The Spivak Reader

The Spivak Reader

 Selected Works of
Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak

Edited by
Donna landry
and
Gerald Maclean

ROUTLEDGE
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& LONDON
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Library of CongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty.
The Spivak reader/ edited by Donna Landry and Gerald MacLean.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical referencesand index.
Contents:Bonding in difference: interview with Alfred Arteaga- Explanationand culture:
marginalia- Feminismand critical theory - Revolutionsthat as yet have no model:
Derrida'sLimited Inc. - Scatteredspeculationson the questionof value - More on
power/knowledge- Echo - Subalternstudies:deconstructinghistoriography- How to
teach a "culturally different" book - Translator'sprefaceand afterword to Mahasweta
Devi, Imaginary Maps - Subalterntalk, interview with editors.
ISBN 0-415-91000-5(eI) - ISBN 0-415-91001-3(pbk)
1. Culture. 2. Social history. 3. Feminist theory. 4. Feminist criticism.
5. Feminism and literature. I. Landry, Donna. II. MacLean,Gerald M. III. Title.

HMI01.S7733 1995 95-22222

306-dc20 CIP

Publisher's Note
The publisherhas gone to greatlengthsto ensurethe quality of this reprint
but points out that someimperfectionsin the original may be apparent.
VJ
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Introduction: Readi ng Spi va k I

ONE Bonding in Difference,

interview with Alfred Arteaga (1993-94) 15
TWO Explanation and Culture: Marginalia (1979) 29
THREE Feminism and Critical Theory (19 8 5) 53
FOUR Revolutions That As Yet Have No Model:
Derrida's "Limited Inc." (1980) 75
FIVE Scattered Speculations
on the Question of VaLue (1985) 10 7
SIX More on Power/Knowledge (1992) 141
SEVEN Echo (1993) 175
EIGHT Suba ltern Studies:
Deconstructing Historiography (1985) 203
NINE How To Teach a
"Cultura lly Different" Book (1991) 237
TEN Translator's Preface and Afterword to
Mahasweta Devi, Imaginary Maps (1994) 267
ELEVEN Subaltern Talk:
Interview with the Editors (1993-94) 287
TWELVE Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak:
A Checklist of Publications 309
Index 32 3
This page intentionally left blank:
PERMISSIONS

The author and editors gratefully acknowledgethe permissionof

the journals and publishersthat follow to reprint theseessaysin
their revised form: Duke University Press for "Bonding in
Difference," from Alfred Arteaga,ed., An Other Tongue: Nation
and Ethnicity in the Linguistic Borderland (1994), pp. 273-85;
Humanitiesin Societyfor "Explanationand Culture: Marginalia," from
2:3 (1979), pp. 201-21;the University of Illinois Pressfor "Feminismand
Critical Theory," from PaulaTreichler, CherisKramerae,and Beth Stafford,
eds.,For Alma Mater: Theoryand Practice in FeministScholarship(1985),
pp. 119-42; Diacritics: A Review of Contemporary Criticism for
"RevolutionsThat As Yet Have No Model: Derrida's 'LimitedInc.,'" from
10:4 (1980), pp. 29-49, and "ScatteredSpeculationson the Questionof
Value," from 15:4 (1985), pp. 73-93; State University of New York
(SUNY) Press,Albany, for "More on PowerlKnowledge,"from ThomasE.
Wartenberg,ed., RethinkingPower (1992), pp. 149-73; New Literary
History for "Echo," from 24:1 (1993), pp. 17-43; Oxford University Press,
New Delhi, for "SubalternStudies:DeconstructingHistoriography,"from
Ranajit Guha, ed., SubalternStudiesIV: Writings on SouthAsian History
and Society(1985), pp. 330-63;ManchesterUniversity Pressfor "How to
Teacha 'Culturally Different' Book," from FrancisBarker, PeterHulme,
and Margaret Iverson, eds., Colonial Discourse/PostcolonialTheory
(1994), pp. 126-50.
This page intentionally left blank:
 RMS
PEION
PERMISS ISSIONS

The editorswould like to thank Bill Germanofor his insistenceand

Eric Zinner for his assistance.The Office of the Deanfor Graduate
Researchat Wayne StateUniversity provided funds for us to travel
to New York to conductthe interview. Very specialthanks to Jo
Dulan for spendingso long away from her own researchto help
preparethe initial computerfiles. For various other forms of help without
which we would never have completedthis project, our thanksto Alfred
Arteaga,Vivek Bald, Mary Lynn Broe, Eric Halpern,PeterHulme, Thomas
Keenan, Suchitra Mathur, Anita Roy, Leah Schoenewolf,Nigel Smith,
Robert Young, and, of course,Gayatri Spivak herself.
This page intentionally left blank:
 Reading Spivak
PERM
RM ISS
ISS
RM ION
ION
ISS SS S
ION

If you have been reading Spivak, you will know that writing an
PE
PE

introductionto her work is no easytask. In 1976 Spivak published

Of Grammatology,an English translationof the French philoso-
pherJacquesDerrida'sDe la grammatologie(1967). Besidesintro-
ducing this influential thinker to English-speakingaudiences,
Spivak's "Translator'sPreface" set a new standardfor self-reflexivity in
prefacesand introductions.It addressedfrom every conceivableangle the
"questionof the preface" and what it meantto translateand explicatethe
work of Derrida, who developedthe form of philosophicalcritique known
as deconstruction.In her "Preface,"Spivak briefly introducedDerrida, the
man or biographicalsubject,and Derrida, the collection of publishedwrit-
ings, beforeturning to the questionof the prefaceas a form of writing and
an occasionor event in writing, with particular protocolsto be observed.
This attentionto the particularprotocolsof specific occasionsis one of the
characteristicgesturesof deconstruction.
Like Spivak introducing Derrida, we shall have to assumethat some
introductionto Spivak is in order.

SPIVAK
Gayatri Chakravortywas born in Calcuttaon 24 February1942, the year of
the great artificial famine and five years before independencefrom British
colonial rule. She graduatedfrom PresidencyCollege of the University of
Calcuttain 1959 with a first-classhonorsdegreein English, including gold
medalsfor English and Bengali literature. At this time, degreerequirements
in English Literature at Calcuttacomparedto those at Oxbridge; a degree
from Calcuttaamountedto a comprehensivefirst-hand readingknowledge
of all literature in "English" from just before Chaucerup to the mid-twen-
tieth century,with a specialfocus on Shakespeare. After a Master'sdegreein
English from Cornell and a year'sfellowship at Girton College,Cambridge,
 The Spivak Reader

I
N
Spivaktook up an instructor'sposition at the University of Iowa while com-
pleting her doctoraldissertationon Yeats,which was beingdirectedby Paul
de Man at Cornell. Along the way she married and divorced an American,
Talbot Spivak, but has kept his surname,under which her work first
appearedin print. Shecurrently holds the Avalon FoundationProfessorship
of the Humanitiesat Columbia University.
Today, Spivak is amongthe foremostfeminist critics who haveachieved
internationaleminence,and one of the few who can claim to have influ-
encedintellectual production on a truly global scale. In addition to the
groundbreakingtranslationof JacquesDerrida'sOf Grammatology,Spivak
has publishedfour books,a volume of interviews,and numeroustheoreti-
cal and critical articles. The checklist of her publicationsincluded at the
end of this volume indicatesthe extent and range of Spivak'swriting. A
revised version of her dissertation,'popularized on what she herself
describesas a "sixties impulse," appearedin 1974, entitled MyselfMust I
Remake:The Life and Poetry of W. B. Yeats.In Other Worlds: Essaysin
Cultural Politics, a collection publishedin 1987, broughttogetherscattered
essayson topics as varied as Dante, Marx, Wordsworth,and the Indiqn
writer MahaswetaDevi. The Post-ColonialCritic: Interviews,Strategies,
Dialogues(1990), put togetherby SarahHarasym,was an attemptto make
Spivak'sthinking more accessibleto thosewho found the essaysin In Other
Worlds-nowin its fifth reprinting-difficult. Outside in the Teaching
Machine (1993) is a more integratedvolume of essays,some new, some
revisedfrom previouspublication,in which Spivak offers analysesof, and
strategies for improving, higher education in a global context. The
"Translator'sPreface"and "Afterword" to Imaginary Maps (1994), a col-
lection of storiesby Devi translatedinto English by Spivak, are included in
this reader. An Unfashionable Grammatology: Colonial Discourse
Revisited,her long-awaitedarchival and theoreticalstudy of genderand
colonial discourse,is in preparationas The Spivak Readergoesto press.1
Gayatri ChakravortySpivak is also this collection of texts.

Particularly in the United States,where Spivak has made her academic

career,there has been within the various women's movementsa strong
populist impulse that has encouragedfeminist critics and intellectualsto
keeptheir work accessibleto generalaudiences.In spite of this pressure,and
the anti-intellectualtendenciesof U.S. culture generally,Spivak has relent-
lesslychallengedthe high groundof establishedphilosophicaldiscourse.She
has done so in difficult theoreticallanguage,and on groundsrecognizable
to philosophers,especiallythosetrained in the traditionsof continentalphi-
losophy. Althoughher own primary training was in literary criticism, Spivak
has a commandof philosophyand ethics,as well as political economyand
 INTRODJJCTION

social theory. Thus she has beenable to challengethe practitionersof the

3
academicdisciplinesof philosophyand history in the United States,Britain,
India, and elsewherein termsthat, if not exactly their own, are nevertheless
recognizable;terms that specifically explore the marginsat which discipli-
nary discoursesbreak down and enter the world of political agency.The
rangeof this challengehasmadeher work seemremoteand difficult to some
readers,and shehasbeencontroversiallyreceivedby academicphilosophers,
historians,literary scholars,and elite Indianists,especiallythoseantagonis-
tic to deconstruction,poststructuralism,subalternstudies,and post-1968
Frenchthinking, with which her work often engages.
Yet it would be a seriousmistaketo assumethat Spivak'swork is so eso-
teric that shehas noaudienceoutsidethe academy.During the pastfifteen
years,her careerhas followed a complex intellectualtrajectory through a
deeplyfeminist perspectiveon deconstruction,the Marxist critique of cap-
ital and the internationaldivision of labor, the critique of imperialismand
colonial discourse,and the critique of race in relation to nationality, eth-
nicity, the statusof the migrant, and what it might meanto identify a nation
or a cultural form as postcolonialin a neocolonialworld. This intellectual
trajectory has gained for Spivak a relatively heterogeneous international
audience.
It helps,of course,that Spivak is a very powerful and charismaticspeak-
er. When shecameto Detroit, for instance,in March 1991,sheaddresseda
large, metropolitan,racially and ethnically mixed audienceat the Detroit
Institute of Arts as part of its Lines speakerserieson new writing in America.
Her lecture, "War and Cultures," addressedquestionsof multiculturalism
with referenceto the linguistically hybrid work of Guillermo G6mezPena,
the Chicarricanartist from Tijuana-SanDiego, and an installation by the
Lebanese-Canadian artist JamelieHassan,in the highly chargedpolitical
contextof u.S. anti-Arab racism at the time of the Gulf War. Not only did
Spivak receive astandingovation, a fairly unusualresponsefor a museum
lecturefrom a cool urbancrowd, but shewas also accompaniedafterwardto
the reception following her talk by an enthusiasticgroup of African
American women not from the local university, but from the Detroit com-
munity. One woman carried a much-readcopy of Spivak'stranslationof
Derrida'sOf Grammatology.Her daughter,also part of the group, was read-
ing In Other Worlds for a courseat her inner-city high school. For these
women,Spivak'sfeminist critique of the links betweenracismand capitalism
had beencrucial for their intellectualdevelopment.They embracedher as a
profoundlypolitical sister,not as an inaccessibleacademic.2
Thoughtheseare times of right-wing backlashon a global scale,cultur-
al resistancecontinues.It would be misleadingto castSpivak as a lone cru-
sader or an academicoutsider. Despite the difficulties that some U.S.
 The Spivak Reader

readershave experiencedwith her ideasand writings, Spivak'scontribu-

4
tions to the critical investigationof literary and cultural theory haveat last
beenwidely recognizedwithin the U.S. academy.Since the late 1970sher
reputationhas becomeincreasinglyinternationalas well. Spivak has held
visiting university appointmentsin France,India, and Saudi Arabia, and
has lecturedextensivelythroughoutthe U.K., U.S., Australia, Canada,the
Indian subcontinent,Belgium, Eire, Finland, France,Germany,Hong Kong,
Italy, Singapore,SouthAfrica, Sweden,Taiwan, the former Yugoslavia,and
before the EuropeanParliament in Strasbourg.Her sustainedcritical
engagementwith the intellectual tradition representedby the writings of
Freud,Lacan,Marx, Derrida, and Foucaulthas beeninstrumentalin trans-
forming and politicizing the receptionof the feminist and poststructuralist
critiquesof psychoanalyticand Marxist thought.Moreover,her wide-rang-
ing critical and theoreticalchallengescontinueto influence the develop-
ment of multicultural studies,postcolonialstudies,and feminist theory not
only in the U.S., but also internationally.
Considerableas it alreadyis, then, Spivak'sintellectual achievementis
so far from being "over" or completedthat any summaryruns the risk of
foreclosingon what is, both in fact and effect, a continuing politico-intel-
lectual global activism. Nevertheless,if we were to formulate the essential
Spivak for the contemporarymoment,the following sloganscould serveas
a beginning:

UNLEARNING ONE'S PRIVILEGE AS ONE'S LOSS

This is one of the most powerful tasksset readersby Spivak'swriting and
teaching.The injunction to "unlearn," recently advocatedby the young
African American filmmaker John Singleton in publicizing the anti-racist
messageof his most recentfilm, Higher Learning, meansworking critically
back through one's history, prejudices,and learned, but now seemingly
instinctual,responses.If we can learn racism,we can unlearnit, and unlearn
it preciselybecauseour assumptionsaboutracerepresenta closing down of
creativepossibility, a loss of other options, otherknowledge.Whoeverwe
are,if we are readingSpivak,we are likely to be comparativelyprivileged,at
least in terms of educationalopportunity,citizenship,and location within
the internationaldivision of labor. Unlearningone'sprivilege by considering
it as one'sloss constitutesa double recognition. Our privileges, whatever
they may be in terms of race, class,nationality, gender,and the like, may
have preventedus from gaining a certain kind of Other knowledge: not
simply information that we have not yet received,but the knowledgethat
we are not equippedto understandby reasonof our social positions.To
unlearn our privileges means,on the one hand, to do our homework,to
work hard at gaining some knowledge of the others who occupy those
 INTRODJJCTION

spacesmost closedto our privileged view. On the other hand,that they v.

attemptingto speakto thoseothersin such a way that they might take us
seriouslyand, most importantof all, be able to answerback.
Unlearningour privilege as our loss is a task for everyone,from Spivak
herselfto her white male students,who may feel silencedby the recent
upsurgeof feminism and marginality studies:"I am only a bourgeoiswhite
male, I can't speak." In an interview in The Post-ColonialCritic, Spivak
advisesthem, '''Why not developa certain degreeof rage againstthe his-
tory that has written such an abject script for you that you are silenced?'
Then you begin to investigatewhat it is that silencesyou, ratherthan take
this very deterministicposition-sincemy skin colour is this, since my sex
is this, I cannotspeak" (p. 62). Doing one'shomework in the interestsof
unlearningone'sprivilege marksthe beginningof an ethical relation to the
Other.

ETHICS ARE NOT A PROBLEM OF KNOWLEDGE BUT A CALL OF

RELATIONSHIP (WITHOUT RELATIONSHIP, AS LIMIT CASE)
In "Echo" (seep. 175), Spivak outlinesa formulation of ethicsthrough
a decipherableinstanceof the ethical relation in the myth of Echo and
Narcissus.Spivak wondershow it is that Freudand othershaveattributed
narcissismprimarily to women,when Narcissuswas a boy. Whereis Echo,
the womanin the story? ReadingEcho in all her complexity requiresa cri-
tique of narcissism,that touchstoneof Westernimperial and masculine
identities. Figuring identities and relations differently-not as narcissistic
fixtures expectingmirror-reflectionsacrossthe globe, but as a call to honor
and embraceacrossimpossibledifferencesand distances-isindispensable
for any movementtoward decolonization.As Spivak observesin both
"How To Teach a 'Culturally Different' Book" and her "Translator's
Prefaceand Afterword" to Devi's Imaginary Maps (seep. 237, p. 267), we
must perpetuallykeepin mind the question"Wha decolanizes?And haw?"
Thinking of the ethical relation as an embrace,an act of love, in which
eachlearnsfrom the other, is not at all the samething as wanting to speak
far an oppressedconstituency.Throughouther work Spivak has beencon-
cernedwith addressingquestionsof the internationaldivision of labor (of
the super-exploitationof Third World female labor in particular)and sheis
well-known for her formulationson the subaltern,that constituencywhich
remainsmost excludedfrom the circuits and possiblebenefitsof socialized
capital. As she explains in the interview "SubalternTalk" (see p. 287),
when sheclaims that the subaltern"cannotspeak,"shemeansthat the sub-
altern as suchcannotbe heardby the privileged of either the First or Third
Worlds. If the subalternwere able to makeherselfheard-ashashappened
when particular subalternshave emerged,in Antonio Gramsci'sterms, as
 The Spivak Reader

organic intellectualsand spokespeoplefor their communities-herstatus

6 as a subalternwould be changedutterly; she would ceaseto be subaltern.
And that is the goal of the ethical relation Spivak is seekingand calling
for-that the subaltern,the most oppressedand invisible constituencies,as
such might ceaseto exist.
Such a revolutionarychangewill not be brought about by traditional
revolutionarymeans,nor by intellectualsattemptingto representoppressed
minorities, nor worse yet, pretendingmerely to let them speakfor them-
selves.Here Spivak'sdeconstructivevigilance leadsher to keepin mind at all
times the dangersof fundamentalismin any form and to insist on the two
meaningsof "representation."

DECONSTRUCTIONCANNOT FOUND A POLITICAL PROGRAM OF ANY

KIND. YET IN ITS SUGGESTION THAT MASTERWORDS LIKE "THE
WORKER" OR "THE WOMAN" HAVE NO LITERAL REFERENTS,
DECONSTRUCTIONIS A POLITICAL SAFEGUARD.
This passage,paraphrasedfrom an interview in The Post-ColonialCritic
(p. 104), exemplifies in its simplicity the practical and political Spivak,
whosetheorizing is always ultimately directedat intervention,at attempt-
ing to changethe world. Yet how can one help to bring aboutchangewith-
out repeatingthe mistakes of previous political movementsthat have
sought liberation yet endedin repressionand fundamentalism?We can
make a start, Spivak suggests,by keeping in mind the two meaningsof
"representation,"which would have been clear to Marx, writing in
German,but which English usageelides: "Treadingin your shoes,wearing
your shoes,that's Vertretung.Representationin that sense:political repre-
sentation.Darstellung-Dar,'there',samecognate.Stellen,is 'to place',so
'placing there.' Representing:'proxy' and 'portrait'.... Now, the thing to
rememberis that in the act of representingpolitically, you actually repre-
sent yourself and your constituencyin the portrait sense,as well" (The
Post-ColonialCritic, p. 108). As we have observedelsewhere,the danger
lies in collapsingthe two meanings,mistaking the aestheticor theatrical
senseof representation-as re-stagingor portraiture-foran actualbeing-
3 This collapsingleadsto the fundamentalistmistake:
in-the-other's-shoes.
assumingthat always imagined and negotiatedconstituenciesbasedon
unstableidentificationshaveliteral referents:"the workers," "the women,"
"the word." But there is no Vertretungwithout Darstellung, without dis-
simulation; the two terms are locked into complicity with one another.
Deconstructionperpetuallyreminds us of this complicity, which funda-
mentalismwould pretendto do without.
 INTRODUCTION

PERSISTENTLYTO CRITIQUE A STRUCTURETHAT ONE

(WISH TO) INHABIT IS THE DECONSTRUCTIVE STANCE.
CANN~ '-J

These arenearly the last words of Outsidein the TeachingMachine (p.

284), Spivak'smost recentcollection of essays,but they echoher most per-
sistenttake on deconstruction,repeatedfrom the "Translator'sPreface"to
Of Grammatologyuntil the presentday. If one setsout to do a critique of
metaphysics,thereis no escapefrom the metaphysicalenclosure.You can-
not simply assert,"I will be anti-essentialist"and makethat stick, for you
cannotnot be an essentialistto somedegree.The critique of essentialismis
predicatedupon essentialism.This is why it is especially important to
chooseas an object of critique somethingwhich we love, or which we can-
not not desire,cannotnot wish to inhabit, howevermuch we wish also to
change it. Spivak translatesDerrida in Of Grammatologyas follows:
"Operatingnecessarilyfrom the inside, borrowing all the strategicand eco-
nomic resourcesof subversionfrom the old structure,borrowing them
structurally,that is to say, without being able to isolate their elementsand
atoms,the enterpriseof deconstructionalways in a certain way falls prey
to its own work."4
This deconstructiveliability, this self-confessedfallibility of deconstruc-
tion, is in somesenseits greatestgift, accordingto Spivak. Her own intel-
lectual productionis as subjectto its exigencyas any other.

We hope that thesefew Spivakianrules-of-thumbprovide somesenseof

why her work might be interesting,important, and worthy of the careful
and patientunpackingit requires.

THE SPIVAK READER

In selectingfrom amongthe rangeof possibleoptionspresentedby Spivak's
list of publications,talks, and interviews, we have attemptedto assemble
not so much a "bluffer's guide to Spivakism" as an exemplaryseriesof
placesto start readingSpivak.
We haveattemptedto tracewhat shecalls the "itinerary" of her thinking
over the last fifteen years.The power of this specific metaphorarisesfrom
its illustration of how Spivak'sthinking proceeds:it is not fixed and finite in
the form of thought as a "product," but active-thinking-a journey that
involves moving back and forth over both familiar and less familiar intel-
lectual terrainswhile constantlyinterrogatingits own premises.Here the
strongconnectionbetweenSpivak'sresearchand writing and her teaching
should be noted, since most of her publishedwritings have arisen from
attemptingto work throughthe critical problemsthat crop up in pedagog-
ical situations.
In a certainway, Spivak'sreceptionhas beena curiously silent or oblique
 The Spivak Reader

one. Have her achievementsseemedtoo formidable or complicatedto be

00
commentedupon accordingto the usual forms? Indeed,while citations to
her work can be found thickly scatteredacrossvarious fields of scholarly
publication,the true rangeand importanceof her intellectualinfluencecan-
not be measuredin the number of scholarly articles, chapters,or books
dedicatedto "explaining" Spivak. For that, we would somehowhave to
assessnot only the conversationsand ideasthat her lecturesand writings
continueto stimulatedirectly, but also the immeasurabledifferencesthat
her work hasmadeto the thinking of feminists, cultural critics, and politi-
cal activists in placesas far flung as Delhi, New York, Riyadh, Hyderabad,
Lund, and Sydney.
The essayscollectedin the presentvolume rangeacrossSpivak'scontri-
butionsto many different aspectsof intellectualand political life subsequent
to her introductionof Derrida to English-speakingaudiences.The essaysare
not simply arrangedin chronologicalsequence;we imagine that readers
coming to Spivak'swork for the first time will find the thematicand devel-
opmentalarrangementwe have adoptedto be more helpful than a strict
chronologywould be. The nine essaysare bracketedby two very recent
interviews, "Bonding in Difference," with Alfred Arteaga,and "Subaltern
Talk." "Can the SubalternSpeak?,"publishedin 1988 but basedon a 1983
lecture, would make the collection more complete, but we gave way to
Spivak'sresistanceto this idea, becauseshe is revising the essayin such a
way that the first version,althoughunchangedin its conclusions,will, in its
details,becomeobsolete.
The first five essaysin The Readerrepresentkey momentsin Spivak's
deconstructivecritique, especiallythe ways it has both challengedand
transformedthe developmentof feminism, Marxist analysis,and cultural
theory. The next four essayssharpen,extend,and broadenthat project by
examiningthe politics of translationand multiculturalism in a variety of
textual, historical, and political arenas.This order, we trust, will usefully
indicate how the itinerary of Spivak's critical thinking is not a settled
achievementbut a continuingprocess,a constantchallengeto rereadFreud,
Marx, Derrida, and Foucault,bringing their provisionalcertaintiesto crisis
as we attemptto negotiatewith the daily eventsthat constituteour political
lives in both the local and the global sense.Spivak paysconsiderableatten-
tion to the managementof the subalternin the southernhemisphere,the
developingworld of the New World Order, so that by a "setting to work"
of theory in theselocationsshecan gaugethe limits of the theory that influ-
encesher.
It is curious but revealingthat as Spivak has increasinglyexpandedher
interestsbeyondthe Europeanliterary and philosophicaltraditions to the
history of imperialismand non-eliteor subalterninsurgency,shehasgained
 INTRODUCTION
UWN

new audiencesinterestedin race,gender,colonial discourse,and m::::

tural education,but also lost ground within the deconstructiveestablish-
~
\0

ment. To be given a hearingby Third World scholarsand ethnic studiesor

minority discoursespecialistswould seemto be accompaniedby being mar-
ginalized on the high deconstructivistagenda.Although Spivak initially
becameknown as the translatorof Derrida and an advocateof decon-
struction, and although she remainsone of the few intellectualsactually
carrying out the suggestionsmadeby the post-Enlightenmentethical move-
ment associatedwith Derrida and EmmanuelLevinas, scholarswho have
engagedin high ethical debatesin the recentpastseemto haveignoredher
contributions.Comparisonof two recentissuesof Diacritics, a journal pub-
lished by the Departmentof RomanceLanguagesat Cornell University, and
one that has servedas one of the chief organsof deconstructivistdebate,
illustratesthis asymmetricalreception.In the Spring 1993 issue,Rey Chow
featuresSpivak in her essay"Ethics after Idealism." Chow, a feminist who
works on questionsof identity, ethnicity, and postcoloniality,readsSpivak
and Slavoj Zizek as two of the "most energetic" post-Marxistswriting
today. Three issueslater, however, in the Winter 1993 issue, two other
pieceson ethical questions,including the questionof the Other, neglectto
mention Spivak. It is as if Spivak'swork had becomecontaminatedby too
long an associationwith Marxism, Third Worldism, and internationalfem-
inism to possessa theoreticalposition pure enoughto be entertainedany
longer as high ethical discourse.5 This foreclosurein ethics of considera-
tions of power or politics is, of course,preciselySpivak'spoint in the recent
interventionsincluded in The Reader.
Living in an age much given to interestin the personal,we have placed
"Bonding in Difference" first, since in this interview Spivak reflects auto-
biographically. By turning her personalrecollectionsagainsttheir histori-
cal contexts,however,in a characteristic gesture sheresistsplaying into the
cult of personalityor trading on her intellectual-celebritystatus,thereby
demonstratinghow deconstructioninterrogatesclaims madeon behalf of
the merely personal:

Deconstructiondoes not say there is no subject,there is no truth, there is

no history. It simply questionsthe privileging of identity so that someoneis
believedto have the truth. It is not the exposureof error. It is constantlyand
persistentlylooking into how truths are produced.That'swhy deconstruc-
tion doesn'tsay logocentrismis a pathology,or metaphysicalenclosuresare
somethingyou can escape.Deconstruction,if one wants a formula, is,
amongother things, a persistentcritique of what one cannotnot want. And
in that sense,yes, it's right there at the beginning.
 The Spivak Reader

I
o
Right thereat the beginning,deconstructionopensup the personalistbelief
.... in identity-as-originnot by denying experience,but by insisting upon the
needto examinethe processeswherebywe naturalizepersonalexperience
and desireinto generaltruth. Deconstructionis not the end of ethics,poli-
tics, or history, as Spivak makesclear in her "Translator'sPreface"to Devi's
Imaginary Maps, when sheechoesDerrida on the questionof deconstruc-
tion and ethicsin a statementtoo often misreadas signifying the ahistoric-
ity of deconstruction:"Pleasenote that I am not saying that ethics are
impossible,but ratherthan ethicsis the experienceof the impossible."
Constantlystressingthe interconnectedness of the seeminglydisparate
aspectsof her intellectualproduction,Spivak saysof herselfin "Bonding":
"I havetwo faces.I am not in exile. I am not a migrant. I am a greencard-
carrying critic of neocolonialismin the United States.It's a difficult posi-
tion to negotiate,becauseI will not marginalizemyself in the United States
in order to get sympathyfrom peoplewho are genuinelymarginalized."
Spivak first openedup this discussionof the foundationalpremisesof what
constitutes"truth" within the academiccommunity at large in the first
essayreprintedhere, "Explanationand Culture: Marginalia" (1979). She
did this by introducingthe problematicsof her own position as an interna-
tionalist, a feminist, and a literary critic who works within the protocolsof
readingnamed"deconstruction."With the third essay,"RevolutionsThat
As Yet Have No Model: Derrida's'Limited Inc.,'" The Readermovesfrom
the secondessay,1985's"Feminismand Critical Theory," back to 1980,in
order to pick up on questionsconcerningdeconstructionthat were greatly
troubling to the English-speakingacademyat that time. For many readers,
this essaymay prove as difficult as any that follow, but it developsdirectly
from the previousessaysby pursuingthe aim announcedtoward the end
of "Feminism and Critical Theory": to learn "how to read [our] own
texts."
In "Revolutions That As Yet Have No Model," Spivak addressesin
detail two texts by Derrida that shecited in "Explanations"as the sourceof
her understandingof Derrideandeconstructionand proceedsto readthem
deconstructively.In the first part of the essay,Spivak reads the debate
betweenspeech-acttheoristJohnSearleand Derrida; in the secondpart she
reads Derrida's texts alongside Heidegger. For those unfamiliar with
Derrida,Searle,and Heidegger,the going will be tough and the rewardsnot
immediatelyapparent.Like Marx, Spivak is often most powerfully sugges-
tive when engagedin polemic. Here she makesno attemptat impartiality
sinceone of her principal aims in the pieceis to demonstratehow Derrida's
responseto Searleexemplifiesmany of the necessarilypractical implica-
tions of Derrida'sgeneralcritique of metaphysics.In a scrupulouslyexact-
ing and highly nuancedstyle of philosophical critique,Spivak describes
 INTRODJJCTION

what it meansto take Derrida'sproject seriously,to read accordingto the I

....
strategyof what sheelsewhereterms "the reversal-displacement morphol- ....

ogy of deconstruction"("Feminism and Critical Theory"), and, finally, to

engagein undoingphilosophicaldiscourseof this very kind.
As she observesin the final paragraphof "Revolutions," students
trainedto readwithin liberal-humanistdiscoursesof identity and meaning
tenaciouslyclaim "their opinions' centeras their own self-possession."If
Spivak'sproseis challenging,it challengesus on our own groundsas read-
ers, as centeredproducersof meaning.For thosereaders-andwho among
us is not necessarilyincludedin this indictment?-trainedto start readingby
"finding oneselfin the text," it might prove useful to approachthis essayby
glancingat the end, with the final paragraphaddressedto "graduatesand
undergraduates. "
For some,this paragraphmight supply an entireevening'sworth of read-
ing and rereadingpreciselybecauseits challengecan only be expressedin a
languagethat seems"difficult," but that is, rather,the achievedvocabulary
of a powerful critical discourseseekingto changethe way we read our
world. Here is the penultimatesentence:

The "deconstructive"lesson,as articulatedin Limited Inc., can teachstudent

and teacheralike a methodof analysisthat would fix its glance upon the
itinerary of the ethico-politicalin authoritarianfictions; call into questionthe
complacentapathy of self-centralization;underminethe bigoted elitism
(theoreticalor practical)converselypossiblein collective practice;while dis-
closing in suchgesturesthe condition of possibility of the positive.

We should notice that the operativeterm here is "'deconstructive'lesson"

and not" deconstructionist.""Deconstructionist"is a term often usedto
describethe processesof deconstructionby those outside it, those who
don't themselvesfollow the protocolsof deconstruction,"in a certainway
always a prey to its own critique" (OG, 24, translationmodified). The
deconstructivelessonprovidesa new way of looking at things and tasks.
We've alreadyencountered"itinerary" in this introduction,so we haveno
trouble fixing our glanceon it and noticing how it here performsa new
metaphoricalturn, therebyannouncingthe allegorical figure of "the ethico-
political" journeying through "authoritarianfictions." This development
deservesat leasta semicolonpause,whateversort of readerwe are; because
yes, that is just what-by definition-authoritarianfictions do, they nar-
fate ethico-political conflict metaphysically("good" versus "evil") even
when they might claim to be about somethingelse. Fictions always come
to an end, and in the authoritariankind, plots are invariably "solved" by the
superimpositionof a third term, "power."
 The Spivak Reader

I So, to pick up the syntax, what's to be learnedfrom reading decon-

N
H
structively is that it is particularly ethically and politically useful to look at
authoritarianfictions by noticing how they figure conflicts and power, and,
within the sameactivity of reading, to continue addressingourselvesas
readerscaughtup in the complicitiesof what the quotedparagraphprevi-
ously termedthe "de-historicizedacademy."For we are surely invited to
recognizeourselves-whatever positions we may occupy with respectto
academicinstitutions-in the suggestionthat studentand teacherlike can
learn to "call into questionthe complacentapathyof self-centralization"
that academicapproachesto readingcontinueto encourage,especiallyin
liberal arts programs.What's at stake here is that wheneverwe rest con-
tentedwith saying "this is my reading,it's different from yours; but that's
okay, we don't needto go any further" or wheneverwe feel, argue,or insist
that what we do within the academyis merely academicand of suchinsuf-
ficient political consequencethat we need do nothing becauseit won't
count anyway, we are simply reproducinga generalliberal dilemma and
not doing what we think we are doing, wheneverwe imagine we are
"thinking for ourselves."
So wheneverwe set about reading"our" texts and find them leadingus
obsessivelyback to ourselves,it is a good idea not to stop there,with our-
selvesas centersof meaning,but rather to go on and to think through the
possibility that the personalmight necessarilylead us outside"ourselves"to
the political. The third and final part of Spivak's accountof the decon-
structive lessoncertainly soundspolitical-the suggestionthat we "under-
mine the bigoted elitism (theoreticalor practical) converselypossiblein
collective practice;while disclosingin suchgesturesthe condition of possi-
bility of the positive." If her turns of languageand thoughthereseempuz-
zling at first glance,this polemical rhetoric at the essay'send at leastserves
to warn us that there are dangersin beginningat the end of things. Spivak
is, in large part, reflecting upon the conditionsthat madepossiblethe very
readingof Derrida, by way of Searleand Heidegger,that she has just per-
formed.
Thus we proposethat Spivak's'''deconstructive'lesson,"while it can be
glimpsed by sneakinga look at this final paragraph,will be more gratify-
ingly intelligible to those who have made the journey through the essay
from the first paragraphinstead.
Becauseof the difficulty of this essay,we have spentsome timeunpack-
ing it hereand in the headnotethat accompaniesit. The essaysandinterview
that follow "Revolutions" may now seemlike plain sailing, by contrast,
though eachis also prefacedby an explanatoryheadnote.

DONNA LANDRY and GERALD MACLEAN

 INTRODUCTION

NOTES
H
In presentingthesewritings, we have silently correctederrors in the original \.>J

versionsand standardizedspelling, orthography,and referenceformats as far

as it has beenpossibleto do so without significantly altering the style of the
original. For example,in order to preservethe historical specificity of the
original publicationof "RevolutionsThat As Yet Have No Model" in 1980,
we haveleft quotationsand referencesto the 1977publication,in Glyph, of
SamuelWeber'sand Jeffrey Mehlman'stranslationof Derrida's "Signature
Event Context" and Weber'stranslationof" Limited Inc." In subsequentcita-
tions of thesetexts by Derrida, we have followed Spivak'smore recentprac-
tice and cited "SignatureEvent Context" from Alan Bass'stranslationin
Margins of Philosophy(1982). Referencesto Derrida's"White Mythology"
throughoutThe Spivak Readerare to Bass'stranslation.
1. Unsolicitedentrieson or from "Spivak" have recentlyappearedin TheJohns
Hopkins Guide to Literary Theoryand Criticism, Michael Grodenand Martin
Kreiswirth, eds. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994); The
RoutledgeEncyclopediaof Philosophy(New York: Routledge,forthcoming);
and the entry on "deconstruction"in The ShorterOxford English Dictionary.
2. It is a bleak historical irony, but Spivak's was one of the last such guest
performancesat the Detroit Institute of Arts. As Kofi Natambureports in
his essay, "Nostalgia for the Present: Cultural Resistancein Detroit,
1977-1987,"by March 1991 funding for the Lines program had already
beencut, and by the end of that year the museumwas to have its budget
slashed by the recently elected Republican governor of Michigan, John
Engler, as part of an economicgutting of the city. Thesepolicies included
eliminating over 100,000generalassistancepayments,many to disabledpeo-
ple, and most statemoniesfor Medicare,Medicaid, and allotmentsfor the
homeless,in addition to funding for variousarts projectsand institutions; see
Natambu in Black Popular Culture, a project by Michelle Wallace, Gina
Dent, ed. (Seattle:Bay Press,1992), pp. 173-86.
3. See Landry and MacLean, Materialist Feminisms (Oxford, UK and
Cambridge,MA: Blackwell Publishers,1994),pp. 197-98.
4. Derrida, Of Grammatology,trans. Gayatri ChakravortySpivak (Baltimore:
JohnsHopkins University Press,1976), p. 24. Hereaftercited in the text as
OG, followed by pagereferences.
5. See Rey Chow, "Ethics after Idealism," Diacritics 23:1 (Spring 1993), pp.
3-22; Judith Butler, "Poststructuralismand Postmarxism,"Diacritics 23:4
(Winter 1993),pp. 3-11; Robert Baker, "Crossingsof Levinas,Derrida, and
Adorno: Horizons of Nonviolence," Diacritics 23:4 (Winter 1993), pp.
12-41.
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