Spivak & Marxism-Feminism (was Re: And another thing)

[kelley]

At 09:20 PM 7/17/00 -0400, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>Dennis:
>
>>On Mon, 17 Jul 2000, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>>
>> > Spivak, however, used to argue that trapped between the rock and hard
>> > places "the subaltern [e.g. poor women in poor nations] cannot speak"
>> > (I don't know if she's still committed to this statement).
>>
>>No, no, this was one of those rhetorical flourishes, kind of the 3rd world
>>equivalent of Adorno's quip, "To write poetry after Auschwitz is
>>barbaric".
>
>Yes, what she mainly means is (1) representation (e.g. speaking for 
>others) won't disappear; and (2) "The subaltern as female cannot be heard 
>or read" within the narrow terms of patriarchal nationalism & Western 
>liberalism.  I agree with Spivak on (1) & (2), but she put it rather 
>misleadingly in a way that casts doubt on the "subaltern's" ability to 
>ever learn & use a revolutionary discourse (such as Marxism-Feminism) on 
>her own behalf, instead of waiting for smart critics like Spivak to come 
>along and represent her.
>
>Yoshie

yeahsureright.  of course.  she spent enough time giving the sublatern 
studies groupa good swift kick  for imagining they could represent the 
subaltern in the name of the subaltern in their struggle against both 
western imperialism and nationalist politics. so i'm afraid that you've 
misrepresented her, yet again.  she doesn't say anything misleadingly in 
order to create a profession for herself, though she may be a nuanced and 
difficult read.  still and all, it appears that you simply present her 
misleadingly to make some imagined point about the superiority of your 
politics as opposed to a "postmodernist" or "left hegelian" or whoever is 
the current evil of the moment.

kelley