pcs

[renjith p george]

Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourse
Mohanty charges western feminist research with producing an image of a
homogenous 'third world woman' as victims without agency, oppressed by
family, culture and religion. Such research 'colonise[s] the material
and historical heterogeneities of the lives of women in the third
world' to construct a singular image of 'an 'average third world
woman'…[who] leads an essentially truncated life based on her feminine
gender (read: sexually constrained) and her being 'third world' (read:
ignorant, poor, uneducated, tradition-bound, domestic, family
oriented, victimized etc.), in contrast to the liberated western
woman' (p56).

Mohanty looks at representations of 'third world' women evoked in
writings by 'first world' feminists on subjects such as female genital
mutilation and Women in Development. The texts she looks at
consistently define women as objects of what is done to them, rather
than acting with any agency, and as victims of either 'male violence',
'the colonial process', 'the Arab familial system', 'the economic
development process', or 'the Islamic code'. Rather than starting from
lived experiences, this body of feminist writing tends to start from
the assumption of certain differences between first and third world
women, and between women and men in the third world, and analyse
material realities on this basis. At the same time, within the third
world, the same meaning and content are assumed to apply throughout,
for example to the sexual division of labour, reproduction, the
family, marriage, household, patriarchy, the veil etc. For instance,
the difference in meaning in wearing veils in different times and
places are ignored, and an arithmetic correspondence between numbers
of women wearing veils and extent of oppression is assumed. Mohanty
gives the example of different meanings of veiling in pre and post-
revolution Iran. Iranian middle-class women veiled themselves during
the 1979 revolution to express solidarity with their working class
sisters in opposition to the Shah and western cultural colonisation,
while in contemporary Iran, the law dictates that all women must wear
veils. Mohanty says her critiques can also apply to third world
scholars writing about their own cultures, particularly urban middle
class scholars who take their own position as the norm in writing
about rural or working class sisters. Her argument holds for anyone
who tries to set up their own standards as the yardstick by which to
'encode and create cultural others' (p.55). However, it is possible to
escape this trap. Some researchers, including westerners, have avoided
colonising the subjects of their research by focusing on local
particularities and by deconstructing, rather than taking 'colonial
preconceptions' as their starting point.
Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing
Theory, Practicing Solidarity
Chandra Mohanty became widely known and celebrated (as well as
critiqued) after her essay "Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship
and Colonial Discourses," which was originally published in 1986. This
widely cited and many times reprinted essay was hugely influential to
those of us engaged in cross-cultural feminist scholarship. The essay
demonstrated that many researchers, particularly those trained and
inserted within Western feminist scholarship, have tended to produce
monolithic, universalising, and essentializing constructions of women
in the Third World. Mohanty was particularly critical of the
discursive production of the `Third World woman' in writings on Gender
and Development that tended to erase historical and geographical
specificity. "Under Western Eyes" alerted us to the dangers of
assuming that women are a coherent group upon which social, economic,
or political processes act and enabled us, I believe, to produce work
which engaged more seriously with the politics of knowledge
production. I certainly have taken her words seriously and they have
greatly influenced my own research practices and philosophies in
Nicaragua and I have continued to use the essay as a basis for
discussion in classes. Thanks in large measure to Mohanty, we learned
the value of abandoning pretensions of global sisterhood in order to
build both solidarity and a more politically effective feminist
scholarship.
"Under Western Eyes" is the opening chapter of Feminism Without
Borders, a collection of mostly previously published work representing
Mohanty's significant contribution to feminist post-colonial and
transnational studies over the last two decades. Originally from
Mumbai, India and today living and working as a professor of Women's
Studies at Hamilton College in the United States, Mohanty has added
much to the debates on feminist epistemology and the politics of
location. I enjoyed re-reading many of these texts, and their
collection in a single volume is highly illustrative of the
contribution and the challenges Mohanty has made to cross-cultural
feminist scholarship.
The arguments in these texts will be familiar to many feminist
researchers, whether they are re-reading them or encountering them for
the first time. Indeed, at times from the vantage point of the early
21st century, many of Mohanty's well digested and debated arguments
now seem a little anachronistic. Of course, as Mohanty herself
acknowledges, many of these issues, despite theoretical development
and refinement by others, continue to be highly pertinent not just
because of the resilience of gender and racial inequalities but
because of the ways in which the latest phase of global capitalism, or
what Mohanty has referred to as the military/prison/cyber/corporate
complex, works to re-colonize marginalized subjects in complex ways
and undermine gains fought for and achieved.
It seems valid, given the nature of this text, to outline Mohanty's
contributions to this body of thought that are brought together in
this volume. One of Mohanty's central endeavours has been to put
issues of race and racism at the heart of feminist politics. Through
detailed analyses of other people's work as well as her own, Mohanty
clearly illuminates how race cannot simply be added onto gender as
another cumulative dimension of oppression but that ideologies of
masculinity, femininity, and sexuality themselves are racialized.
Mohanty also made calls in the 1980s for scholarship which is
geographically and historically specific. The most valuable kind of
feminist research is that which avoids specious generalizations about
"Third World Women" or "Women in Africa" and instead takes the lived
experiences of specific women as a basis for understanding and
theorizing. In this regard, labels and definitions must never be used
unthinkingly because they have the power to produce constructions and
understandings of gender and race as well as to reflect them. Another
of Mohanty's prime aims has been to make explicit and effective the
links between scholarship and activism. To do this, we need to
acknowledge differences between women (and avoid universalizing
narratives) while building coalitions and solidarities. Mohanty
retains hope in the possibility of building feminist solidarities
across national, racial, class, and sexual divides and suggests that a
way forward here is to understand and theorize how the lives of both
privileged and marginalized women are interconnected through global
processes. Mohanty's work also demonstrates how and why the politics
of location matter. Our personal backgrounds and experiences and the
identities we adopt for ourselves or have projected onto us have
political and theoretical implications with which we must engage.
Throughout this text Mohanty reflexively explores her multiple
identities, for example, as a member of the secular elite in India, a
foreigner in Nigeria, and a woman of color in the U.S., and shows how
these identities have informed and continue to inform her feminist
politics and scholarship. This is in keeping with Mohanty's constant
efforts to place experience at the heart of her work.
While she is clearly a standpoint feminist who believes in the
analytical value of historical materialism and rejects what she sees
as the cultural relativism of postmodernist thought, Mohanty is
theoretically promiscuous. She draws on Foucauldian perspectives when
necessary and her critique of universalizing positions means that her
ideas have had great appeal for postmodernist feminists. She aims in
her work to strike a careful balance between the discursive and the
material, between experience and theory, and refuses to privilege one
term over the other. Instead, she argues forcefully that feminist
struggles are fought on both an ideological, representational level
and an experiential, everyday level; thus she reminds us that the
value of theory resides finally in its political effectiveness.
The text is divided into three main sections: (1) Decolonizing
Feminism (2) Demystifying Capitalism (3) Reorienting Feminism. The
first, in addition to "Under Western Eyes," includes a reprint of a
chapter which originally appeared in 1991's Third World Women and the
Politics of Feminism, which also takes up the themes of knowledge and
representation, focusing on the relationship between Third World
Women, colonialism, and feminism. She illustrates how discourses of
race and racism, which are profoundly gendered in their dimensions,
were central to colonial rule. Given these legacies, writing - and in
particular the writing of the lives of Third World women - should be
seen as a political practice and should engage centrally with issues
of race and racism as well as gender. This first section also includes
"What's Home Got to Do with it?" in which Mohanty analyzes Minnie
Bruce Pratt's 1984 autobiographical narrative, "Identity: Skin Blood
Heart," and develops a complex approach to understanding the relations
between home, identity, and political change.
The second section brings together work on the gendered politics of
the global labour market as well as two chapters on the U.S.
university. Chapter 6 shows how ideologies of femininity, sexuality,
and race are central to understanding the global labour market. By
comparing the situations of workers in diverse locations, including
lacemakers in Narspur, electronic workers in the Silicon Valley, and
migrant women workers in Britain, (and by developing interesting
analyses of existing scholarship), Mohanty demonstrates how similar
ideological patterns exist within different class dynamics. She thus
enables us to think about common struggles without universalizing
women workers across the world. Chapters 7 and 8 provide insightful
approaches to pedagogy and the corporatized university. While Mohanty
is not unaware that certain contradictions inherent to capitalism lead
to the creation of opportunities as well as constraints, and though
she continues to view the academy as an important site of political
struggle and change, she is nevertheless highly critical of the
commoditization of higher education. She believes we need an anti-
capitalist and feminist lens though which to critique the corporate
restructuring of universities, which has decreased their public
accountability and poses threats to both citizenship and democratic
forms of participation. Mohanty offers a particularly interesting
analysis of how university authorities have enacted strategies
designed to reduce prejudice but which have instead created an
insidious kind of diversity management whose effect is to occlude any
awareness of historical contexts in favor of interpersonal ones.
The final section consists of just one ambitious chapter, "Reorienting
Feminism," which revisits "Under Western Eyes" nearly two decades
after its original publication and addresses some of the responses and
critiques of this significant essay. Here, Mohanty rejects the
postmodernist readings of her work and attempts to reconnect to both
materialist analyses and the universal. She urges feminist scholars to
broaden their concerns and focus their struggle within the anti-
globalization movement, where Mohanty finds hope for the future. This
essay also explores how we might teach feminist studies in the early
21st century and suggests we might reject courses that adopt Feminist-
as-Tourist (add and stir approach) or Feminist-as-Explorer (cultural
relativist approach) models in favor of a comparative feminist studies
alternative that would illuminate how the historical experiences of
U.S. women of color, white women, and women in the Third World/South
are interconnected.
One problem with this kind of book which draws largely on work
published in the 1980s and early 1990s is that it fails to account for
the significant ways in which more recent feminist research has
addressed many of the concerns raised in its first two chapters. There
is now a significant body of literature which attempts to make a
theoretically sophisticated sense of the links between gender and
globalization and of the importance of feminist struggles under
neoliberalism. Work of this sort by feminist geographers such as Sarah
Radcliffe, Nina Laurie, or Claire Dwyer is not even cited, despite the
insights it has brought to Mohanty's principal concerns. Much of this
work has addressed the multiple connections between constructions of
femininities, gender inequalities, and economic, cultural, and
political globalization processes, as well as the ways in which these
connections create both constraints and opportunities for women across
the world. While the last chapter of Mohanty's book attempts to
reflect on how `Under Western Eyes' has been received over the years
and to outline her current thinking on the issues raised, none of the
previously published works which are reprinted have been updated in
any way. In this respect, Feminism Without Borders represents a lost
opportunity to incorporate the insights of more recent feminist work
and to more fully acknowledge that we are in a vastly different
theoretical space today, thanks in part to the pioneering work done by
postcolonial feminists such as Mohanty herself. Nevertheless, this
collection would undoubtedly make a valuable starting point for
undergraduate students wishing to gain an accessible and engaging
overview of transnational feminist thought and how boundaries or
borders produce particular politics and identities.
Ranajit Guha on Elitist Historiography – An Analysis
The essay “On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial India” by
Ranajit Guha analyses and compares neo-colonialist historiography and
neo-nationalist historiography from the elitist perspective. The essay
also touches upon the subaltern groups’ contribution to Indian
Nationalism, which has been overlooked by the elite historiographers.
There are sixteen points discussed in the essay with reference to
bourgeoisie nationalist, colonialist, elite and subaltern tendencies
in the writing of Indian history. The essay speaks of both pre-
colonial and post-colonial India with reference to Nationalism.
The author begins by establishing the differences between the history
written by British elite groups and Indian elite groups. The British
adopt a method of neo-colonialism or the use of economic, political
and other pressures to control or influence a former dependency such
as India. This method is adopted chiefly by British writers but not
without Indian imitators. On the other hand, the neo-nationalists
attribute the entire credit of achieving Indian Independence to native
(Indian) elite groups. There are liberal British historiographers who
support this idea along with the Indian historiographers.
The one commonality however, is their prejudice to the elite class
making them predominant heroes who brought about the nationalist
consciousness in an otherwise subdued India.
In the neo-nationalist sense the Indian elite groups are made up of
Indian elite personalities, institutions, activities and ideas. It
seems correct, for, the Indian neo-nationalist history credits the
whole of the struggle for Independence as an act performed by a group
of elitist lawyers such as Gandhi, Nehru, Ram Mohan Roy, Tilak,
Gokhale, Patel, Rajagopalachari and others.
In the neo-colonialist sense the elite groups are made up of British
colonial rulers, administrators, policies, institutions and cultures.
The neo-colonialist definition of Indian Nationalist portrays it as a
function of stimulus and response. A good example would be the text
book depiction of the 1857 War of Independence as “Sepoy Mutiny”. This
portrayal attempts to classify the 1857 rebellion of the Indian
soldiers as a mere reaction to a provocation of their religious
sentiments (The Enfield Cartridges). It also portrays the native elite
as a group of people who were in a learning process, trying to
assimilate a huge governing structure and understand its principles.
This too is not due to any great idealism but only because the native
elites seemed to want to gain power, wealth and positions of pride.
The Zamindars and princes (bourgeois) are always represented as the
subordinate natives who would commit treason for their own ends. They
were also depicted as being divided, inefficient, dull and easily
surmountable.
As opposed to the neo-colonialist depiction, the native elitist
historiographers depict the elite nationalists as idealists who led
the people from subjugation to freedom. There are several versions in
this sort of historiography depending on varying degrees of emphasis
on individuals and institutions. The chief aspects highlighted about
the indigenous elite nationalists are:
1. Their goodness and its phenomenal expression in the form of Indian
Nationalism.
2. Their antagonistic stance against the colonial regime.
3. Their role as promoters of the cause of the indigenous people.
4. Their altruistic and self-abnegating characters.
Guha puts it across very satirically and sardonically by placing an
opposition next to each of these tall claims.
“They have completely tried to evade the accusations of being
collaborationists, exploiters and oppressors who scrambled for power
and privilege, making them appear like spiritual men…” he says.
There are certain advantages in elite historiography. It helps:
1. In understanding the colonial state structure.
2. In knowing the various state organs and their operation during
certain historical circumstance.
3. In knowing the ‘nature of alignment of the classes’.
4. In the identification of elite ideology as dominant during certain
periods.
5. In understanding the contradictions between Indian and British
elite groups, their oppositions and coalitions.
6. In classifying the roles of certain important people and
organizations of the Indian and British elite groups.
The ideological characteristics of such historiography, is made
evident by these interpretations.
The people or the subaltern groups and their contributions have been
looked at as mere response to an elite inspiration and influence. The
British elite represents the subaltern nationalist upsurges as a ‘law-
and-order’ problem and the Indian elite represents it as the response
to the charisma of a certain leader. They use the term “vertical
mobilization of factions” to describe these leaders moving the whole
nation towards a common goal. This sort of falsehood and
misrepresentation gets exposed where history has to explain phenomena
such as the Rowlatt Movement and the Quit India Movement where the
people acted against the colonialists without any elite control or
guidance.
Such inadequate history whose efficiency is doubly crippled by beliefs
such as the ones upholding the colonialist superstructure and ‘class
outlook’ can never give the native nationalists as much importance as
they deserve. The subaltern groups mobilized themselves. Guha calls
them an “autonomous domain”. Though colonialism intruded into elite
nationalism several times and rendered it ineffective, the subaltern
nationalism continued to operate vigorously by a) adjusting and
adapting to changing conditions and b) developing new ideas in form
and content.
Subaltern politics considered mobilization as a horizontal activity
that touches upon social groups of equal status at any point in time.
The elitist groups practiced vertical mobilization that touched upon
several levels of colonial hierarchy. Such elitist mobilization
depended on the movements of the British parliamentary institutions
and such. For example, Patel who unified the Princely States after
independence did it with great difficulty by using vertical
mobilization. Horizontal mobilization involved kinship, territorial
and class associations at the level of consciousness of the people
involved. This was simpler and pragmatic. It was spontaneous and
violent unlike the controlled, legalistic, and cautious mobilization
methods of the elites.
Peasant uprisings and such subaltern revolts had a constant element of
antagonism to elite domination. This ideology was in varied degrees.
Sometimes it helped by increasing the concreteness, focus and tension
in subaltern politics. At other times, by its communal interests, it
resulted in bigotry and confusion. Two things that drove the subaltern
class in a certain path was their understanding of exploitation and of
productive labour. This was a distinct factor that set it apart from
elite politics.
Despite the living contradictions that stopped the subaltern politics
from actualization in history, clear demarcations ideology, operation
and spontaneity can be made between subaltern politics and elite
politics. The failure of the bourgeoisie in speaking for the nation is
evident. Their hegemony created a dichotomy which cannot be ignored by
an interpreted of history. Ignoring the vast differences in ideologies
between the subaltern and the elite could mislead the history reader.
These two factions are not watertight compartments sealed off from one
another. They still overlap due to bourgeoisie attempts to integrate
them. These efforts succeeded when backed by anti-imperialist motives.
They failed miserably causing nasty strife among the sects when the
anti-imperialist motives were not firm and when compromises were made
with the colonialists. A good example would be the partition of India
and Pakistan.
Due to the inability of the working class to rise above the local
limitations, and the lack of good leadership, history has interpreted
their national struggles as fragmented local rebellions for economic,
political and petty reasons. The inadequacy of the bourgeoisie and the
working class has resulted in a historic failure.
The end result could have been either ‘a democratic revolution under
the bourgeoisie hegemony’ or ‘a ‘new-democracy’ under the subaltern
hegemony’. Unfortunately, it was neither.
Ranajit Guha concludes with a need to resolutely fight against elitist
historiography by ” I) rejection of spurious and unhistorical monism
and II) recognition of the co-existence and interaction of the elite
and subaltern domains of politics”. The purpose of the writers of
subaltern studies, he says, is to create a convergence of elitist
views and ideas opposing it. Criticism and discussions that ensue
would help in learning a great deal more about how to preserve the
integrity of historiography.