+

Can the Subaltern Speak?An Essay by Gayatri Spivak

+Subaltern

Subaltern is that identity that has no possibility at social mobility

No possibility to speak

No possibility to be heard

Intransability of the Subaltern’s structural position

Photograph by Fazal Sheikh. Ajoh Achot and Achol Manyen, Sudanese refugee camp. Lokichoggio, Kenya, 1992.

+Representation

Who is represented as the Subject?

Who is representable as the Subject?

Who is chosen to represent the Subaltern?

+How is Speaking Subject being Produced?Savior -whit

e man

Injurer -brown

man

Injured -brown wo

man

Brown woman oppressed as structural necessity

Saving brown woman is also a structural necessity

+Woman as a Subject

Woman remains an unthinkable figure that needs saving, protection, an assigned identity, a set of limits, rules.

Where do the rules/norms/ideas of identity come from?

How are the rules, norms, identities POLICED?

+Subaltern Identity

Accepts wretchedness as normality

Millennial cognitive damage done to subaltern

Valid institutional background can help subaltern speak

+Agency

Agency is the CAPABILITY or POWER to affect a desired change.

Agency is NOT the same as Rights, Freedoms, Privileges, Advantages, Abilities.

Agency is more specific to time, place, socio-economic context.

Agency is increasingly perceived as a key goal of development.

+New Subaltern Identity

Subaltern becoming permeable because of desire to “do good” or “do something”

Allow subaltern to speak and be heard

A general will to create exploitation into the subaltern, too, is present