Initially I was surprised at the anger Spivak expresses against Bhubaneswari's great-grandniece for her new executive position, a job most people would praise. The last line of Spivak's article has a clear undertone of anger, "Is it any wonder that this young woman is a staunch multiculturist, believes in natural childbirth, and wears only cotton?" (809) and demanded that I unfold some of Spivak's article in order to make sense of it.
We understand the subaltern to be any class or sector of society marginalized by hegemony by the end of Spivak's article, any member which is part of "the circuit marked out by epistemic violence" (800). Basically, any person that is hiding behind or over shadowed by the letters of Colonial texts, people whose histories were deemed unimportant or misremembered. This is the anger through which Spivak speaks when talking about the story of Bhubaneswari. A woman who took careful steps when planning her suicide in order to prevent it being read as just a sati-suicide. Her waiting for menstruation before hanging herself, was her exercising her right to speak out for her history and bare witness to the severity with which she viewed her inability to follow through with this political assassination for Indian Independence. This demonstrates the power of Bhubaneswari's voice, one that supported Indian Independence so much that she would rather kill herself than face her political party for not following through on this assassination.
It is through this context that we can understand the anger in Spivak's last line, she is angry at how Bhubaneswari's own history has been silenced within the voices of her ancestors (the people most trusted with upholding her history). As her great-grandniece accept her position in the New Empire she accepts her role in the hegemonic system that Bhubaneswari fought to disrupt. She becomes a "staunch multiculturist" instead of a staunch Indian woman, still holding on to aspects of her native culture's belief systems, "believes in natural childbirth," but has wrapped these beliefs and her entire culture in the fabric of Post-Colonial Capitalism, "cotton."
1 comment:
This is a really interesting point and I thought I'd go ahead and remark on it. I think we can apply Burke here as well with his "terministic screen," even if just to the last line of this article. "Is it any wonder that this young woman is a staunch multiculturist, believes in natural childbirth, and wears only cotton?" (Spivak, 809. This quote in and of itself indicates a certain set of values that I think Spivak is claiming are in direct conflict with what Bhubaneswari fought for in her heavily planned and carefully orchestrated suicide.
"Is it any wonder" elicits from me the initial reaction "no it isn't." It really is not surprising at all that this young woman believes and does these things. So why is this observation made? Let's look at our paradox: "Re/Presentation." Bhubaneswari killed herself for political reasons (she failed to assassinate someone). This suicide is painted as a heroic act by Spivak, "she generalized the sanctioned motive for female suicide by taking immense trouble to displace...her body, its imprisonment within the legitimate passion by a single male." (Spivak, 806)This quote reflects a kind of awe at the careful planning of Bhubaneswari and her anti-hegemonic action.
Spivak then claims that her ancestors would not let her speak because they refused to believe that the suicide was anti-hegemonic (they still believed it was a case of illicit love). Now, this may indeed be a source of silencing, but I wonder if Spivak's own representation of Bhubaneswari's ancestors is silencing? They hold a set of values that perhaps are not traditional Indian ones, but neither are they "traditional" Western ideas either. True they may have come from this direction, but to represent Bhubaneswari's descendant's as perfectly constructed hegemonicaly-influenced people may also be a silencing. It is a silencing of the legitimacy of their own beliefs. What I mean is, Bhubaneswari's beliefs are not the only beliefs. There are others that are perfectly legitimate even if they are "popular"
While I agree with Spivak that Bhubaneswari was, in a way, silenced. I don't know that she can generalize this silence to future generations without using a screen that also attempts to silence.
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