Subalternity and the Politics of Representation
The subaltern names those excluded from dominant structures of power and speech, and this topic asks whether and how they can be represented.
Definition
The study of subaltern groups excluded from hegemonic power and of the problems involved in representing or recovering their voices.
Scope
This topic examines the concept of the subaltern from Gramsci through the Subaltern Studies historians to Spivak's influential question of whether the subaltern can speak. It addresses the difference between speaking-for and speaking-about, and the ethical and political stakes of representing the marginalized.
Core questions
- Who counts as subaltern, and what defines subalternity?
- Can the subaltern speak and be heard within dominant discourse?
- What is the difference between political and representational 'speaking for'?
Key theories
- Can the subaltern speak?
- Spivak argued that the gendered subaltern is so positioned that her speech cannot be heard within colonial and patriarchal discourse, warning against intellectuals who claim to let her speak.
- Subaltern historiography
- Ranajit Guha and the Subaltern Studies collective sought to recover the agency of peasants and the colonized excluded from elite nationalist history.
History
Gramsci coined 'subaltern' in his prison writings; the term was taken up by South Asian historians in the Subaltern Studies project from 1982, and reframed by Spivak's 1988 essay, which became one of the most debated texts in postcolonial theory.
Debates
- Recovery versus impossibility of voice
- Scholars dispute whether subaltern voices can be recovered through history, as Guha hoped, or are structurally foreclosed, as Spivak suggests.
Key figures
- Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak
- Ranajit Guha
- Antonio Gramsci
Related topics
Seminal works
- spivak1988
- guha1982
Frequently asked questions
- What does 'subaltern' mean?
- It refers to social groups excluded from established structures of political and cultural power, a term adapted from Gramsci and central to postcolonial and South Asian studies.