objective. and "textualism': and offers a compelling example of the necessity of a tution still leave no space for the voice of the subaltern. and that her endless critiques of the Western insti. careful "labour of reading" applied to both (Syrotinski 2007: 59). assimilating or excluding the others it examines. partly in order to confess the limitations of her vision. writers and critics. and it must reveal its Eagleton laments that Spivak spends so much time examining the bad situatedness. of ethical. attitude to the work of Derrida is in turn mirrored by an idiosyncratic ments to be finite and immutable. an internal debate. but he asserts at the same time nity to which it claims to attend. these critics imply that Spivak's self-conscious (ibid. whereby she by turns applauds the systematic its convolutions. identitarian subject position. the offering up of a set of propositions and Hallward. lies is in her unusually sensitive writing and reading ject of some controversy. and/or formalizing practices of the academic or disciplinary calculus" and to avoid falling into the trap of narcissism by altering or indeed (Spivak 1999: 429). Parry famously objects points out. Cer- and in spite of herself. learned from Derrida. Her eclecticism and her self-conscious anxiety do not offer Spivak's interrogation of Western discourses on the Third World and a single model of critique but precisely warn against the adoption of notes her vigilance towards the ways in which her own discourse risks the sort of dogmatic.

that his writing can access this dreamed authenticity. with an ethical denunciation of "the history of the same'~ informed The Invention of Africa opens with a systematic and clearly . but it does suggest that atten. reli. Y. is less frequently associated with postcolonialism. Foucauldian analysis of the political and ethical violence inherent in and. Again and in Louvain. and philosophy. since Mudimbe engages specifically trol of specific procedures for its use as well as transmission" (1988: with the discipline of African studies and. more obliquely. published in 1988.: 2). are perhaps best summed up clear how attention to the workings. it is not always clear dangers of allowing that knowledge to be corrupted by forms of ideol. yet a specialist action found in Fanon. The work of Valentin Yves (Vumbi Yoka) Mudimbe evolves out of a very common. and that the concept has at its root the notion of organization in this sense incorporates both a call for political freedom and a desire to or arrangement. tive reading can offer insight into specific moments of both ethical and Mudimbe writes in both English and French. Mudimbe's fragile ogy that efface the African other. Mudimbe argues that etymolOgically the between discussion of colonial systems. anthropolOgical methods. France that the structures under analysis are diverse and discontinuous. distributing. and conventional knowledge. African. and the manner of managing highly wary of unmediated forms of empiricism. before studying linguistics in Besanyon. Although he taught in DRC between 1973 and like Spivak. the conception or indeed I of Congo (DRC). His philosophical works shift regularly the project of colonialism. Mudimbe real forms of African authenticity. and the goes on to comment on Marxist analyses of the ways in which overseas 164 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politiCS? 165 . Like Said. course is relevant to an understanding ofparticular instances of political so to speak. oppression. Rousseau and Levi-Strauss. the margin of margins: black. Mudimbe asks who is producing knowledge about Africa. however. and he is now a professor at Duke University. Catholic. and the seizing of economic control. and has published both political violation. the critique of Africanism or design. the (unethical) direction of the local people's away from excessive textualism and upholds the necessity of seeking identity and mentality.and the an alternative knowledge. In other words. however. now the Democratic Republic subtended by. novels and philosophical works. this time by Foucault. Belgium. term colonialism derives from the Latin" colere". in Indo-European philology and philosophy" (1991: x). Mubimbe draws on Foucault to theorize the ways in which power structures are himself was born in the Belgian Congo. Her writing does not call for the sorts of immediate political intellectually Marxist. Mudimbe is treated here alongSide vision of African authenticity will nevertheless provide the basis for a I Spivak. as well as actively propagating. yet agnostic. but it is in her readings that it becomes convolutions of his intellectual trajectory. he subsequently moved to the United States in part to escape the and to what extent the discourses shaping that knowledge assimilate the regime ofMobutu. these three facets include the political domi- cal awareness of the difficulty of knowing and specifying Africa shies nation of the territory. of "the Same': In his more political moments Mudimbe is nevertheless the policies of domesticating natives. (ibid. In many other into a framework governed by Western assumptions and expec- i ways Mudimbe's philosophical work can be seen as related to Said's Ori. but his most famous text is perhaps The Invention ofAfrica. Unlike Spivak. but one strictly under the con- different context from that of Spivak. disposed toward psychoanalysis. and blindnesses. The Invention v. of ideological dis. The eclecticism of his work. entalism in that his thinking centres on a critique ofthe parallel concepts intractable figure. although well known in this ix). Like Mudimbe's subsequent works Parables and Fables and The Idea ofAfrica (1994). as we shall see.the production of knowledge about Africa . and he also stresses with Foucault Rwanda at the age of 9. Derrida. . because his work similarly revolves around questions new political and ethical philosophy that recognizes as well as criticizes of representation. as well as by Sartre. whose "subaltern" remains a singular. tations. Spivak and the Subaltern Studies Collective. and combines a critical engagement with Marxism the European currents on which it is founded. even if. Mudimbe ofAfrica seeks to survey and analyse the practice of African philosophy or "gnosis': a term proposed by the author to refer to "a structured. and exploiting lands in colonies. Mudimbe holds on to a belief in the possibility of of'l\fricanism" . while at the same time his call for an ethi. since he conceives ancient organizations and implementing new modes of production" these as potentially reductive. 1982. Mudimbe domain. although he went to live in a Benedictine monastery in the creation of the other by the West. by his own comment at the opening of Parables and Fables: ''here I was. ethics that comes before politics. This process of organization has three facets to it: "the discover ethical forms of African knowledge released from the shackles procedures of acquiring. meaning to cultivate gious practice and ideology. Sartre or Gandhi.

Mudimbe affirms that Senghor's rule and system privileges the enclosure and internal coherence of the provisional use both of notions of African tradition. can be defended precisely because he conceives neither as coincides with the invention of the concept of "Man" as a subject who a permanent system that would ossify into the history of the Same. and this is used to assume a greater generality. their own chose du texte. conflict and rule. Tempels. commentator E.: 33). This shift revolution. are but elements in the history of the knowledge. both "chose du texte" riames the authenticity that lingers elusively behind Foucault and Levi-Strauss are themselves unable to extract themselves the textual artifice. is "an organized and rational construction': and both conceive Afri- and he notes that for the latter. although it will emerge that he conceives the Marxist reading rule and system': itself as excessively generalized and adrift from the specific experiences While criticizing Foucault. and the chapter on the West Indian observer and Same and its knowledge" (ibid. territories are restructured and subjected to the colonizer's economic of knowledge that doubts the value of schemata such as that of "norm. Analysis conducted on the basis of norm. of African natives. Nevertheless. African tourist art is just one example models: they are seen as poor and pagan. as well as Mudimbe is sensitive to the ambiguities of certain forms of African commentaries on their differences. such as that between the other.: end of the eighteenth century. it is not only discourse served a crucial role in backing up the expropriation and the colonial apparatus itself but a broader set of representations and exploitation of conquered lands with its ideology of civilization and hypotheses that separate and hypostatize cultures according to a domi. and of Marxist code analysed. In addition. to use distinctly Levinasian terms. in plurality of individual codes. Mudimbe. This obscured but both lament its blindness. however. emerges from a Western epistemological grid. Mudimbe nevertheless uses his of individual African communities. ture is always inferior to the great ideals of Christianity. Mudimbe asserts that missionary which serve to undermine the local culture. all of spiritual transformation of Africans. which promotes the traditional and the modern. Levi. W. Mudimbe shows how. three paradigms come to structure the 151). However. and suggests that although it in each couple brings at the same time both an understanding of the seeks to establish the sorts of African authenticity that he supports. biases and hasty assumptions. . Here. Similarly.. or as savages. Subsequent philosophers such as Alexis Kagame Mudimbe's next section explores in more detail the methodology of refine Tempels's study of Bantu philosophy and stress that the latter Africanist critique. Africa for more then ten years. but their cul- for Mudimbe of the ways in which. Blyden notes the curious intermingling of colonial rather than charting the "archaeology" of Western knowledge.: 28). Foucault tracks "the history of fundamental reality. The first of these is missionary discourse. The movement towards the latter term comments on the negritude movement. signi. or between the oral and the written. i knows. model. and a new unity over and above these the end Sartre's argument that negritude must be part of a dialectic and within the human sciences. ideology with African nativist views. after an epistemological shift at the can culture as "an original alterity>' to be assessed independently (ibid. the history of knowledge Strauss explores the "primitives" and "savages" that the West endeavours about Africa that Mudimbe tracks in The Invention ofAfrica constantly to caricature. discourse in all its variety and multiplicity>' (ibid. doubts myths of African backwardness trism" linked both to the specific episteme defining the discipline and to while nevertheless promoting a Christian policy for the improvement various moral or behavioural attitudes exhibited by anthropologists. spiritual conversion. this school of African philosophy. and the consequence is that "stories about Others. then. and the upshot of his work is that "the usefulness of a reveals gaps and blanks. He finishes by discourse on others goes beyond the gospel of otherness: there is not wondering whether "the discourses of African gnosis do not obscure a a normative human culture" (ibid. here Mudimbe maps concept of "archaeology" to offer a critique in the rest of the work of this conception of the colonizer's economic control onto the ideolOgi. from the history they denounce. Nevertheless.: 12). Mudimbe seeks rather a methodology Mudimbe's critique of the political exploitation and ethical silencing faithful to African epistemology: he seeks to retrieve an African order of the African other rests on a deep-seated anxiety about the concept ethics with politics? 167 166 understanding postcolonialism . Africans are depicted according to a variety of nant and Western set of values. Furthermore. he develops his engagement with Foucault. Even Placide "alterity is a negative category of the Same" (ibid. According to Mudimbe. Mudimbe also fication and system" (ibid. F. various epistemological structures that posit the African as inferior or cal creation of a whole gamut of oppositions.: 186). however.: 26). the primordial African the Same" while Levi-Strauss rails against its universalizing gestures. And even worse. who lived among the Luba Katanga people in Central the practice of anthropology is similarly criticized for an "ethnocen. surpass itself makes sense. paradoxically for production of knowledge: "function and norm.

Equally. an anxiety that he theorizes explicitly in Parables and to Mrica an unethical lack of attention to specific African cultural dif- Fables. framework of the anthropologist's knowledge. even local dis- noting nevertheless his ambivalence towards Marxism. Mudimbe then notes a out the difficulties associated with certain philosophical approaches. figures such as Senghor and. finally. ist method. in a chapter on "Anthropology and Marxist in his Confessions that "in truth. fact to be observed and studied by the anthropologist. Although he courses on Africa. and suggests that although in Anti-Oedipus mastery and self-presence. Mudimbe reads Sartre's reworking of Descartes. after which the African becomes an empirical . Mudimbe examines the use of Marx in the work of Deleuze Sartre's concept of self-consciousness severs the Cartesian ego's apparent and Guattari. analogies and resemblances in figurative and Fables cited above. Anthropology or ethnology will always be circling around Africa': but the problem was that they thought in the 1960s that '~ca this hidden. Furthermore. although again the cal groups: anthropological philosophy. The Anatomy of Melancholy (1989) portrays the "savage" as a faceless Like The Invention of Africa. More broadly. in that he theorizes an unconscious claim discourse. according to Mudimbe. xvii). and shows how ferences. while dictionaries of the sixteenth century baldly use the term number of forms of African knowledge or "gnosis" in order to pick '1\. Marxist projects. and. speculative and critical philosophy. This volume also includes examination of myths of Africa reach- reference to which he adheres here. Uneasy about the Western frames of other. identifies himself as a Marxist intellectual in the extract from Parables turn on "figures and images. In addition. Mudimbe nevertheless uses these ing as far back as Philostratus's story of Hercules among the pygmies thinkers to argue that the contemplation of African cultures requires a of Libya. but it is worth cultures to suit the imagination of the West. I am not 'me' but the weakest most Discourse': Mudimbe offers a critique of Peter Rigby's Persistent Pas- humble of others" (Mudimbe 1991: xiv). Ironically. Levi-Strauss goes fur. the upshot of which is a further critique of the Marx- Rousseau's thinking to inform his conception of ethnology as a con. but he also perceives in the application of Marxism subjugated Mrican. being is a tension between the they seek to undermine imperialist forms of history.ethiops" to name any dark-skinned person. which comprises also as that of Marxism) on the unfamiliar other. promoted the "dubious acculturation of Marxism in (ibid. unconscious.: 71). of the subject. Levi-Strauss in turn allows toralists (1983).: 184). and includes further comments both on i Levi-Strauss also throws into question the position of the anthropologist the political successes of Marxism and on its obfuscation of the African in relation to the other he analyses. Robert Burton's in relation to the other. and Mudimbe exposes here the association between pygmies fundamental rethinking of the way in which the subject conceives itself and backwardness or straightforward stupidity. For Sartre. an extreme example of which might be Mobutuism. I to uncover "hidden forms': as well as shOwing how myths perform a Mudimbe's The Idea ofAfrica continues this critique of the creation of I search for "discreet. In addition. beyond ist social scientist. Africa as a product ofthe West. Mudimbe cites Rousseau's statement (ibid. In this way. which also includes linguistic tendency remains even now to ~pose various totalizing models (such philosophy. 168 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politiCS? 169 . the course of his analyses Mudimbe distinguishes three methodolOgi. Levi-Strauss llparakuyo precisely according to the dreams of the rational. Marxists tend to I Sartre presents consciousness as other to itself. the apparent rationality and the lOgical constructs of the visible surface" Mudimbe himself. for example. One understands oneself only as an other. overlook the question of the specific epistemological roots of their own i ther. Mudimbe then notes how in his Mythologiques. invisible. Mudimbe reads in detail Rigby's study of the llparakuyo frontation with the stranger that puts the ethnolOgist's very self into people of East Africa. the brute materiality of existence.:. but argues that Rigby conceives the future of the question. museum metaphilosophy.: xvi). indeed. "they make a in-itself. Parables and Fables sifts through a victim. move toward a possible universal historicization of individualities by ive consciousness. he is also deeply sceptical of its universalizing constructions that simulate reality rather than signifying or representing tendencies and suggests that the generalization of the Marxist model it" (Mudimbe 1994: 145). and the for~itself. There will not be space collections of "primitivist" art similarly serve to appropriate African here to explore all the thinkers analysed by Mudimbe. or under distinguishing types of interpretation of socioeconomic disharmonies" the gaze of the other. although succeed in organizing socialist societies" (ibid.or reflex. elusive and unconscious meaning that escapes the secure was an absolutely virgin terrain on which we could experiment and . containing structures" (ibid. Marx- reveals how "the master-meaning is always discreet. In change around the 1950s. Almost all the forms of knowledge discussed is another example of the "history of the same'~ Mudimbe's politics in Mudimbe's text are ultimately fictions that serve only to silence the may be Marxist.

and economic conditions associated with colonialism and its aftermath. This questioning has a particular resonance in the context of African is that it can be turned back on itself and denounced for its own failure to studies since. is the result of profound in Mudimbe's thought or in his novels as an identifiable essence. since the latter's deconstructive tion to infinite otherness while excluding particular others. or an African specificity. Just limits of its habitual Marxist and deconstructive para9igms. moreover. in the sense of an openness deceptive images. Marxist thinking promotes an ethics of liberation while glossing over However. and goes some way to promoting what Miller conceives as a . with Mudimbe and. Again. as Mudimbe shows. This elusive but specific . he does not offer a erner' who applies his own structures of knowledge to the African "void" constructive alternative. but as a self-consciousness and vigilant attention to the conditions and precepts horizon towards which the writer aspires even ifhe will remain unable of postcolonial philosophy. like Spivak. It is all the more urgent. One of the dangers ofMudimbe's form ofcriticism. then. studied history at the Sorbonne and. he lamentably fails to emancipate himself from the vicious influence even after the termination of its political grasp. that the philosopher should locate sophical mastery or totalization. His awareness of well as of uncertainty. African order of knowledge he certainly reaches tude. temology in this way directly answers back to a particularly pernicious Certainly it is true that Mudimbe spends rather more time unravelling set of Africanist stereotypes. Mudimbe is another thinker who questions not only political cal and an ethical project. This Miller's study Theories ofAfricans (1990) explores how the very practice means that Mubimbe may successfully offer a multitude of examples of of theorizing has been conceived as the exclusive domain of the West- invented or ideological Africanist representation. Masolo character. Mudimbe's project still champions a beliefin African authenticity. the African is conventionally per- attend to the subjugated others it seeks to rescue. conflictual and elusive. tutions in the United States. as in Spivak's work. for an independent. In addition. but he goes on to object that "although authentically African forms of knowledge. can be seen ostenSibly as both a politi- Finally. the loopholes and identifying the blindspots of existing discourses than create this authentic knowledge. nostalgic the multiple requirements of postcolonial African philosophy. includ- images of an original homeland or tradition. This authenticity is provocative. Mudimbe upholds a notion of specific African knowledge while persisting in depicting that know. Masolo's critique also rests on a partial misreading of ethnic specificity. Indeed. mask an or "blank. This necessary interplay between ethics and ethnicity in African studies. and the need to conceive both story of an African intellectual in Paris on a quest for African knowledge a specific African ethnos alongSide an understanding of its ineffability. although the impact of colo- Mudimbe makes an important contribution to the debate on the creation nialism on Africa is such that the native is never free from its intellectual ofknowledge. precisely because it is not figured precarious combination. like that ofSpivak. is the ing political and ethical requirements.': Mudimbe's recommendation for a specifically African epis- inability to redefine African culture authentically and on its own terms. beyond the forms of questioning proposed for example by Derrida. is (erroneously) seen to be at odds with his perceptive engagement with the philosophical archive. His readings. Christopher circle inherent in the deconstructionist stance" (Masolo 1994: 179). as Spivak seeks a form of subaltern agency while underlining the other's necessary Singularity or intractability. and deconstructive ethical thinking promotes atten- Mudimbe's use of deconstruction. having worked in various insti- but also the ethics of reading. Western creation of a positivist vision of African subjectivity. and in this search work both rescues the African from the myth of philosophical inepti- . is now a senior researcher at the Wits 170 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politics? 171 . D. once again. knowledge is at the same time what both Marxism and deconstructive The work of Achille Mbembe clearly emerges out of an engagement ethics ignore. savage. the Mrica ofMudimbe's novels is a site of conflict as able to follow through his celebration of the specific. and whose disoriented condition borders on schizophrenia. it is perhaps also relevant he does constructing a concrete image ofAfrican identity to replace these that Miller goes on to explain that ethics. Mbembe was born in Cameroon in 1957. for example. writing and theorizing about the other. and not the any more concrete notion of"ethnos". even if he remains anxious about how to . and he never has recourse to reassuring. his major achievement is perhaps towards the intractable other. and it is not always clear that Mudimbe is to reach it. The Rift. A. ceived to be incapable of philosophy and consigned to the status of a izes Mudimbe's work as deconstructive in its stated resistance to philo. Achille Mbembe ledge as fragmentary. who struggles to find himselfbetween competing discourses of African nevertheless offers a challenge to postcolonial thinking and exposes the history. then. from this point of view.

finished by perpetuating Marxist tradition" in favour of a psychoanalytic critique of the con. it involved no reciprocity oflegally codified obliga- exegesis of the structures of economic oppression. by the 1970s "the bulk of national wealth was. and colonial regime. 'There is no authentic African the chaotic economic structures of the new regimes. This structure of economic tion of the right to conquest together with the diminution of the right hierarchy and inequality stems. powerholders. fluctuate. to elucidate his critique. In addition. At the centre of this cluster is the notion of 172 understanding postcolonialism ethics with pol itics? 173 . Mbembe's . for all practical purposes. ated by mimicry of a discourse whose oppressiveness is persistent and part of the 'eminent domain' of a tyrant acting as a mercenary with state unrelenting.in individuals. One of the consequences 'The first section of On the Postcolony analyses structures of "com. cularity of state sovereignty learned during the colonial period. was published in English in 2001. and in some cases the dissolution of the public Mbembe argues that state sovereignty in the colony rested on the infla. Moving away from tions between the state. Like the work of Spivak and rested on the creation of a generalized. to justify its necessity and universalizing mission . and individuals" (ibid. Mbembe's approach promises to of establishing colonial sovereign authority was never a contract since.: 66). subordinated category subjected Mudimbe. has also led to deepening poverty.: Mudimbe's call for an African order of knowledge. culture. because at the same time were in this way fuelled by an unethical homogenization and subjuga- it reaches beyond both in its vibrant. This entanglement names not only the coercion exercised on order meaning. study opens with a critique of prevailing images of the African native 'This tyrannical form of state sovereignty was. and a series of recent changes in the way power is exercised violence into authorizing authority" (ibid. however. This again stems from the empty. from the violence and cir- to debate and discussion. however. society. appropri- as sub-human and. Mbembe first dismisses "an outdated together with a stratum of well-off planters.: 50). moreover. the author rails against ated by Africans after decolonization. direct and exploit. after independence. Recalling Mudimbe. once again. only then to lament the absence of a were formed in such a way as to deny individuals rights as citizens. 'The practical mechanics of engagements both with Marxism and with Derridean deconstruction. between reflection on processes of representation and strictly speaking. in typically colourful style. only the suppressed laughter gener. Public affairs quickly became confused with the use of unbridled study of the entangled forces of tyranny in postcolonial Africa offers a violence. to help produce an imaginary capacity converting the founding and identity. A these structures in the move from a colonial to a postcolonial regime. short. African traders came to occupy the "invention" of Africa by the imperialist visions of the West. for example the exclusion of the African from citizenship. the spread and the permanence of the famous work. as in the colonial vision of resistance that operates only within the repetition or simula. sector. of the economic structural points explored by Mbembe is that African mandemenf' or governance in Africa and explores the development of nations are unable to fit into the international division of capital. His thinking is highly innovative. then. Founded on an initial order ofvio. almost demonic vision of the tion of native others. as well as of ethical violence towards the other. Mbembe uses Derrida here to envisage law as circular is distinctive among the postcolonial studies discussed here for its focus or self-generating.: 25). however. "to give this regimes. colonial law. the colonial power then executes asecond order. the old hierarchies after independence. Mbembe then takes as a specific under colonialism. which refers to the sped:frc admin- sion and exploitation in Africa and offers insight into the troubling istrative system applied to natives in French colonies before 1945 that and persistent force of neocolonialism. and its very self-ratifying structure constitutes an act specifically on political regimes in Africa.Institute for Social and Economic Research in Johannesburg. Equally. Mbembe's writing is diverse and eclectic as a result of its to particular constraints and punishments. Mbembe goes on to explore tion of the ritualistic discourse of power. funds and the national treasury" (ibid. model described above. Mbembe's 42). and framework with which to conceptualize economic exploitation in the Mbembe argues that a structural problem was created because "the act African postcolony (Mbembe 2001: 5). example the notion of the indigenat. stratified labour market. because the structures of authority were. On the Postcolony. entanglement that perpetuates the violence of postcolonial African lence. Mbembe uses Derrida's understand. the new states struction of the African as Other. A third order follows and rationalized" (ibid. but also "a whole cluster of re-orderings of society. I drive to control.. ing of the violence of the law to argue that colonial sovereignty was Mbembe's next section examines what he terms the structure of self-creating and self-perpetuating. His most that assures the maintenance. 'This text theorizes contemporary forms of oppres. self-fulfilling injustices of the African postcolony. and observes that subjectivity in Mbembe's vision. In order positions as middlemen between colonial firms and consumers and. conceived as given.

(Ibid. but the analysis ends with a disturbing People whose identities have been partly confiscated have been reflection on the dislocation or dismemberment of any stable notion able. this excessive performance is an ognition of self-consciousness. must be his vision of terrifying emptiness beneath the simulacra discussed above. and critics have sug- sistent with Bhabha's theory of mimicry as a subversive performance gested that Mbembe's study would benefit from further attention to the of at once sameness and difference. that borders on inhumanity. so tumultuous and opaque tionalized "as a fetish to which the subject is bound. Mbembe stresses that the historical specificity of particular regimes. of a sense of fun. By taking over the signs the affirmation of free will. that makes him homo nevertheless grasp and anchor in pre-set certainty" (ibid. however. Power is manifested and disseminated explores an African verbal economy in which language is a discordant through excessive representation."private indirect government" and the weakening of state structures.: 104). effects this discourse leaves in the postcolony: "what death does one die ance' although this resistance will always itselfbe an empty practice. and HegeYs words become the arch example of colo- power is performed and inscribed. but which words must deployment of a talent for play. The very If the people can enact passing gestures of resistance. hence the obsession with ori. At the same time. but this undermining does not alter the practice of means that there is no longer a necessary bond between the ruler and performance and excess on which the regime continues to rely. oblivion in modern and contemporary discourse on Africa. commandement into a sort of zombie. If the Negro was annihilated by colonial performance rather than an affirmation of agency and a call for change. Mbembe also comments on fices. Mbembe goes on to ask what image of the simulacrum and its potential opening to a logic of resist. Mbembe uses Bakhtin to think through the splitting of the of an animal. turning the be achieved.: 197). however. Like Mudimbe. as well as cacophony adrift from referentiality.: 201). and he notes that the Negro in Hegel is empty simulacrum. serves as a pos- sible response to this oblivion. Mbembe's study concludes by calling for together their fragmented identities. any notion of "public good': Society is run by coercion. Hegel ludens par excellence" (ibid. the ruled. and a crisis in the taxation system boIs of ratification. in what form does he survive if he is living "when the time Mbembe argues: to die has passed"? (ibid. Mbembe notes also how HegeYs Negro is indolent bodily functions and orifices. tumultuous world of drives and sensations. a swarm of noise and energy that through images of sexual potency. hardly any sector The state can be de-authorized through the repetition of its own sym- is free from venality and corruption. through pomp and fables. The "commandement" fantasizes nial discourse in their reduction of the African native to a facelessness its power through images of penetration. Mbembe takes Cameroon as an example of a state in which the Hindu culture. and in the subject's as to be practically impossible to represent. vision of the "vulgarity': excess and theatricality of power in the post. however. This is equally a regime obsessed with covers only a void. in the chapter "Out of principle and have led to the dissolution of the crucial founding notion the World': Here Mbembe examines the function of annihilation and of common good. for Mbembe. in a manner con. to glue back of existence in the postcolony.: 11) It can easily be objected that Mbembe's analysis in On the Postcolony is both somewhat hyperbolic and extraordinarily generalized. whose mimicry allows for subtle shifts and hints of in fact deprived of this self-consciousness and consigned to the status subversion. term "postcolony" is a somewhat abstract notion. and phantasms of virility serve to mime state dominance over its HegeYs dialectic between the master and the slave and the mutual rec- subjects. language as performance gives little sense of how that freedom might gize their conceptual universe while. in the process. Mbembe tation as a mask through an examination of cartoon images of the observes that in certain African contexts poorly defined borders and autocrat. Mbembe can 174 understanding postcolonialism ethics with politics? 175 . In a manner that recalls Spivak's analysis of HegeYs misapprehension of colony. Like Fanon. The text pushes the analysis of the tyranny of representation the use of taxes to fund an apparatus of coercion have interrupted that in the postcolony perhaps furthest. a 'after the colony'?" (ibid. Mbembe explores the Hegelian image of Africa as "a vast "commandement" is constantly ratified by its own rituals and institu. discourse. precisely because there was this simulacrum. If the principle of taxation rests on the notion that both the Mbembe's study goes on to develop this exploration of represen- state and its citizens mutually owe something to one another. of regime will remain one governed by vacuous theatricality and carnival. Even more disturbingly. however. but the book's immersion in the tyranny of and language of officialdom. Laughter. they have been able to remythoIo.: 176). offering a The most famous part of Mbembe's analysis. and the body becomes the site on which and untrustworthy.

and if Mbembe moves furthest from any claim to subaltern agency or authenticity. Mudimbe and Mbembe all stantly reminds readers of her own complicity with the imperial- hold back from offering the sorts of emancipatory vision to be found in ism she sets out to undermine. and the more anxious. for example. it is perhaps ethics. be it in terms that are clearly Marxist and subjugates the native. The ethical critique of the violence of representation is. work is also distinctive for its self-consciousness. He may merely shake without crumbling the edifice of authority's simulacrum. this is perhaps a necessary testimony to the • Mudimbe's work consists in a political and ethical critique of perpetuation of yet more forms of oppression after decolonization. Mudimbe and Mbembe the "history of the Same': He calls for a more authentic form of suggests that the end of colonial or neocolonial oppression is neither African knowledge. the most sig. and how ways. also be accused of feeding off the very Western discourses he contests Key points in his own use of Derrida. ficulty of overcoming both colonial and postcolonial violence. Her readings of Marx tend to focus on textual slippages disturbing that Mbembe does not question whether the slave's capacity and moments of ambivalence. the for revolt in Hegel might provide the Mrican with a model for self. The ''Africanism: Mudimbe vilifies both the mechanics of the colo- most militant and politicized philosophers explored in this book write nial project and the forms of knowledge that support it. Her works denounce the ways in which subaltern women ill i conventional and facile oppositions between resistance and passivity.•. if the international division oflabour. He ar~es : in the lead-up to independence. In addition. and yet Spivak also criticizes the blindspots of liberation for the dehumanized African. and much of the work suggests that there is no clear road to . One ofSpivaKS key concepts is the "subaltern" or native info~­ ent strategy for change. tute forms of inequality that these thinkers all vilify. . His analysis is testimony to the dif- oppressive regimes apparent in some parts of postcolonial Africa. indeterminacy in his notion of value. power through subversive mimicry is certainly not presented as a coher. The deconstruction of state Derrida's engagement with Marx. Foucault and Bakhtin.."'1y and violence. 176 understanding postcolonialism ethics with polities? 177 . Indeed. then. ambivalent that knowledge about Mricans has often incorporated them mto and troubled work of thinkers such as Spivak. With Spivak and Mudimbe. insti. This form of reading is itself assertion. or the newly they also disallow resistance. Fanon or Gandhi. however. the systematic and total overthrow of such structures emerges as difficult to imagine. Her path to emancipation. but he also reminds us all too lUCidly of the power of representation when abused to the extreme in a world still ravaged by postcolOnial oppression. He reveals how these regimes or post-Marxist. and an awareness of the tyrannical forms and struc- tures of representation working on postcolOnial societies in diverse are characterized by excess.I deconstructive. and she con- While it should be conceded that Spivak. and she shows how their voices the liberatory tactics he does recommend do not provide an identifiable echo between the lines of Western philosophy and literature. Mbembe is apparently less openly self-aware than Mudimbe in his espousal of • Spivak's work draws on both Marxism and poststru~turalist theories and philosophies created in the West. vulgarity and theatricality. particular have been silenced. but he also denounces the violence of . while admitting that this authenticity is dif- imminent nor easily conceived. implies that postcolonial criticism requires both the denunciation of • Mbembe criticizes the way in which colonial law homogenizes political and economic inequality. he perhaps comes closest to communicating the horrors of a neocolonial discourse that uses representation or performance to back up its regime of tyran. If Mbembe deliberately sets out to undermine ant. I nificant strategy by which these thinkers construct their postcolonial critique. Mbembe ficult to attain. i African regimes in the postcolony. Furthermore. as she explores.

Despite the efforts of philosophers. at least at the time of publication while mo:-e "deconstructionist" thinkers such as Syrotinski or Philip in 1927. African neocolonial states depend on foreign capital. The Spanish conquistadors destroyed an abundant and progressive an~ Lazarus tum away from the "textualism" of Bhabha or Spivak. for eight example. this neo-imperialist economic oppres- This book has attempted to demonstrate that postcolonialism is a set sion is supported by Western academics blind to the experiences of the of at times overlapping and at times distinct strategies aimed at under. the split among readers of propped up by foreign investors. subaltern others to whom they claim to attend. If Mariategui serve to demonstrate to critics of British and French neo- ~e~da pornts out that ethics and politics require the deployment of colonialism just how long after independence the effects of imperialist different sets of concepts (he argues that the former insists on abso. but that capital is 178 understanding postcolonialism conclusion 179 . of op~ression is necessary for the establishment of a critique. Dernda and hIS followers must be embraced before political liberation Neocolonialism can be seen to operate in three principal ways that can occur. Kwame Nkrumah. In and art it is clear that it should not have to submit to a clear political Neo-colonialism. to Mbembe. because the bourgeoisie. neo-imperialist oppression remains formidable long after many col- onies achieved independence. Spivak reminds us that global capitalism and the international division of labour have entrenched the subjugation and exploitation initiated by colonialism and. despite the hostility accom. Western thinkers rely mining colonialism. critics and intellectuals. Mbembes horrifying exegesis of the future of the discipline i the African postcolony. In reality its economic . Nevertheless. Nkrumah explains that "the essence of neo-colonialism agenda. on technologies produced in the Third World and ignore the exploita- Postcolonial philosophy is a complex intermingling of political and tion on which the production of these technologies rests. demonstrates that although national liberation is becoming less and less viable. First. as well as wider forms of imperialist subjugation. some extent with both levels. even more. is that the state which is subject to it is independent and has all the panying debates among postcolonial readers. suggests that the drive for i power originally exhibited by the colonizer is now pushed to excess by local leaders and tyrants in countries such as Cameroon. even after emancipa- rules). commentators on postcolonial Latin America such as Jose Carlos i tures. remains in control of banks and indus- postcolOnial thought remains palpable. The need for postcolonial questioning did not disappear with the decolonization movements of the 1950s and 1960s. Mariategui's Seven Interpretive Essays on Peruvian lute openness while the latter requires the creation of norms and Reality explores the ways in which Peru is still. corrupted by the sin of conquest. Certainly. contemporary power structures are perhaps all the more pervasive because they are insidious. Glissant's work on Martinique. however. Glissant's work indicates that there should be a can be sketched briefly in this conclusion. and when the ethics of relationality is explored through literature colonial domination in the immediate aftermath of decolonization. politics remain a more or less anxious coupling detectable from Fanon system and thus its political policy is directed from outside' (1965: ix). the hierarchies and inequalities characteristic of the Conclusion: neocolonialism and colonial regime in its heyday are far from extinct in the French Over- seas Departments and Regions today. that the feudal economy that the colonialists instituted has not Leon. show how an understanding of both empirical and discursive struc. Lastly. of independent Ghana. and Mariategui insists. although abstract.ard IIllpl! that the ethical reading strategies recommended by been overthrown or replaced. while at the ethical thinking. But I hope to have shown that. indeed. postcolOnial ethics and outward trappings of international sovereignty. and theorists such as Spivak. vilifies the persistence of tion. "Materialists" such as Parry try. Moreover. the inaugural president ~istinct space for cultural and aesthetic postcolonial experimenta. Inca society. Mudimbe and Mbembe same time risking ventriloquizing for the other in their academic work. most of the thinkers assessed in this study engage at least to tion in 1824. domination persist.

more liberated for her own sake and ultimately for the sake of a healthy world structures of organization. as well as divisions between the First. Moreover. it is noteworthy that Nkrumah's. cooperative. This form of difference is J'jJegri.: 25) For Hardt and Negri. Having accomplished this gesture of assimilation.· not used for the development oflocal initiatives and instead entrenches under a single logic of rule" (Hardt & Negri 2000: xii). is to assert African unity. Furthermore. but Hardt and Negri show how the hybridities he mg lacked an understanding of the economic unity that might have champions as an alternative are themselves part of this new structure helped African development in the wake of colonialism. was politically ambitious. manage" (ibid. While old forms of colonialism revolve around a notion 9 f economics in the postcolony suggests that this foreign influence still of difference. color. Moreover. as well as from accepted because it can nevertheless be controlled. then. although Nkrumah's vision of pan-African union. in ~d Antonio Negri to have been transformed more recently into a new. sexual orientation. ment. It is nevertheless significant for as those of international law. the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the ~conomic power over African regeneration. by Empire's all-encompassing embrace: "the triple imperative of 'Ibis new system of Empire has emerged with the decline in the power Empire is incorporate. regardless i Secondly. the United Nations (UN) and North ¥1y current purposes that in the wake of independence neocolonial.: ~on of the power ofinternational capital has been seen by Michael Hardt 198). Second and 1hird Worlds. . and specifically and also signals the decline of factory labour in favour of "communi- .: xiii). Mbembe's study World Bank.: 201). · merely increases the debt of 1hird World countries. •omnipresent force. Young points out that his thiuk. Bhabha rails against the binary divisions that pit colomzer . (Ibid. however. it is an insidious ideology that seeks United States). he certainly postmodern. Furthermore. of Empire. creed. Empire presents itself as a broad totality outside history. gender. •which the African ex-colonies can attempt to resist this powerful and Although Empire names a new order of global domination. but "composed of a series of national and supranational organisms united while population movements might have the potential to work against 180 understanding postcolonialism conclusion 181 . but the it is only when artificial boundaries are broken down so as authors of this provocative study nevertheless argue that the movements to prOvide for viable economic units.that: according to Hardt and Negri. Nkrumah argues it is not a monolith and its multiple branches and processes may also.sm was conceived by Nkrumah as the ongoing dominance of foreign Monetary Fund (IMF). The force of Empire transcends the borders between · to serve the interests only of developed countries. but this must rpagisterial form of "Empire': This "Empire': according to Hardt and be cultural difference rather than political. Empire from the exploitation of the poor. and ultimately a single of "the multitude': the poor and disenfranchised. on the contrary. of the nation state and can be seen as an alternative form of sovereignty in this new structure of Empire migration occurs ona massive scale. and wields its power in a to ring hollow and he became something of a dictator. its pro- : or later weapons fall into the hands of the opponents of the neocolonial cesses of globalization bring new economic structures but also regulate regime and war perpetuates the ex-colony's misery. in a third move- C11d forms of imperialism that still rely on a notion of state sovereignty. at the expense of local regeneration. The only way in social life and human nature itself by means of its regime ofbiopower. Empire is. blind to difference: "all are welcome within its boundaries. however. of race. trigger the invention of new democratic forms. or through the International . the sorts of postcolOnial criticism offered by thinkers such as Bhabha engage with old forms of colonialism ~d However. and so forth" (ibid. influenced imperialism. Even more. military aid also stalls rather than promotes development since sooner cative. and affective labour" (ibid. against this apparently African unit. Nkrumah as a network of power and does not originate in a single source (this is argues that neocolonialism is pernicious because it executes power not a name for the diffuse power held over the rest of the world by the without assuming responsibility. economy. and later Spivak's. '~d': for example. capable of recognizing difference. International capital controls. concep. is quite distinct from colonialism as settlement. This structure has already moved away from the divisions :Mudimbe notes that once he was in power Nkrumah's rhetoric started that Bhabha spends his time challenging. differentiate. that Africa will be able to develop industrially transcendent system of Empire might bring alternative.by Marxism. Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Hardt and Negri stress that Empire is. against colonized. a second movement. the world this point of view is decentred and deterritorialized: it manifests itself market. nations. '\Vields power today. multifaceted but global form through institutions such failed to put his ideals into practice.

lik which ~e mul~tude might practically organize itself so as to challenge questions . Postcoloniali~ tips over :. their writ. if Hardt and Negri intend to update thinkers and. for the anthropological infonnation they proVIde. For Huggan. together with Huggan's denunciation of . deterritorializa. because it signals at least the These sorts of observations paint a rather pessimistic view of the peginnings ofa shift in the workings ofimperialism beyond the confines discipline. The the misinformed and careless treatment of literary texts. ity as it manifests itself in the present. self-image of intellectuals who view themselves (or have come to VIew themselves) as postcolonial intellectuals" (1994: 339) and. of criticism might apply to some. It is perhaps rather strong to als to engage with the structures and mechanics ofpostcolomal mequal- denouncepostcolOnialism necessarily as a function of neocolOnialism. Certainly. the controlling grasp of Empire. then. ~owever. more of "global citizenship" that Hardt and Negri offer as a force of resistance nuanced study The Postcolonial Exotic (2001) emphaSIZes that thIS s~rt to ~mpire is hopelessly impractical. Ahmad perceives postcolonial theo~ Negri detect a force for the dismantling of Empire. (2001: vn) labstract. like Ahmad. as representa~ves of 1hir~ : ti?n of Empire. and the problems associated with Hardt and Negri's work. suggest that there remams a failure amon~ m~ellectu­ very diSCipline of postcolonial studies. More broadly. academic concepts like postcolonialism are turned. diffuse ~d ~ifficult to pin down. IT . into watchwords for the fashio~­ [of the nation state. Dirlik goes on to argue that the focus on culture obfuscates. For D. de~plte :the recent. smoothed-out postcolomalism is "a discourse that seeks to constitute the world ill ~e order of global capital. not merely when Its propo- they fail to offer a properly political account of how that attack migh~ nents draw on culture and theory. of the potential complicity of academic study with the illternatlOnal : ing lac~ elucidation of the sorts of workable revolutionary strategies division of labour. rhetOric of "security" has in fact strengthened again the power their historicist pretensions. postmodern creativity of Deleuze and Guattari's A Thousand 'flateaus ~an to ~tant Marxism. Hardt and Negri's text is an extraordinarily bold endeavour to rewrite Marxist theory for the twenty-first century.the ph~nomenon ~f cultural : The third approach to neocolonialism pertinent here refers to the commodification. Slavoj ZiZek comments that the notion cate the oppressive structures they set out to critiqu~. Ism of Empire is vulnerable to attack from the forces of the multitude into a sort of neocolonial exoticism.st analYSIS for the postmodern. The aporias ofDerrida's thinking around colomalism and 182 understanding postcolonialism conclusion 183 . but when its consumers fail to read take place. their cosmopolitan background. ~ound ill Marx or Gramsci Although they argue that the new capital. As Paul Gilroy (2005) has shown. Huggan's. indeed. The process of decolonization but radical Marxists such as AlImad and Dirlik nevertheless lament produced militants such as Fanon and Gandhi. this is: Left Review in 2000. liberation and equality lack that precision of focus perhaps beca~se the and vilify the postmodernist celebration of postcolOnial cultures as a forces of oppression are now rather more insidious. ~f the nation state. work deserves mention here. in his review of Empire published in the New postcolonial texts properly. wh~n . it has also been criticized for its abstract jargon and its material conditions. however. when literary works like Chinua Achebes i dIagnose the end of old power structures in their argument that the Things Fall Apart (1958) are gleaned.reliance on hierarchies of sovereignty. global commodification of cultural difference. post-imperialist era. sp~ci:fic en?c:I. but more recent calls for the c~~licity of postcolOnial academics in the West with capitalism. It is in this mobility that Hardt and commodification of otherness. and it has been highly influ. postcolomal catio~ of state ~orders. Gopal Balakrishnan suggests that Hardt and Negri when creative writers like Salman Rushdie are seen.na. In addition. its status. the danger lies rather in the broader. despite therr: fictional •smooth force field ofEmpire replaces the "striations" of imperialism. Hardt and Negri somewhat prematurely World countries. but the manner in a "marketplace of ideas" adrift from real political and econonnc as of inequality and oppression (Ahmad ~992: 70) . often they lead in the end to further disenfranchisement and poverty. Both commentators believe that postcolomal mtel- pnvilegmg of buzzwords such as "deterritorialization" and "hybridity" lectuals' lack of attention to global capitalism means that they obfus- over concrete economic analYSis. since it implies literally the eradi. the dommant sItes of power remains elusive in this new. In Huggan's tenns. despite ! underplay the significant role played by the United States in the control : of global capital in their inflation of the postmodern. and dismisses perhaps rather swiftly An exoticism complicit with neocolonialism occurs precisely through :the potentially lingering effects of old forms of neo-imperialism. we have already seen that Spivak is ~ighly a:ware Ma. The text of Empire is as a result rather closer to the able study of cultural otherness. but certainly not all.

but rather to use their reading strategies to undermine the violent. Levinasian or even humanist terms. and ch~ge. and although reSIstance to such injustice may be conceived in neo-Marxist.struggle between different forms of critique. It is perhaps iety now inherent in the discipline in itself reflects a useful vigi- : not the role ofpostcolonial philosophers to herald new political regimes. Huggan argues more ~f postcol~mal studies. the old imperialism has been replaced by compelling. their critique relies on this attention to the ways in Iwhich colomal knowledge is created in language and disseminated in [texts. Keypornts ethnocentris~ t~stify to a. "Empire" is linked to the economic and to ?mpomt the workings and effects of globalization. but at the time of writ- ~g it ne-:ertheless testifies to a new openness in philosophical language 'l-ppropnate to the demands of postcolonialism. out m the production. but it also signals a reliance on old categories rather than "Empire": a diffuse network of power operating beyond the bor- the ~ve~tion of a n~w idiom. are united in their careful exegeses of the blind- inesses and errors of the colonial discourses they read and. c?nsumers to whom Huggan refers. tion share IS a commitment to careful reading and writing. In a~~ition. models of reSIstance to postcolonial and neocolonial domination. To a greater or lesser extent. violence enact both political and ethical injustice. and at times an acute anxiety. NATO and the UN. I ngo~ous readers. and should perhaps be surpassed in the ~ture by a more affirmative mode of discourse. postcolonial philosophers express F the:r wnting a lucidity. the World Bank. but postcolonial political forces of globalization and is propagated through organi- philosophy c~ntinues to struggle to come up with broader conceptual zations such as the IMP. h~wever. Finally. • Critics such as Dirlik suggest that postcolonial studies itself as a . Bhabha Iand SPIVak. then. Unlike the that celebrates literatures from the colonies and ex-colonies but . tions of imperialist and neo-imperialist ideology. Said. postcolonial philosophy offers new modes of writing [that are VIgilant towards the potential assumptions and biases of the !critic. lance with regard to processes of representation. ! deco~struct!ve. in relation to their own project that stems from an unprecedented awareness of ~e ethics of theorizing itself. all the postcolonial thinkers explored :here learn from their own subtle reading strategies and engender on !that basis an alternative mode of theorizing that resists temptations of IIDastery and assimilation. although their lap~roaches ~iffer. for example. what many thinkers writing after decoloniza- specifically that postcolonial studies have created a new "exotic" . This anxiety may rightly be conceived to lillpede direct political action. From Said and the Subaltern Studies Collec- pve ~oug~ ~o Derrida and Spivak. and the eclectICIsm of SPIvak or Mudimbe equally betrays a restless. • Nkrumah conceived neocolonialism as the ongoing dominance ness and an anxiety concerning the tools necessary for emancipation of foreign economic power over African regeneration. ~espite the uneasiness that persists in the discipline discipline is complicit with neocolonialism. the philosophers explored here are that elides their historical specificities. to the challenges . but the anx- . Political science may well be equipped ders of the nation state. The return to a form of humanism in many thinkers is • For Hardt and Negri. diffusion and consumption of texts. These discourses of postcolonial. conclusion 185 184 understanding postcolonialism . the philosophical Iand di~cursive core of that injustice must be denounced. of reading and writing about cultural difference in the current ~ masterful and ethnocentric modes of thinking that lie at the founda- postcolonial context. a~entive to the ways in which colonial power is played • The future of postcolonial studies remains uncertain.

How was Said's Orientalism criticized? 4. Nandy and the Subaltern Studies Collective L Why does Gandhi vilify modern civilization? 2. How does Gandhi define Indian civilization? 3. How does Levinas conceive the relation between politics and ethics? L What examples does Derrida offer ofthe ethnocentrism ofWestern philoso- phy? two Fanon and Sartre: colonial Manichaeism and the call to 2. How does Fanon respond to the politics of nationalism? than the former work? 7. How does Foucault conceive the effect of power on the construction of the one Introduction individual subject? 3. What does Gandhi mean by "Swaraj"? 5. 7. What does it mean if the colonial structure is "Manichaean"? 8. How does Derrida conceive the relation between the universal. In what sense is Fanon's thought ethical? course? 5. In what ways is Bhabha's recent writing on minority rights more politicized 6. nationalism: Ga'ndhi. 6. How does Bhabha conceive the role of theory? colonialism? 6. What is the relation between politics and ethics in Derrida's thought? 2. In what ways was Marx ambivalent in his attitude to colonialism? 5. How is Gramscls notion of hegemony distinct from Marx's concept ofideol. What do you understand by the term "satyagraha"? 4. How does Sartre position the colonizer in relation to the colonized? questions for discussion and revision 187 186 understanding postcolonialism . Define the Levinasian concepts of Totality and Infinity. Analyse Fanon's use of the term "negro". Why does Chatterjee conceive the Indian nation as ambivalent? four Foucault and Said: colonial discourse and Orientalism L How does Foucault theorize the position of the minorities or marginalized subjects in both Madness and Civilisation and Discipline and Punish? 2. White Masks? 4. What does Bhabha mean by the "Third Space"? 3. How does Derrida conceive the relation between language and colonial- arms ism? 3. 7. How does Fanon use and critique psychoanalytic models in his analysis of 5. the specific L How does Fanon configure the relation between black and white in Black and the singular? Skin. community. How does Nandy use Gandhi's thought? 7. How does Nandy understand the psychology of colonialism? 6. three Decolonization. What aspects of Levinas's thought can be used to offer a critique of colonial- ism? five Derrida and Bhabha: self.'sapproach differ in Culture and Imperialism and in Oriental- colonial thought? ism? 5. What are the basic tenets of Said's humanism? 6. How does Said. What were the main objectives of the Subaltern Studies Collective? Questions for discussion and revision 8. What criticisms were levelled against Foucault's conceptions of power and L What is the difference between colonialism and imperialism? subjectivity? 2. What does Said mean by the term "contrapuntal"? ogy? 8. other and postcolonial ethics 8. How does Marx's theory of ideology inform more recent forms of post. How does Sartre conceive the role of negritude? 8. What is the difference between postcolonialism and postcoloniality? 4. How does Said define Orientalism? 3. How does Bhabha explore the notion of ambivalence in colonial dis- 4. 7.

What does postcolonialism tell us about the power of representation? Howard Caygill's Levinas and the Political (2002) provides a detailed summary of 4. How does Khatibi describe his "pensee autre" of the Maghreb? 2. followed by Elleke Boehmer's Colonial and Postcolonial Literature (1995). is the best way to offer resistance to the deluded dis- courses of Africanism? to postcolonial literature. How is Khatibi's thought at once ethical and political? 5. Ania Loombas Colonial- 8. Examine the importance of gender in Spivak's Critique of Postcolonial Reason. In what ways does Spivak draw on Derrida? There are several introductions to postcolonialism that might complement the 4. Young's book includes the best introduction to Marx's 1. six Khatibi and Glissant: postcolonial ethics and the return to place 1. Frantz Fanon (2003). White Masks (1968) and The Wretched ofthe Earth (1967). Gareth Grif- fiths and Helen Tiffin's The Empire Writes Back (1989) is one ofthe first introductions 6. and the slim volume by Marx and Engels On Colonialism Huggan? (1960) presents a series of extracts in which the philosophers comment on coloni- 2. and Ato Quayson's Postcolonialism (2000) offers an interesting take on the practice endorsed by the discipline of postcolonial studies. are the available forms of postcolonial resistance? ismlPostcolonialism (1998) is an introduction to postcolonial culture and thought. The best guide to Fanon's work is Nigel Gibson. How does Spivak criticize existing accounts of the Hindu immolation of one Introduction widows? 3. How does Spivak read Marx? 2. 3. two Fanon and Sartre: colonial Manichaeism and the call to arms The two important works by Fanon are Black Skin. 7. David Macey's biography Frantz Fanon (2000) helps to situate his work in the context ofhis career and political activism. for Mudimbe. for Mbembe. The Cambridge Companion to Postcolonial Literary Studies (2004). edited by Patrick 5. How might postcolonialism divorce itself from neocolonialism? alism. Mudimbe. What. Colonial Discourse and Postcolonial Theory (1993). Mbembe 1.88 understanding postcoioniatism further reading 189 . How is neocolonialism defined by Nkrumah. contains many key essays. Bill Ashcroft. In what ways does Khatibi draw on both poststructuralism and Marxism? 3. What does Glissant conceive as the ultimate aim of Caribbean Discourse? Guide to further reading 8. What is the difference between "history" and "History" in Glissant's think- ing? 6. Can postcolOnial ethics and politics be reconciled? his engagement with National Socialism and totalitarianism. Ato Sekyi-Oto's book Fanon's 1. How does Mbembe theorize the operation of power in the postcolony? edited by Neil Lazarus. seven Ethics with politics? Spivak. What are the diverse features that make up the notion of"Antillanitr? 7. and by views on colonialism. Describe the form of cultural production recommended in The Politics of Relation. by Hardt and Negri. updates some of this earlier work. Robert Young's comprehensive eight Conclusion Postcolonialism (2001) is a long and highly detailed exploration of colonial history and postcolOnial thought. What. What sorts of African "gnosis" does Mudimbe vilify? Williams and Laura Chrisman. What does Khatibi perceive as the effects ofhilingualism? 4. present study. A lucid introduction to Levinas in general is Colin Davis's Levinas {1996).

of deconstruction more broadly. colonial Theory (1999) offers a sophisticated reading of his novels as well as his theory. Bhabha. Young's White Mythologies and Moore-Gilbert's Postcolonial Theory con- theory (1997). Homi Bhabhis key work is the volume inialiSm. For more information on the Subaltern oj the Maghreb (2003) contains a chapter on Khatibi and multilingualism. Michael Dash provides an overview in Edouard Glissant (1995). ~1994) develops Said's thinking in the context of globalization. ·Dialectic oJExperience (1996) offers a detailed reading of the philosophical under. land his An Autobiography or The Story oj My Experiments with Truth (1982) six Khatibi and Glissant: postcolonial ethics and the return to ~ogether with Hind Swaraj (1997) also clarify his intellectual development and key place fdeas. but good examples are again Young's White Mythologies and Moore-Gilbert's Postcolonial Theory. but Maghreb pluriel (1983) is the key volume pn his thought. Mudimbe. An example of his . and Peter Hallward offers a provocative critique of Glissant in Absolutely Postcolonial (2001). Glissant's iJnd Gayatri Spivak's volume Selected Subaltern Studies (1988) provides a useful Caribbean Discourse (1989) and The Poetics oj Relation (1997c) are key theoretical i:Jverview. Criticism of Bhabha is abundant. The Invention j::ontains some commentary on his work. other and postcolonial ethics Fables (1991). Michael Syrotinski's Deconstruction and the Postcolonial (2007) edited collection Fanon (1996) includes essays on a variety of aspects of his thought. IA useful selection of Gandhi's writing can be found in The Essential Gandhi (1962). Mbembe ?nly full volume devoted to the links between Foucault's thought and questions of folonialism. Disclipline and Punish (1991) and PowerlKnow- ~edge (1980). texts by Glissant available in English. but Reda Bensmalas Experimental Nations. Celia Britton's Edouard Glissant and Post- rincializing Europe (2000) expand on the journal's mission. and more critical viewpoints can be found in J?dward Said (1992). Ashis Nandys The IntImate Enemy (1983) is the principal text for for an understanding of his thinking on postcolonialism. and J. but Young's Postcolonialism ofKhatibi in English. Dennis Dalton's Mahatma Gandhi (1993) explores Gandhi's life and work. but good ~xamples include Young's White Mythologies and Bart Moore-Gilbert's Postcolonial (1988) is also a useful place to start. The best reading ofMudimbe can be found in Syrotinski's Singular Performances (2002). Fd ~hikhu Parekh'~ Gandhi~ Politica~ Philosophy (1989) concentrates specifically Khatibi's work is not widely translated. deconstruction in White Mythologies and in the essay "Deconstruction and the Post- . Ann Laura Stoler's Race and the Education oj Desire (1995) is the seven Ethics with politics? Spivak. Most Critique oJPostcolonialReason (1999). Edward Said's volumes Orientalism (1995) and Culture and Imperial- Spivak is a prolific writer. David Huddart's Homi K. Young's Colonial Desire (1995) is an intriguing study of the notion of hybridity. There is also a useful collection edited by Michael Sprinker entitled tain intelligent readings of Spivak. Mbembe's important text is On the Postcolony (2001). Bhabha (2005) is a useful summary of Bhabhas Nandy. Key works by Mudimbe include The Invention ojAfrica (1988) and Parables and five Derrida and Bhabha: self. as does Philip Leonard's Nationality between Post- nialism and Neocolonialism (2001) offers a useful survey of Sartre's writing on colo. Global Designs (2000). nationalism: Gandhi. and Guhas Dominance without Hegemony (1997) and Chakrabarty's Pro. and the volume Colo. White's colonial" (2000). Relevant works by Michel Foucault include Madness and Civilisation (200la). community. while The there is a chapter on Mbeme in Syrotinski's Deconstruction and the PostcoloniaL Monolingualism oj the Other (1998) contains specific commentary on colonialism in Algeria Young has signalled the importance of postcolonialism to Derridean 190 understanding postcoionialism further reading 191 . structuralism and Postcolonial Theory (2005). D. contains exposition not only ofDerridas relation with postcolonialism but also that Sartre's Orphee noir (1948b) presents his views on negritude. The ~rchaeology oJKnowledge (2001b). Writing Rights" (2003). and Derridas OJGrammatology (1976) outlines his critique of ethnocentrism. and Lewis Gordon. Mark Sanders's Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (2006) is a clear. Young's White Mythologies (1990) situates Sartre in relation to the broader The Location oj Culture (1994). The famous essay "Can the Subaltern Speak?" mtroductions to postcolonialism contain detailed commentary on Said. also containing discussion of the recent work on minority rights. Nandy has tended to be under-studied. synoptic introduc- I ! tion. the best place to start is the journal Subaltern Studies. and The Spivak Reader (1996c) contains many key essays.recent writing on rights is "On ihistory of colonialism and postcolonialism in twentieth-century thought. Sharpley-Whiting and R. Postmodernism and Globalism Benita Parry's Postcolonial Studies (2004) and in Aijaz Ahmad's In Theory (1992). There is also little criticism ptudy used here. or. Walter ~tudies Group. but a lot of her thinking is condensed in the volume A jsm (1993) are his most frequently cited interventions into postcolonialism. Ranajit Guha Mignolo champions Khatibi in Local Histories. T. Bryan Turner's Orientalism. and the Subaltern Studies Collective thought. used by three Decolonization.pinnings of his work. Chris Bongie's Islands and Exiles (1998) situates him in relation to Caribbean and Creole four Foucault and Said: colonial discourse and Orientalism culture more broadly.

H. ArifDirlik's The · Postcolonial Aura (1997) offers a critique of the neocolonialism ofpostcolonial stud- ies. "On Minorities: Cultural Rights': Radical Philosophy 100 (March-April): 3. eight Conclusion: neocoloniaJism and the future of the discipline The key work by Kwame Nkrumah on neocolonialism is Neo-colonialism (1965). M. H. Godzich & W. 186-203.eduJpmc/issue. Manchester: Man- chester University Press. Seattle.html (accessed November 2008). 1995. London: Verso. H. J. London: Methuen. 01. Both : are long. Bhabha. Gibney (ed. Jacques Derrida. Howard (trans. G. Colonial and Postcolonial Literature: Migrant Metaphors. Experimental Nations.). Barthes. Empire of Signs. G. A. 1987. Ahmad. The Invention of the Maghreb. Chicago. B. Althusser. 2000. Alloula. Literatures. 1983. & J.). J. Balakrishnan. Griffiths & H. Harmondsworth: Penguin.1. Achebe.) 1990.virginia. Austen. "Day by Day': In The Fact ofBlackness: Frantz Fanon and Visual Representa- tion. detailed explorations of the authors' controversial theory. 2003. Read (ed. Tiffin 1989. Godzich (trans. Essays on Ideology. C. H. and Graham Huggan's The Postcolonial Exotic (2D01) explores the marketing • of postcolonial literature. "Exiles on Main Stream: Valuing the Popularity of Postcolonial Litera- ture': Postmodern Culture 14(1). Bhabha. Nation and Narration. Bhabha. Oxford: Oxford University Press. In Theory: Classes. H. Princeton. followed up by Multitude (2004). (ed. NJ: Princeton University Press. The Location of Culture. R. 2003.2000. London: Routledge. IL: University of Chicago Press. E. R. The Empire Writes Back: Theory and Practice in Post-colonial Literatures. "On Writing Rights': In Globalizing Rights: Oxford Amnesty Lectures 1999. Nations. 162-83. Oxford: Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bennington. 1992. The Colonial Harem. A. London: Routledge. CA: Stanford University Press. 192 understanding postcolonialism bibliography 193 . David Bibliography Scott's Refashioning Futures (1999) is a more general exploration of the future of postcolonial thought. Boehme:r. Young's Postcolonialism also contains summary of Nkrumah's career. Palo Alto. Interrupting Derrida. Islands and Exiles: The Creole Identities ofPost!colonial Literature. Ashcroft. M. Bhabha. C. Edward Said: Continuing the Conversation: 371-80.1bongie.). 2003.903/14. ':Adagio': Critical Inquiry 31. wwwlath. 2005. 1984. London: Routledge. K 1992. 2000. G. Bhabha. Things Fall Apart. WA: lCA and Bay Press. 1996. C. Bongie. Bongie. 1998. R.. BensIDala. Derrida 1993. G. Hardt and · Negri's provocative volume is Empire (2000). 2003.). Appiah. London: Routledge. 2006.. Bhabha. Bennington. Another provocative article on the commercialization • of postcolonial studies is Chris Bongie's "Exiles on Main Stream" (2003). Mansfield Park. 1994. London: Cape. London: Verso. Harmondsworth: Penguin. "Yrrgilian Visions': New Left Review 5: 142-8. H. In My Father's House: Africa in the Philosophy ofCulture. M.

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125.147-8. 122.183-5. 48. 108. ideology 2. 16. 112.125. c.156.59. 147 Koran 127-8. 26-7.115. R 83.145.121. .147.143.162 146. N. 116.130. 156. G. Y. S.51. 183. 55. 10.57.110.164. A 43. 97 and Sartre 35-53 Morocco 41. 33. 190.155.127. 98. 133-4 Dirlik. 7l. M.172.62 and Spivak 151-5.100-107. Sartre on 43-52 and Levinas 20-23 187. 54.15-23. K 6-15. 94.152.189 Palestine 22.149 i Diaspora 22.178. 74 Descartes.152.22.81.101.184.135-50. B.24. 156.96. 185. 131.159. 108. J.135. 96 Guattari. 161 and Glissant 139. M.77. V.80-81. 136-9 113.97.47.115. 152.43. 122. 130. E. 128.119. 61.8. C. 22.138.124.122. 175. 95 170-72. 101. c.J.24.104. Memmi.32.119.183 exotidzation 5 Huggan.164.144 Israel 21. 125.7-8.76. 183. J. 140 75 i Caribbean 27. 151. 128. negritude 28. 124 Islam 22. 190 Latin America 3.108-13. 136.17. A.105-7 mission civilisatrice 9.175-8.159-60. 130.177. and Nandy 65-6 Jews 21. Nandy. 60 167. Guha. 191 masculinity 66-7 135-50.151.144. 186. and Derrida 99.191 Chakrabarty.54.157. Lamartine. 68-7l. 135 marvellous realism 145 Capeda. 157. 182 Louverture.190 188. 7l-3.131.189-90 industrialization 3. 52 European 44 exotidsm 88-9. 179 Patrick. 98-9. and Spivak 158 and postmodernism 161.54-75. 87 I 100. 6.27.182 and Said 77 ontology 16. 115.136.61.148.190 187. 182. A 15.93-4.49. 15.54.22.64.104. 96.140. 98 Judaism 22.173 gender 32. 191 ! Comad.175-6 152-60.96.187. 129.23.149 Gandhi. Critchley. 74.66.191 Parry.122.155. 101.186 Meddeb. 6.161. 100. G. 60. 179.74 133.85.161 Dash.54. 182. 118 .113.63-4. 64 i Devi. Lacan.23. 130. 64.149.187 and the Subaltern Studies Collective struggle against 11. A.162-3.131. 189 190 and Khatibi 126-8.191 ethnidty 81.49. 136.157.153. 52.149.64.150.141. 137.179-80 human rights 123-4. D. E.112.118 Rlpling.84. 84.98. Mudimbe. 22. 180. 32 Hegel.188 andMbembe 172 and modern dvilization 55.93.179. M.95.22. 188.27. 156. 17l-7.84.190 and Bhabha 116.121.190 161. D. 168 Hallward.R 104 and Gandhi 54-7.25-35.28. 189 124-5 Fuss. A 170 Caygill.184.152. 129 I 170. 103 Maghreb 126-35.F.151. de 88 and Sartre 50-51 and the Subaltern Studies Collective and Glissant 140 non-violence 55. P.8. 89-92. 93-8.186.27. 14.59. 119.deconstruction 22.164-7. 162.97.146.33.172.118. 57. 49. Coetzee.187. 112.180.124. 89. 69-72.188 and passive resistance 61-2. 57.135-50. 123. 191 Haddour. 164-7l.161. 123.74 and Mudimbe 166 North Africa 94. 11-12 Mannoni. 189 Negri.188. calligraphy 128.191 172.98. 80. S.9.157. J. 147 Hassoun. East India Company 7.63.76-97.134 Naipaul.35.126. 68-70. 87. Glissant. 125. 138.119.188. 14-15. H. 118.199. J.74-7.152.95.143. 97.28. P. 84.130 Ortiz. 105-7.150 India 3. : dialectic 27. 69-7l.161-5. 98-113.103. 8.23.112. 167.20. 176.56-9.28. and Fanon 38.J. 96. 95.155.119. M. V. M. P. 130. 164. c. 82.177.47. 27 Lazarus. 118 : Deleuze. 126.134. 15.31. ideological state apparatus 13 Mbembe.188.46.181 I colonial discourse 14. 176 ! colonial ideology 24-6.176. A.35.126-35.52. 131. 178 departmentalization 138 Hall. 97 dispossession 50. 192 Hardt.30. 34.181. 94.167.3.180. A 15. 130. 95.20.176.151.34.184.119. 31 passive resistance 56. 40. 190 115.24.156.179 National Socialism 6.117. Macey. 137 Orwell. 97. 60 103.60-63.126-7.147 . : 187. 63 I Chateaubriand 87-8 Fanon. 16. 6. L R 137 mimicry 41. 183. 67.190 158 Nehru. and Glissant 135-6.109. 182 63.167.188.D. 183 190 and Khatibi 130 global 153. 18. R 12.126.127.L 70 186. 7l.30. capitalism Eagleton. 121. 6-15.161. 178.88. A 22.3. 111 200 understanding postcolonial ism index 201 .121.17.191 Forster. 4.114. 62. 133.34.111-12 Flaubert.159. 22.28. 5. A 54. 166.E 140 : Djebar. 161 Heidegger. 122. 14.151.91.70 equal rights 123 Hinduism 55. G.101 and Said 84.130. 84-6. A de 87-8 National Liberation Front 25 andBhabha 114. G.175. M. 14. A 49.125 179. 69.60 exploitation 3. E 143. 88. T.R.190-91 130. 10.168 opacity 145.99. 174.180. 94. J.163.144. 106 Gramsci. 178. 23.68. Egypt 85-7 hybridity 68. 24. I Derrida.117. M.17.35.146. 67.44.15. E.92-4. 76-83.69. M. and Khatibi 129 Miller. 180-82 Martinique 25. Cesaire.151 metissage 140.132 187. 73 andMbembe 176-7 and Nandy 65-8 and Khatibi 131.12.91.108.74. 155. 58.187 metaphysics 16. 65-6. 103. 94. 94.33.52.127. 176.184. 125. 169. 98. 133 Gandhi. 189 ethnocentrism 22. W E 32.152.186. 68.20.179 Camus.188. A 11-14. B.182 24.48.127-35 creolite 139-41 femininity 67.105-7 Moore-Gilbert.186 logocentrism 101.107. O. 102.14.134.110.87-9 149. 27.178.34.184.118.123. A 180-82 and Foucault 82-3 Levinas.149 i Chow. S.G. Levi-Strauss. G. 36-7. 131 i 52. A 131-3 chaos-monde 146-7.109 Marxism 6-15. 161 Gilroy.178 James.169.6-15.44.182 Foucault.151. 89.191 Mariategui. humanism 27. 54-64. M. 95. M.129. 17l Masolo. 89 migration 144.191 166.103.145. 85. 44.64-8.183. 112. D. 88 Khatibi. 69. 135 Nerval. 164. Chatterjee.182. Marx.188-9 and colonialism 2.56.187 andMbembe 175.5. 17l 113-25. J. 154.156. 184. 178.135.182. T.

112.189. 15.118..81. 98.125.179 118.125 Taylor. M. 21 surplus value 7. 160 Subaltern Studies Collective 54.23.121. 97. 63. L A. 135 Salih. 105 Young.98. 140 '~ 164.180.14. 22. J. 91. 105.44-5.187..65..-.76. 62. 123 Thiong'o. 136-7. 104. 94 totalitarianism 15.56.78.74. 98. --~ ~ -.140. poststructuralism 23. 65 and Mudimbe 164. 154 .9.43.J. 187. I race 12. 61. 97 Shelley. 38·2931 . 103. 112. T.68-9. 168 swadeshi 63. 144 187. E.104 144-9 and Foucault 82. 188.178.48. INC.155. 191 and Derrida 103..20. D. M.140. transculturation 3.190. South Africa 26. O.181 and Spivak 157-63 Rhys. 57.40. 1.156. 189 Stoler. -~' .191 I poetics of relation 137. 6. 58 1l l l l l l l l i~iji imiii~ 39346 00961149 4 1111111111111111 paz. 151. 187 Scott. 64.170. 80-81.39.189-90 use value 153 and Fanon 30. 113. 28. Rousseau.180...191.90.A 123 68_75. A. 14-15 110.O:.62-4._ . T. N. 184. 128.77. 25.157. R 6. 66. 16. 163. In. 183-4.76.173. M.99. A. 167.. 8-11.190 ! Rosello. 105 sati 156-9 virility 34.76.192 Senghor.12. 182 DEMCO.51.48. 176-80.... 160-61 ZiZek.152. 64. 188.68-75. I Rich. J. 9. G. 14. 165 Todorov.~_ 202 understanding postcolonialism . 132.165.. V.174 satyagraha 58.179. 38 andMudimbe 167-8 Vichy 100.152. 4. 124. C.142.82. 77. peasantry 12.28. L S.58.60. 70 Rowlatt Bills 58 Swaraj 55. 169 sexuality 67.184. 96.. 190. 95. 103. 54. 82. 83-97. S. 112.124. 119 sovereignty 16-18.141.24.83 proletariat 6. 94-5. 14. 84. 38 and the Subaltern Studies Collective 73-4 Quayson. 32.22. 33. 16. 81 .67. 29.182 Perse.170. Segalen.63. 190 Syrotinski. 19.151-64. 74.189 Sartre. 144 162-3.73 123. 101. 105.51.190 andBhabha 114.177. Rimbaud. 147. 8.65.81.191 Said. _ _ _. J-P.~ subaltern 12.71.66. 43-53. . 144 Spivak. E.172. S..82.77. 164.186._ -_ _ _ _ -. .151."--.23. W..165. San Juan Jr.47.. j.. 33. 171.