WEBVTT 00:01.390 --> 00:05.770 Prof: Well, post-colonial studies is really 00:05.768 --> 00:10.858 by far the most varied and eclectic of the identity fields 00:10.861 --> 00:16.041 that we're passing in review in this portion of the course: 00:16.043 --> 00:21.123 eclectic really of necessity, of course, because of the 00:21.116 --> 00:24.306 immense variety of the materials covered, 00:24.310 --> 00:28.830 but also because of swirling issues and controversies within 00:28.828 --> 00:32.048 post-colonial studies or "po-co," 00:32.045 --> 00:38.265 as it's affectionately known, which kind of pose a number of 00:38.272 --> 00:44.312 questions from the side that keep things lively, 00:44.310 --> 00:45.470 to say the least. 00:45.470 --> 00:50.860 We are taking up only one strand, one developmental 00:50.861 --> 00:54.291 strand, in post-colonial studies today, 00:54.287 --> 00:58.597 a kind of progression from the work of Said to the work of 00:58.602 --> 01:02.012 Bhabha which is relatively easily mapped, 01:02.009 --> 01:07.359 simply in terms of the intellectual agendas of each of 01:07.361 --> 01:09.781 them, but there's a great deal else 01:09.775 --> 01:10.325 going on. 01:10.328 --> 01:16.348 I suppose I should just mention in passing certain topics that 01:16.352 --> 01:21.462 we won't be discussing, at least except possibly in 01:21.455 --> 01:25.335 passing and that, however, you might really be 01:25.340 --> 01:29.770 interested in considering if you do have an interest in this 01:29.765 --> 01:30.435 field. 01:30.438 --> 01:33.528 The first issue, of course, is who says 01:33.525 --> 01:37.505 "post-colonial," and who says that we're 01:37.506 --> 01:40.346 necessarily out of colonialism? 01:40.349 --> 01:44.249 Just because the local viceroy packs up and goes home doesn't 01:44.250 --> 01:48.150 necessarily mean that things change all that significantly in 01:48.150 --> 01:50.750 the so-called postcolonial setting, 01:50.750 --> 01:53.360 and it needs to be taken into account, 01:53.360 --> 01:58.090 seriously considered, whether or not one isn't still 01:58.086 --> 02:02.806 in colonial or colonial studies and that the moniker 02:02.813 --> 02:06.803 "post-colonial" might therefore be 02:06.799 --> 02:09.579 inappropriately applied. 02:09.580 --> 02:13.860 There's also the question that arises in the study of the 02:13.859 --> 02:17.829 so-called third world, which is obviously in itself a 02:17.831 --> 02:19.591 controversial term. 02:19.590 --> 02:24.590 It arises as that which is not comprised as either of the great 02:24.590 --> 02:29.590 sort of trajectories of the superpowers during the Cold War. 02:29.590 --> 02:33.700 There is no Cold War, at least allegedly no Cold War 02:33.700 --> 02:36.580 any longer, and so the question of the 02:36.577 --> 02:39.597 status, nature, and structure of the third 02:39.599 --> 02:41.769 world is obviously wide open. 02:41.770 --> 02:45.430 But the issue I mean to touch on in terms of post-colonial 02:45.428 --> 02:50.168 studies is whether, in fact, crises and concerns 02:50.168 --> 02:57.178 with respect to the third world are necessarily always to be 02:57.181 --> 03:01.701 understood in terms of coloniality. 03:01.699 --> 03:07.439 Is it just that certain parts of the globe have been colonized 03:07.437 --> 03:13.267 that constitutes them as they are and shapes their identity? 03:13.270 --> 03:19.250 Said in a very interesting way takes this up in trying to 03:19.252 --> 03:25.562 figure out how it is that German Orientalism so very closely 03:25.556 --> 03:31.846 resembles French Orientalism, even though the Germans had no 03:31.854 --> 03:35.324 colonial interests in the Middle East. 03:35.318 --> 03:38.908 During the whole period--the early nineteenth century in 03:38.906 --> 03:41.776 particular, when German Orientalism is 03:41.780 --> 03:45.400 practically indistinguishable from the French, 03:45.400 --> 03:47.880 takes up the same concerns, and has the same interests-- 03:47.878 --> 03:52.148 how is it that the French are undoubtedly in some sense, 03:52.150 --> 03:55.500 in Said's view, determined by their colonial 03:55.504 --> 03:57.914 interests, and the Germans, 03:57.908 --> 04:01.988 who seem so much to reflect French attitudes, 04:01.990 --> 04:06.950 have no colonial interests, at least in the Middle East? 04:06.949 --> 04:10.689 Said sort of quite honestly tries to come to terms with 04:10.693 --> 04:11.183 this. 04:11.180 --> 04:14.450 His answer is, "Well, German Orientalism 04:14.453 --> 04:19.143 is simply derived in scholarly terms from French Orientalism. 04:19.139 --> 04:22.319 It has the stamp of that thinking and reflects that 04:22.324 --> 04:24.814 thinking," and so there you are. 04:24.810 --> 04:27.090 He could have said on the other hand, 04:27.089 --> 04:32.389 however, that a certain mindset toward the third world-- 04:32.389 --> 04:34.939 and this is the point I have been making about this 04:34.940 --> 04:38.000 particular issue-- dictates a certain way of 04:38.002 --> 04:41.682 structuring one's thought about that world, 04:41.680 --> 04:46.100 irrespective of whether or not there are colonial interests 04:46.101 --> 04:46.941 involved. 04:46.940 --> 04:51.090 That's what I mean by raising the question, 04:51.086 --> 04:56.216 "Is coloniality always at issue in cases of this 04:56.218 --> 04:57.698 kind?" 04:57.699 --> 05:02.349 There's a kind of confusion in thinking about these things, 05:02.350 --> 05:06.890 a confusion which is distilled in the history of the British 05:06.894 --> 05:10.724 East India Company-- which is both nationalist and, 05:10.723 --> 05:14.973 as it were, globalizing--but a confusion 05:14.973 --> 05:21.623 which comes out in more recent history of coloniality, 05:21.620 --> 05:24.450 and that is: well, what drives coloniality? 05:24.449 --> 05:29.969 Is it always nationalism or, as seems increasingly the case 05:29.973 --> 05:34.643 in the modern world, is it transnational interests 05:34.639 --> 05:36.639 in globalization? 05:36.639 --> 05:40.549 In other words, is the relationship between the 05:40.545 --> 05:44.955 colonist and the colonized a relation of some sort of 05:44.959 --> 05:50.139 metropolitan nation with respect to a provincial empire, 05:50.139 --> 05:54.779 or is it a relation which is dictated and generated by the 05:54.778 --> 05:57.868 economic interests of globalization? 05:57.870 --> 06:01.940 This is a complex subject which generates a great deal of debate 06:01.935 --> 06:04.385 in the field that we take up today, 06:04.389 --> 06:08.359 but in a way, we can't just say, 06:08.363 --> 06:11.683 "Well, nationalism isn't important 06:11.677 --> 06:14.197 anymore, now it's globalization" 06:14.199 --> 06:18.329 because actually nationalism seems to have reappeared in the 06:18.329 --> 06:21.929 Bush foreign policy, even possibly to be continued 06:21.925 --> 06:25.865 in the Obama foreign policy, and so there's a complex 06:25.869 --> 06:30.359 relationship still between nationalism and globalization 06:30.358 --> 06:35.258 that needs to be considered and thought about if these social 06:35.257 --> 06:38.847 relations are to be clearly understood. 06:38.850 --> 06:43.770 Finally, there is within post-colonial studies-- 06:43.769 --> 06:50.269 especially among those who represent the various colonized 06:50.273 --> 06:54.813 interests of the world-- there is the question, 06:54.809 --> 06:58.089 to borrow an expression from Gayatri Spivak, 06:58.089 --> 07:01.119 "How should the subaltern speak?" 07:01.120 --> 07:05.310 It has to do most vividly with the very question, 07:05.309 --> 07:10.459 "Which language should the subaltern speak in?" 07:10.459 --> 07:13.639 Spivak's own question is, "Can the subaltern speak 07:13.637 --> 07:14.517 at all?" 07:14.519 --> 07:17.899 and Said raises that question, as you notice, 07:17.896 --> 07:20.656 during the course of his analysis; 07:20.660 --> 07:24.510 but the related issue is, okay, suppose that the 07:24.511 --> 07:28.281 subaltern can speak--suppose Ngugi wa Thiong'o, 07:28.281 --> 07:31.151 for example, can write a novel. 07:31.149 --> 07:34.639 What language should it be written in? 07:34.639 --> 07:40.819 Ngugi campaigned in his more recent career not to write in 07:40.815 --> 07:46.985 English and also to urge other African writers to write in 07:46.992 --> 07:53.712 native languages and not in the language of the colonizer. 07:53.709 --> 07:58.869 This is a frequently heard opinion from within 07:58.865 --> 08:03.235 post-colonial studies, but debate swirls around it 08:03.240 --> 08:06.040 because, of course, the means of 08:06.040 --> 08:11.400 circulation of literary influence is languages that draw 08:11.396 --> 08:17.236 upon international publishing possibilities and not languages 08:17.240 --> 08:22.500 that can only be grasped and published and disseminated 08:22.499 --> 08:23.959 locally. 08:23.959 --> 08:28.219 So there, too, you have a complicated issue or 08:28.216 --> 08:33.796 controversy on both sides, of which there is much to say; 08:33.798 --> 08:36.938 but as I say, for us today it's simply a 08:36.942 --> 08:39.552 question-- or more simply a question, 08:39.549 --> 08:43.209 because when you've got Homi Bhabha on the syllabus there's 08:43.210 --> 08:48.230 no such thing as simplicity-- so I should say it's a question 08:48.232 --> 08:54.242 of following the trajectory or development specifically between 08:54.239 --> 08:56.079 Said and Bhabha. 08:56.080 --> 08:59.310 In beginning to think about Said, I thought we wouldn't 08:59.312 --> 09:00.392 think about him. 09:00.389 --> 09:02.839 We'd think instead, for a moment at least, 09:02.839 --> 09:04.869 once again about Virginia Woolf. 09:04.870 --> 09:07.820 In the second chapter of A Room of One's Own, 09:07.820 --> 09:11.610 this young woman, Mary Beton, Mary Seton, 09:11.610 --> 09:15.690 Mary Carmichael--whoever she is, is sitting in the British 09:15.692 --> 09:16.412 Library. 09:16.408 --> 09:20.948 She's thought that she'd spend the morning trying to figure out 09:20.950 --> 09:23.440 what scholars think about women. 09:23.440 --> 09:27.510 After all, the subject is women and fiction. 09:27.509 --> 09:30.769 I'm supposed to be addressing these undergraduates on this 09:30.765 --> 09:33.275 subject: "what do I know about women? 09:33.279 --> 09:35.859 I'd better go to the library and find out." 09:35.860 --> 09:41.040 So she expects just to find a couple of books and she'll be 09:41.037 --> 09:41.927 all set. 09:41.928 --> 09:46.228 Instead she is simply overwhelmed, and there's this 09:46.226 --> 09:48.286 avalanche of material. 09:48.288 --> 09:52.838 She submits maybe a dozen or two call slips and then sits 09:52.837 --> 09:56.247 back waiting for the material to appear. 09:56.250 --> 10:00.820 Of course, the point of it is that everything in the British 10:00.823 --> 10:05.633 Library on what turns out to be the voluminous subject of women 10:05.630 --> 10:07.880 is written by men, right? 10:07.879 --> 10:09.189 Everything. 10:09.190 --> 10:14.600 She begins to take note of the way these things are described 10:14.596 --> 10:18.106 in the sort of pre-computer database. 10:18.110 --> 10:21.700 That is to say, how do you classify the various 10:21.695 --> 10:24.965 things that men have to say about women? 10:24.970 --> 10:29.510 This is the way it goes: "condition of Middle Ages 10:29.509 --> 10:32.559 of; habits in the Fiji Islands of; 10:32.559 --> 10:38.649 worshipped as goddesses by; weaker in moral sense than; 10:38.649 --> 10:43.839 idealism of; greater conscientious of; 10:43.840 --> 10:47.530 South Sea islanders age of puberty among; 10:47.529 --> 10:53.259 attractiveness of; offered as sacrifice to; 10:53.259 --> 10:59.449 small size of brain of; profounder sub-consciousness of; 10:59.450 --> 11:05.000 less hair on the body of; mental, moral and physical 11:05.003 --> 11:08.833 inferiority of; love of children of; 11:08.830 --> 11:12.850 greater length of life of; weaker muscles of; 11:12.850 --> 11:17.170 strength of affections of; vanity of; 11:17.169 --> 11:20.759 higher education of; Shakespeare's opinion of; 11:20.759 --> 11:23.959 Lord Birkenhead's opinion of; Dean Inge's opinion of; 11:23.960 --> 11:27.310 La Bruyere's opinion of; Dr. Johnson's opinion of; 11:27.309 --> 11:30.739 Mr. Oscar Browning's opinion of; and dot, dot, 11:30.735 --> 11:33.395 dot--the list can continue. 11:33.399 --> 11:35.479 In other words, she sits there. 11:35.480 --> 11:39.300 She's simply overwhelmed, and what she of course is 11:39.304 --> 11:43.894 telling us is that there's lots and lots and lots and lots of 11:43.894 --> 11:49.554 opinions on record about women, all of them expressed by men. 11:49.548 --> 11:52.408 So now thinking about Edward Said, 11:52.408 --> 11:56.238 if Edward Said had taken up Virginia Woolf's project, 11:56.240 --> 12:00.730 if Edward Said had undertaken to write A Room of One's Own, 12:00.730 --> 12:03.690 the title of it would have been Female-ism, 12:03.693 --> 12:04.213 right? 12:04.210 --> 12:08.990 That's precisely what he means by "Orientalism," 12:08.986 --> 12:13.416 the vast body of information-- some of it scholarly, 12:13.424 --> 12:17.274 some of it just sort of sheerly doxological-- 12:17.269 --> 12:21.199 the vast body of information about peoples called 12:21.200 --> 12:24.230 "Oriental" by and large, 12:24.230 --> 12:27.020 especially in the nineteenth-century tradition. 12:27.019 --> 12:32.329 Said's main concern is the peoples of the Middle East, 12:32.330 --> 12:35.690 and he shows how it is that there's a certain reason why 12:35.688 --> 12:39.048 this is an appropriate term to use for that tradition of 12:39.048 --> 12:42.468 scholarship and philology in the nineteenth century. 12:42.470 --> 12:45.630 In any case, the vast body of material 12:45.628 --> 12:50.898 published about these people-- and it's perfectly true that 12:50.899 --> 12:56.249 there are the infinitely long shelves of the library devoted 12:56.250 --> 13:00.150 to multivolume treatises on this topic, 13:00.149 --> 13:03.579 all of them written by us in the West-- 13:03.580 --> 13:10.420 us--about this other who is perpetually in our imagination 13:10.418 --> 13:16.778 and constructed by us in the variety of ways that Said 13:16.778 --> 13:22.848 discusses on page 1811, the right-hand column. 13:22.850 --> 13:27.220 13:27.220 --> 13:29.800 He says toward the bottom of the column: 13:29.798 --> 13:33.588 Orientalism is premised upon exteriority, 13:33.590 --> 13:36.650 that is, on the fact that the Orientalist, 13:36.649 --> 13:40.379 poet or scholar, makes the Orient speak, 13:40.379 --> 13:45.499 describes the Orient, renders its mysteries plain for 13:45.498 --> 13:47.268 and to the West. 13:47.269 --> 13:51.419 Just as in Woolf, men's opinions about women 13:51.422 --> 13:57.412 getting themselves expressed in books make the subject of woman 13:57.408 --> 14:00.498 clear to an audience of men. 14:00.500 --> 14:01.280 All right. 14:01.278 --> 14:09.638 So before moving in with some more depth and precision into 14:09.638 --> 14:14.328 Said's text, let me quickly explain what I 14:14.327 --> 14:19.117 mean by saying that Said and Bhabha constitute a kind of 14:19.123 --> 14:20.173 sequence. 14:20.168 --> 14:24.988 I'm thinking in particular of Elaine Showalter's distinction 14:24.990 --> 14:28.750 between feminist and gynocritical criticism. 14:28.750 --> 14:31.540 You remember the distinction which is echoed, 14:31.542 --> 14:33.512 by the way, in Gates's essay. 14:33.509 --> 14:37.009 The distinction is: first you get criticism in 14:37.011 --> 14:41.761 which the treatment of women in literature by men is the focus 14:41.759 --> 14:45.609 of attention, and then subsequently you get 14:45.611 --> 14:49.251 criticism in which the women's tradition, 14:49.250 --> 14:54.420 the voice of women themselves, is the focus and, 14:54.418 --> 14:58.378 as Showalter believes, the more fruitful terrain for 14:58.378 --> 14:59.308 criticism. 14:59.308 --> 15:04.558 You can see that in that context, by way of making that 15:04.561 --> 15:07.981 distinction, you can see that Said is 15:07.980 --> 15:13.170 decidedly phase one because, of course, Orientalism is about 15:13.173 --> 15:18.043 the treatment of the Middle Eastern other by the West. 15:18.038 --> 15:23.688 It can be slotted into that same moment. 15:23.690 --> 15:29.900 Then Homi Bhabha obviously in a variety of ways takes up the 15:29.898 --> 15:35.578 subject position of the colonized, of the subaltern. 15:35.580 --> 15:39.120 He doesn't leave out the subject position of the 15:39.123 --> 15:44.103 colonizer because he sees them as being radically interrelated, 15:44.100 --> 15:48.450 but he plainly is as interested in a variety of ways of talking 15:48.448 --> 15:52.378 about the traditions of the colonized as he is of talking 15:52.378 --> 15:55.888 about the way in which colonization takes place and 15:55.885 --> 15:57.495 expresses itself. 15:57.500 --> 16:01.870 So in that sense, we can see Said and Bhabha as 16:01.871 --> 16:07.101 belonging to these two phases as mapped by Showalter. 16:07.100 --> 16:11.520 As I say also in passing by Gates--and I'm sorry for the 16:11.520 --> 16:15.460 confusion of this heading [gestures to board]-- 16:15.460 --> 16:19.440 actually there's another way in which Said and Bhabha can be 16:19.441 --> 16:22.141 understood as phase one and phase two. 16:22.139 --> 16:26.839 That has much more to do with the tradition of literary 16:26.839 --> 16:29.649 theory, which in their ways both 16:29.649 --> 16:32.559 Showalter and Gates have rejected, 16:32.558 --> 16:37.678 insisting that one needs to commandeer white male literary 16:37.677 --> 16:40.547 theory for one's own purposes. 16:40.548 --> 16:44.998 I suppose it's a question of how this issue doesn't come up 16:44.999 --> 16:46.609 in Said and Bhabha. 16:46.610 --> 16:51.600 It could perhaps be answered by saying that precisely in the 16:51.601 --> 16:57.211 situation of colonialism, the intellectuals--third world, 16:57.205 --> 17:03.655 colonized intellectuals-- nevertheless are educated in 17:03.658 --> 17:09.668 high-octane male metropolitan institutions, 17:09.670 --> 17:13.330 by which of course one means primarily Oxford and Cambridge. 17:13.328 --> 17:18.008 In a certain sense, they come to identify-- 17:18.009 --> 17:23.659 and this is not actually a thing apart from Bhabha's 17:23.657 --> 17:29.717 argument about hybridity-- they come to identify in some 17:29.720 --> 17:35.340 measure with the educational agenda of the colonizer and 17:35.336 --> 17:37.476 participate in it. 17:37.480 --> 17:38.660 Now that's speculative. 17:38.660 --> 17:44.030 It may simply be that we have missed out on those moments when 17:44.028 --> 17:47.608 Said and Bhabha, too, may be talking about the 17:47.605 --> 17:51.215 way in which the white male tradition of literary theory 17:51.220 --> 17:55.250 needs to be appropriated; but for the moment what I want 17:55.248 --> 17:58.888 to point out is this: Said's Orientalism works very 17:58.894 --> 18:03.494 much in the historical moment of what we call structuralism. 18:03.490 --> 18:07.010 That is to say, it's primary concern is with 18:07.011 --> 18:12.671 the binary opposition, a mutual and interdependent 18:12.666 --> 18:20.146 binary opposition of central self and decentralized other 18:20.148 --> 18:23.728 including, as we'll see in a minute, 18:23.728 --> 18:27.278 the way in which the construction of the otherness of 18:27.282 --> 18:31.522 the other is actually covertly also at the same time a means of 18:31.520 --> 18:36.030 constructing, defining, and delimiting the 18:36.025 --> 18:41.155 nature of selfhood, or in this case of being 18:41.163 --> 18:42.193 Western. 18:42.190 --> 18:46.270 There is a fundamental binarism in Said's point of view, 18:46.269 --> 18:49.379 which by the way has often been criticized, 18:49.380 --> 18:55.850 and it's been criticized most often from the standpoint of 18:55.845 --> 18:58.785 Bhabha-- if only because he's constantly 18:58.786 --> 19:00.996 referring to Derrida's famous essay, 19:03.788 --> 19:08.118 and also because he appropriates a great deal of the 19:08.115 --> 19:10.825 language and style of Derrida. 19:10.828 --> 19:15.468 You can see that Bhabha takes, with respect to the binarism of 19:15.469 --> 19:18.739 structuralism, a deconstructive attitude. 19:18.740 --> 19:23.230 In other words, his sense of these relations 19:23.230 --> 19:26.700 breaks down into, at the very least, 19:26.702 --> 19:30.312 a redoubling sense of what he calls "double 19:30.313 --> 19:33.693 consciousness" so that one can't clearly 19:33.692 --> 19:38.382 identify colonizer and colonized as a binary opposition. 19:38.380 --> 19:42.240 It's more complicated than that, and it's a series of 19:42.242 --> 19:46.402 issues that turns on a highly Derridian sense of what one 19:46.404 --> 19:48.564 might mean by difference. 19:48.558 --> 19:53.328 All I want to say is that the relation, Said-Bhabha, 19:53.325 --> 19:57.805 is phase one-phase two in that regard as well. 19:57.808 --> 20:03.588 By the way, this is a tendency that one can find in other forms 20:03.592 --> 20:07.232 of theory having to do with identity. 20:07.230 --> 20:11.510 The relationship between the classical feminism that we have 20:11.513 --> 20:15.803 been discussing so far and the gender theory that we will be 20:15.798 --> 20:19.418 discussing on Tuesday, especially in the case of 20:19.423 --> 20:23.023 Judith Butler, is once again a relation that 20:23.016 --> 20:27.106 could be understood as between structuralism and 20:27.111 --> 20:28.681 deconstruction. 20:28.680 --> 20:34.030 There, too, you have a not completely overlapping but, 20:34.029 --> 20:37.299 from the standpoint of our concerns in literary theory, 20:37.298 --> 20:42.378 nevertheless rather interesting way in which this succession, 20:42.380 --> 20:46.180 Said-Bhabha, is phase one-phase two in two 20:46.183 --> 20:49.993 different ways that can be identified, 20:49.990 --> 20:51.110 I think, usefully. 20:51.109 --> 20:51.999 All right. 20:52.000 --> 20:55.830 So that then about their relationship. 20:55.829 --> 20:58.509 So what about Said? 20:58.509 --> 21:03.809 How do we get at the issues that Said wants to talk about 21:03.806 --> 21:09.856 and understand the way in which he thinks they have integrity? 21:09.858 --> 21:13.818 I think I'd like actually to begin with a word or two about 21:13.816 --> 21:18.616 truth, because Said makes it clear 21:18.624 --> 21:24.664 that in a way, the demonization of Orientalism 21:24.655 --> 21:31.285 that his project undertakes isn't really undertaken because 21:31.290 --> 21:36.440 Orientalism is necessarily a pack of lies. 21:36.440 --> 21:41.250 Maybe he waffles a little bit about this, but it's not really 21:41.248 --> 21:45.658 ultimately the point for him whether Orientalism lies or 21:45.656 --> 21:47.256 tells the truth. 21:47.259 --> 21:51.479 This is the way he puts it on page 1802 in the right-hand 21:51.476 --> 21:53.126 column: … [A] 21:53.127 --> 21:54.697 third qualification. 21:54.700 --> 21:59.280 One ought never to assume that the structure of Orientalism is 21:59.277 --> 22:03.477 nothing more than a structure of lies or myths which, 22:03.480 --> 22:05.890 were the truth about them to be told, 22:05.890 --> 22:07.540 would simply blow away. 22:07.538 --> 22:10.838 I myself believe that Orientalism is more particularly 22:10.835 --> 22:14.125 valuable as a sign of European-Atlantic power over the 22:14.130 --> 22:18.110 Orient than it is as a veridic discourse about the Orient... 22:18.108 --> 22:21.148 Nevertheless, what we must respect and try to 22:21.146 --> 22:24.316 grasp is the sheer knitted-together strength of 22:24.321 --> 22:27.841 Orientalist discourse… In other words, 22:27.839 --> 22:31.979 one of Napoleon's adjutants during Napoleon's campaign 22:31.976 --> 22:36.576 through Egypt wrote a ten-volume Eastward de l'Egypt. 22:36.578 --> 22:41.718 Many of the texts which Said mentions in passing in his 22:41.717 --> 22:45.877 introduction to Orientalism are just as long. 22:45.880 --> 22:51.280 You've got fifty-volume, sort of gigantic scholarly 22:51.280 --> 22:54.610 undertakings, and you've got to admit, 22:54.606 --> 22:57.066 well, if they are saying that much, 22:57.068 --> 22:59.098 there's got to be something in it that's true. 22:59.098 --> 23:03.008 There is, after all, a great deal of knowledge of a 23:03.009 --> 23:05.859 certain kind, at least, that has gone into 23:05.864 --> 23:09.054 thinking of this kind, and so one can't just say, 23:09.045 --> 23:12.375 "My point is that none of it's true." 23:12.380 --> 23:16.810 Said is at pains to make a distinction, therefore, 23:16.808 --> 23:19.158 between truth and value. 23:19.160 --> 23:24.930 It's not that Orientalist discourse is necessarily true or 23:24.930 --> 23:25.740 false. 23:25.740 --> 23:32.870 It is the case though that it is insidiously devaluate of its 23:32.866 --> 23:37.946 object of attention-- that there is an implicit 23:37.945 --> 23:43.855 euro-centrism which Said does go so far as to consider a form of 23:43.858 --> 23:48.338 racism in Orientalism, quite irrespective of any 23:48.344 --> 23:51.864 measure or degree of truth that what are, 23:51.858 --> 23:55.458 after all, the meticulous researches of a lot of these 23:55.461 --> 23:56.891 characters turn up. 23:56.890 --> 24:00.250 For example, on page 1812, 24:00.247 --> 24:04.677 the left-hand column, he says: 24:04.680 --> 24:08.690 My analysis of the Orientalist text therefore places emphasis 24:08.688 --> 24:11.228 [this is about a third of the way down] 24:11.227 --> 24:16.657 on the evidence, which is by no means invisible, 24:16.655 --> 24:23.535 for such representations as representations, 24:23.538 --> 24:27.768 not as "natural" descriptions of the Orient. 24:27.769 --> 24:32.379 Now we might pause for a minute over that as a possible object 24:32.377 --> 24:35.927 of critique because at the end of his essay, 24:35.930 --> 24:38.060 or at the end of the introduction as you have it, 24:38.058 --> 24:40.198 you notice Said saying, "Look, 24:40.200 --> 24:43.700 I don't take up here the question of how one might 24:43.700 --> 24:47.200 actually write correctly > 24:47.200 --> 24:48.470 about these people." 24:48.470 --> 24:51.570 He doesn't take up, for example, 24:51.567 --> 24:56.767 the question of what it might be like to be sort of a 24:56.765 --> 25:02.155 representative of these minorities or colonized figures 25:02.161 --> 25:05.461 and to write about oneself. 25:05.460 --> 25:09.600 He doesn't really take up the question of whether the bias of 25:09.602 --> 25:13.922 somebody else writing about me, a man writing about a woman, 25:13.920 --> 25:17.440 is worse than the bias of my own preconceptions and 25:17.439 --> 25:19.339 prejudices about myself. 25:19.338 --> 25:23.908 He admits that he doesn't really have an advanced theory 25:23.914 --> 25:27.994 that secures one kind of representation as true or 25:27.990 --> 25:32.900 authentic and secures another kind of representation as bias 25:32.898 --> 25:34.728 and inauthentic. 25:34.730 --> 25:38.140 He says, "Another scholar will perhaps take this up. 25:38.140 --> 25:41.460 I leave it alone in my book," and it is left 25:41.457 --> 25:45.057 alone, the problem being that the 25:45.057 --> 25:50.587 claim remains that he does-- anticipating many other people 25:50.586 --> 25:53.156 who have written on this subject-- 25:53.160 --> 25:57.860 he does impugn Orientalism as mere representation: 25:57.862 --> 26:02.872 that is to say, as the opposite because it is a 26:02.869 --> 26:07.799 representation, the opposite of a natural 26:07.800 --> 26:11.810 evocation of an ethos or world. 26:11.808 --> 26:15.948 So we just do want to put a little question mark in the 26:15.951 --> 26:19.021 margin and then say, "Well, fine. 26:19.019 --> 26:21.929 Granted this is all representation, 26:21.928 --> 26:23.638 where is the text? 26:23.640 --> 26:27.080 Where could the text be that would be natural?" 26:27.078 --> 26:29.368 Is there, for example, any such thing, 26:29.366 --> 26:32.826 as we've asked ourselves over the course of the semester, 26:32.828 --> 26:34.188 as a natural sign? 26:34.190 --> 26:38.930 The sign being arbitrary, it does place us already pretty 26:38.932 --> 26:42.492 securely in the realm of representation. 26:42.490 --> 26:47.340 So all of these questions are then posed by Said's sense of 26:47.339 --> 26:52.109 the relationship between truth and value in the history of 26:52.107 --> 26:54.447 Orientalist scholarship. 26:54.450 --> 26:57.070 Now where is he coming from? 26:57.068 --> 27:02.668 He's quite open about it, and it's perhaps worth pausing 27:02.674 --> 27:08.594 over an idea common to the two scholar-theorists who matter 27:08.586 --> 27:13.196 most to him, Michel Foucault and the Italian 27:13.198 --> 27:15.518 Marxist Antonio Gramsci. 27:15.519 --> 27:20.089 First of all, just to pass in review the way 27:20.088 --> 27:24.978 in which he's indebted to Gramsci on page 1803, 27:24.978 --> 27:28.908 the left-hand column, Said says: 27:28.910 --> 27:31.900 Culture, of course, is to be found operating within 27:31.902 --> 27:34.992 civil society, where the influence of ideas, 27:34.990 --> 27:38.770 of institutions and of other persons works not through 27:38.772 --> 27:42.202 domination but by what Gramsci calls consent. 27:42.200 --> 27:45.250 In other words, it's not just a question of 27:45.246 --> 27:49.446 having forced down your throat certain ideas of concepts or 27:49.453 --> 27:51.663 laws, for that matter, 27:51.659 --> 27:57.249 but a circulation of knowledge, so called, of feeling about 27:57.251 --> 27:59.721 things, of ideology, 27:59.724 --> 28:06.914 which through consent establishes certain attitudes of 28:06.905 --> 28:07.985 bias. 28:07.990 --> 28:13.350 This is the distinction that Gramsci makes between the way in 28:13.349 --> 28:18.349 which one is imposed on by actual power and authority and 28:18.353 --> 28:23.803 the way in which one is imposed on by the circulations of what 28:23.801 --> 28:28.091 we've been exposed to in the past as being called 28:28.090 --> 28:30.950 "ideologemes." 28:30.950 --> 28:35.320 So to continue: In any society not totalitarian 28:35.320 --> 28:38.260 [says Said], then, certain cultural forms 28:38.258 --> 28:42.048 predominate over others, just as certain ideas are more 28:42.047 --> 28:45.887 influential than others; the form of this cultural 28:45.894 --> 28:51.044 leadership is what Gramsci has identified as hegemony. 28:51.038 --> 28:55.408 This is a term that you will frequently encounter, 28:55.410 --> 28:59.660 particularly in Marxist criticism, but it is also a term 28:59.660 --> 29:04.300 very closely related to what for most Western readers is more 29:04.297 --> 29:07.617 famous in the work of Michel Foucault, 29:07.618 --> 29:09.998 the term "power" or sometimes 29:10.000 --> 29:11.880 "power/knowledge." 29:11.880 --> 29:15.360 As you will learn in the excerpt from Foucault that 29:15.355 --> 29:20.115 you'll be reading on Tuesday, Foucault like Gramsci makes a 29:20.119 --> 29:25.459 distinction between power merely as that which is exercised by 29:25.464 --> 29:29.614 the police, by the legal arm of society, 29:29.609 --> 29:33.669 by the dictator, by the government, 29:33.670 --> 29:40.030 and by power as the ways, the frequently insidious ways, 29:40.032 --> 29:45.442 in which knowledge is circulated and made hegemonic-- 29:45.440 --> 29:49.060 that is to say, made authoritative. 29:49.058 --> 29:55.908 Foucault is fascinated by the structure of this circulation of 29:55.912 --> 29:57.262 knowledge. 29:57.259 --> 30:01.229 That is, in fact the essential subject matter of all of his 30:01.230 --> 30:04.140 late work, the way in which we are 30:04.140 --> 30:09.410 thinking that we are sort of free contemplative agents in the 30:09.411 --> 30:12.031 world, in fact browbeaten by 30:12.027 --> 30:16.327 structures of opinion circulating around us that lull 30:16.330 --> 30:21.380 us into feeling that we are in the presence of the truth, 30:21.380 --> 30:25.300 whereas of course, we're only in the presence of 30:25.296 --> 30:28.626 one form or another of motivated bias. 30:28.630 --> 30:34.180 Both Gramsci and Foucault make the distinction between absolute 30:34.183 --> 30:38.133 power and, as Gramsci calls it, hegemony and, 30:38.126 --> 30:41.886 as Foucault calls it, power/knowledge. 30:41.890 --> 30:45.850 Said is talking here about power/knowledge. 30:45.848 --> 30:49.888 He's not talking about the imposition of law through force 30:49.885 --> 30:52.855 or any other means on a colonized world. 30:52.858 --> 30:58.388 He's talking about the way in which opinions construct that 30:58.385 --> 31:03.715 world and simultaneously reinforce the authority of those 31:03.721 --> 31:06.581 who generate the opinions. 31:06.578 --> 31:10.658 I think it's important to point this relatively subtle 31:10.657 --> 31:13.197 distinction out: he does, however, 31:13.196 --> 31:16.426 disagree from Foucault in one respect. 31:16.430 --> 31:20.920 On page 1813 he goes back to what we already know about 31:20.919 --> 31:25.909 Foucault, which is Foucault's interest in the author function 31:25.907 --> 31:28.317 as opposed to the author. 31:28.318 --> 31:33.238 Authors, generally speaking, Foucault wants to say, 31:33.238 --> 31:39.238 are not authorities but simply vessels of forms of opinion. 31:39.240 --> 31:44.000 Certain authors who come very close to being authority we call 31:44.002 --> 31:48.142 founders of discursivity, but even in their cases it's 31:48.136 --> 31:52.376 the nature of the discourse and not their existence as authors 31:52.378 --> 31:53.908 which is important. 31:53.910 --> 31:57.160 Said wants to say, "I take authors a little 31:57.162 --> 32:00.902 bit more seriously than that," and he does on page 32:00.898 --> 32:04.288 1813 in the right-hand column where he says: 32:04.288 --> 32:08.418 Foucault believes that in general the individual text or 32:08.417 --> 32:13.087 author counts for very little; empirically [that is to say, 32:13.094 --> 32:16.104 "through my experience"], 32:16.098 --> 32:20.818 in the case of Orientalism, and perhaps nowhere else I find 32:20.820 --> 32:22.450 this not to be so. 32:22.450 --> 32:24.540 In other words, the author is the central 32:24.544 --> 32:27.314 philologist, and social historians, 32:27.308 --> 32:32.798 explorers, and demographers who have written so extensively on 32:32.798 --> 32:36.578 this part of the world are authorities. 32:36.578 --> 32:42.208 They are the oracles from which generalized and ultimately 32:42.212 --> 32:47.552 commonplace opinions disseminate as power/knowledge. 32:47.548 --> 32:51.078 It's not a question, therefore, of a kind of silent 32:51.079 --> 32:55.099 drumbeat of opinion expressing itself over and over again, 32:55.104 --> 32:58.074 which is more what interests Foucault. 32:58.068 --> 33:02.388 So Said, as I say, distinguishes himself subtly 33:02.386 --> 33:07.736 from Foucault in that regard while nevertheless confessing 33:07.738 --> 33:13.178 openly the influence both of Foucault and of Gramsci on his 33:13.182 --> 33:16.752 way of approaching his material. 33:16.750 --> 33:24.200 So as a circulation of power, the effect of Orientalism is 33:24.202 --> 33:30.482 something that ultimately concerns Said.Well, 33:30.480 --> 33:32.890 he says this somewhat rhetorically because it 33:32.891 --> 33:36.291 obviously does concern him that it has an effect on the peoples 33:36.288 --> 33:39.548 in question, but what ultimately concerns 33:39.548 --> 33:43.868 Said is the effect of Orientalism on the Euro-centric 33:43.871 --> 33:46.791 mind, indeed the degree to which it 33:46.792 --> 33:50.842 even can be said to construct the Euro-centric mind, 33:50.838 --> 33:54.178 page 1806, the right-hand column: 33:54.180 --> 33:57.510 33:57.509 --> 34:00.549 … [M]y real argument is that Orientalism is-- 34:00.548 --> 34:03.508 and does not simply represent--a considerable 34:03.512 --> 34:07.152 dimension of modern political-intellectual culture, 34:07.150 --> 34:11.830 and as such has less to do with the Orient than it does with 34:11.827 --> 34:13.727 "our" world. 34:13.730 --> 34:17.950 Now here you can see the degree to which Said is saying 34:17.954 --> 34:23.044 something very similar to what Toni Morrison said in her essay. 34:23.039 --> 34:29.899 The existence of black as absence needs to be understood-- 34:29.900 --> 34:32.040 for example, if we are studying the history 34:32.036 --> 34:35.496 of American literature-- as the means of constructing 34:35.501 --> 34:39.021 whiteness, of that which liberates 34:39.021 --> 34:45.701 whiteness from the forms of constraint under which it's been 34:45.699 --> 34:48.189 chafing at the bit. 34:48.190 --> 34:50.340 Morrison, of course, develops this argument 34:50.340 --> 34:53.500 beautifully, and she quite clearly takes it 34:53.503 --> 34:58.133 from the fourth chapter of Hegel's Phenomenology of Mind 34:58.132 --> 35:02.922 as a way of understanding the master-slave dialectic. 35:02.920 --> 35:06.550 In other words, in Hegel it's clear as Hegel 35:06.545 --> 35:11.015 develops the idea that master and slave are absolutely 35:11.016 --> 35:15.736 necessary to each other in a structure of mutuality. 35:15.739 --> 35:19.659 The master isn't the master, can't define himself as free or 35:19.661 --> 35:22.721 superior without the existence of the slave. 35:22.719 --> 35:27.309 The trickiness that the slave learns being in the position of 35:27.313 --> 35:31.453 subordination involving the development of all sorts of 35:31.449 --> 35:35.199 complicated skills means ultimately that the slave 35:35.201 --> 35:38.961 becomes, as it were, that which drives 35:38.963 --> 35:44.373 the master technologically and ultimately controls the master 35:44.373 --> 35:48.073 in a kind of fable of class reversal, 35:48.070 --> 35:52.780 which continues to reverse itself again and again and again 35:52.782 --> 35:54.492 on various grounds. 35:54.489 --> 35:59.279 This is the fable, which at the same time is a 35:59.282 --> 36:05.142 philosophy of class relations that structures Morrison's 36:05.143 --> 36:11.623 argument and which, I think, also structures Said's. 36:11.619 --> 36:16.459 I want to make the transition to Bhabha because obviously this 36:16.456 --> 36:18.356 is a form of binarism. 36:18.360 --> 36:24.160 The two signifiers in relation to each other need each other in 36:24.164 --> 36:29.874 the way that we described when we were discussing Saussure and 36:29.873 --> 36:31.563 structuralism. 36:31.559 --> 36:36.909 I can't simply say that a red light has positive value. 36:36.909 --> 36:41.169 You remember the whole argument: I have to see the red 36:41.166 --> 36:45.506 light in the context of the semiotic system to which it 36:45.505 --> 36:46.465 belongs. 36:46.469 --> 36:49.809 I have to see it as being different from, 36:49.806 --> 36:53.136 or opposed to, something else in order to 36:53.144 --> 36:54.234 grasp it. 36:54.230 --> 36:57.000 I cannot know it positively, in other words; 36:57.000 --> 36:59.550 I can only know it negatively. 36:59.550 --> 37:04.200 This basic concept of structuralism in the Saussurian 37:04.197 --> 37:09.287 tradition is what creates, is what shapes binary arguments 37:09.293 --> 37:12.783 of the kind that one finds in Said. 37:12.780 --> 37:18.470 That we know ourselves negatively as the not-other is 37:18.465 --> 37:23.365 the basic principle, the theoretical principle which 37:23.371 --> 37:28.081 underlies obviously aspects of the argument which are also, 37:28.079 --> 37:29.989 as Said says, empirical. 37:29.989 --> 37:32.449 Yes, I can say it's a structuralist idea, 37:32.454 --> 37:36.154 but I really believe it because I've seen it in operation. 37:36.150 --> 37:38.910 It's not just structuralism in other words. 37:38.909 --> 37:42.569 It shares, however, with structuralism a 37:42.568 --> 37:45.288 theoretical predisposition. 37:45.289 --> 37:51.549 Bhabha, if you look at page 1879, openly criticizes the 37:51.547 --> 37:55.717 premise of binarism of this kind-- 37:55.719 --> 37:59.189 not just any binarism, but he actually does go 37:59.190 --> 38:01.120 directly back to Hegel. 38:01.119 --> 38:03.809 In other words, he identifies the source of 38:03.813 --> 38:06.193 thinking of this kind, bottom of 1879, 38:06.186 --> 38:08.556 right-hand column, when he says: 38:08.559 --> 38:12.859 It is this ambivalence that makes the boundaries of colonial 38:12.864 --> 38:17.154 "positionality"-- the division of self/other--and 38:17.153 --> 38:21.433 the question of colonial power-- the differentiation of 38:21.434 --> 38:24.654 colonizer/colonized-- different from both the 38:24.652 --> 38:27.602 Hegelian master/slave dialectic or the phenomenological 38:27.597 --> 38:29.067 projection of Otherness. 38:29.070 --> 38:31.300 He goes on to mention other things, 38:31.300 --> 38:36.820 but I just want to focus on this as a moment in which Bhabha 38:36.818 --> 38:41.868 is distinguishing himself as clearly as he can from the 38:41.869 --> 38:43.739 project of Said. 38:43.739 --> 38:46.989 Now the passage I just read begins with the word 38:46.990 --> 38:48.790 "ambivalence." 38:48.789 --> 38:52.759 What does Bhabha mean by ambivalence? 38:52.760 --> 38:57.770 Let's try to start there and see if we can work our way into 38:57.771 --> 39:01.341 Bhabha's complex thinking on these matters, 39:01.340 --> 39:05.250 first by way of the notion of ambivalence. 39:05.250 --> 39:09.630 I'm going to put this in terms of an historical example because 39:09.630 --> 39:12.740 I hope that will make it a little clearer. 39:12.739 --> 39:18.699 There is the ambivalence of the colonizer toward the colonized. 39:18.699 --> 39:21.559 In other words, it's not just one mindset that 39:21.561 --> 39:22.961 drives colonization. 39:22.960 --> 39:28.750 In the historical experience of England in the East India 39:28.751 --> 39:32.141 Company, there are two distinct phases, 39:32.141 --> 39:36.271 phases which actually repeat themselves recurrently even 39:36.268 --> 39:38.968 throughout the twentieth century. 39:38.969 --> 39:43.089 The first in the eighteenth century is the period of the 39:43.090 --> 39:47.440 government of the East India Company by Warren Hastings who 39:47.436 --> 39:51.026 in a certain sense was interested in what we call 39:51.032 --> 39:55.082 "going native" and also encouraged all of his 39:55.077 --> 39:58.747 provincial administrators to do likewise. 39:58.750 --> 40:03.710 Hastings, in other words, in Saidian terms knew a great 40:03.706 --> 40:07.006 deal about the Orientalized other. 40:07.010 --> 40:09.920 He knew all the local languages and dialects. 40:09.920 --> 40:11.380 He knew all the customs. 40:11.380 --> 40:17.180 He really knew everything there was to know and in a certain 40:17.181 --> 40:22.891 sense was a person who did go native while at the same time 40:22.885 --> 40:28.095 wielding with an iron grip of authority power over the 40:28.096 --> 40:30.256 colonized other. 40:30.260 --> 40:34.490 He himself then embodies a certain ambivalence in not 40:34.492 --> 40:39.052 giving an inch as to the actual control of authority, 40:39.050 --> 40:44.220 while at the same time seeming to become one with the other. 40:44.219 --> 40:47.709 Then there is the historical ambivalence which expresses 40:47.706 --> 40:50.556 itself in a completely different attitude, 40:50.559 --> 40:57.489 an attitude which surfaced in the East India Company early in 40:57.485 --> 41:05.215 the nineteenth century under the supervisorship of Charles Grant. 41:05.219 --> 41:08.969 There had been a tremendous revival of fundamentalist 41:08.965 --> 41:11.395 religion, mainly Methodism, 41:11.402 --> 41:15.932 in England, and this evangelical enthusiasm spread 41:15.932 --> 41:19.912 itself into the interests of the empire. 41:19.909 --> 41:25.469 Charles Grant and others like him no longer had any interest 41:25.471 --> 41:29.521 at all in going native but, on the contrary, 41:29.523 --> 41:33.043 insisted that a standard of Englishness and, 41:33.039 --> 41:36.109 in particular, the standard of the English 41:36.106 --> 41:38.676 Bible-- the coming of the English book 41:38.684 --> 41:42.244 that Bhabha talks about at the beginning of his essay-- 41:42.239 --> 41:46.389 be firmly implanted, and that the imposition of 41:46.391 --> 41:50.911 Englishness on the colonized other be the agenda of 41:50.905 --> 41:52.435 colonization. 41:52.440 --> 42:00.070 The famous historian Thomas Babington Macaulay codified this 42:00.067 --> 42:05.077 attitude in a famous, and soon to be infamous, 42:05.079 --> 42:08.499 document he wrote called "The Minute on 42:08.503 --> 42:11.613 Education," which insisted that the 42:11.608 --> 42:16.228 education of the Indian people under the regime of the East 42:16.226 --> 42:20.606 India Company be conducted strictly according to English 42:20.605 --> 42:25.295 models: that missionaries no longer try to adapt their ideas 42:25.302 --> 42:30.162 to local customs and folk ways but that everything be strictly 42:30.159 --> 42:32.069 anglicized. 42:32.070 --> 42:36.690 This is a completely different attitude toward colonization, 42:36.693 --> 42:41.633 and it can be understood as a sort of historical ambivalence. 42:41.630 --> 42:46.860 I'd actually like to pause over an example of what you might 42:46.864 --> 42:52.234 call the Warren Hastings moment, a vicious example although an 42:52.228 --> 42:56.748 absolutely fascinating one in the disturbing masterpiece by 42:56.746 --> 42:59.626 John Ford called The Searchers. 42:59.630 --> 43:02.550 I hope some of you at least know that film. 43:02.550 --> 43:12.060 The John Wayne character is sort of a lone stranger-- 43:12.059 --> 43:15.229 which is of course not infrequent in the western-- 43:15.230 --> 43:20.380 who shows up at the house of some relatives and hears that a 43:20.376 --> 43:24.386 daughter has been abducted by native Americans, 43:24.391 --> 43:25.701 by Indians. 43:25.699 --> 43:30.279 Now the thing about John Wayne is that in this film is that 43:30.277 --> 43:34.977 he's a vicious racist, that he absolutely hates the 43:34.976 --> 43:38.546 Indians, but he is not a vicious racist 43:38.550 --> 43:41.500 from the standpoint of ignorance. 43:41.500 --> 43:46.140 He is in fact a person who has himself, in a certain sense, 43:46.139 --> 43:47.259 gone native. 43:47.260 --> 43:50.590 He knows all the Indian languages and dialects. 43:50.590 --> 43:52.950 He knows all their customs. 43:52.949 --> 43:59.069 He has throughout a lifetime made a careful study of the 43:59.065 --> 44:03.655 people he hates, and this is a volatile mixture 44:03.655 --> 44:07.775 to be exposed to in a film because we are much more 44:07.780 --> 44:12.810 comfortable with the idea that hatred arises out of ignorance, 44:12.811 --> 44:13.721 right? 44:13.719 --> 44:19.099 What is so deeply disturbing about John Ford's The 44:19.101 --> 44:25.211 Searchers is that it is a portrait of absolutely vicious 44:25.208 --> 44:29.868 racism: again Said says, "Hey, it's not necessarily 44:29.871 --> 44:33.051 truth, but we do have to acknowledge a 44:33.050 --> 44:35.650 certain local, thick description. 44:35.650 --> 44:38.600 We have to acknowledge that there's quite a bit of 44:38.601 --> 44:40.771 information > 44:40.768 --> 44:45.318 at this person's disposal, and all of that is borne out in 44:45.318 --> 44:49.308 the characterization of John Wayne in this film. 44:49.309 --> 44:51.389 Warren Hastings was a lot like that. 44:51.389 --> 44:56.919 Warren Hastings knew everything about people whom he ultimately 44:56.920 --> 45:02.270 didn't really respect and whom he insisted on ruling with the 45:02.271 --> 45:04.681 iron fist of authority. 45:04.679 --> 45:08.989 That's the kind of thing that Bhabha is thinking about when he 45:08.994 --> 45:12.464 thinks about the ambivalence of the colonizer, 45:12.460 --> 45:16.170 the relationship between knowledge and value as it's 45:16.168 --> 45:20.678 already been enunciated in Said but also the fact that there is 45:20.679 --> 45:23.879 more than one mindset for the colonizer. 45:23.880 --> 45:26.370 There is the local knowledge mindset, 45:26.369 --> 45:32.629 and there is the sort of raising the absolute unequivocal 45:32.628 --> 45:38.548 standard of the colonizer that these are two different 45:38.552 --> 45:42.382 attitudes, each of which dictate different 45:42.378 --> 45:45.138 strategies, particularly strategies of 45:45.141 --> 45:45.931 education. 45:45.929 --> 45:50.509 So that's the ambivalence of the colonizer. 45:50.510 --> 45:54.800 Then there is the ambivalence of the colonized, 45:54.804 --> 45:58.454 and that, too, has to be understood as a 45:58.447 --> 46:01.807 complex relation to co-optation. 46:01.809 --> 46:05.469 The anecdote with which Bhabha begins, I think, 46:05.474 --> 46:09.064 is fascinating and well worth attending to. 46:09.059 --> 46:14.769 You have not a colonizer but someone thoroughly co-opted, 46:14.768 --> 46:23.438 an evangelical converted Christian of Indian descent who 46:23.442 --> 46:27.722 represents, in a way, that the people he 46:27.721 --> 46:32.241 finds sitting under the trees reading the Bible consider to be 46:32.235 --> 46:36.815 completely authentic because he believes and is perfectly happy 46:36.822 --> 46:40.722 to believe that the Bible, and for that matter 46:40.722 --> 46:45.302 Christianity itself, is an English gift. 46:45.300 --> 46:49.250 But he's met with the response of people who resist that, 46:49.246 --> 46:52.626 who say, "This is very interesting stuff. 46:52.630 --> 46:56.080 We wish we could have some local authority for it. 46:56.079 --> 47:00.379 Our understanding is we got this book directly from God, 47:00.375 --> 47:00.995 right? 47:01.000 --> 47:04.940 That's our understanding and we have our own attitude toward it. 47:04.940 --> 47:07.400 Sure, maybe we'll get baptized one of these days, 47:07.402 --> 47:10.332 but in the meantime we got to go home and take care of the 47:10.326 --> 47:12.426 harvest, so we'll get around to that. 47:12.429 --> 47:13.549 Don't worry about it. 47:13.550 --> 47:17.870 By the way, if we get baptized we certainly can't take the 47:17.871 --> 47:20.831 Eucharist because that's eating meat. 47:20.829 --> 47:21.999 We don't eat meat. 47:22.000 --> 47:25.900 We are who we are." 47:25.900 --> 47:30.800 You can see that these cunningly insinuated provisos to 47:30.804 --> 47:36.534 the attitude that the missionary wants to inculcate in them in a 47:36.525 --> 47:41.245 very real way completely undermines his purpose. 47:41.250 --> 47:43.510 They don't think of it as the English Bible. 47:43.510 --> 47:45.880 They won't accept it as the English Bible. 47:45.880 --> 47:50.610 They will only accept it as an authority that's mediated by 47:50.610 --> 47:54.690 their own values, which transforms the document. 47:54.690 --> 47:59.100 You can see it again--this is1813, as Bhabha points out. 47:59.099 --> 48:02.779 This is precisely at the moment when we're moving, 48:02.780 --> 48:07.580 when the regime of authority is moving from the Warren Hastings 48:07.577 --> 48:10.747 paradigm to the Charles Grant paradigm. 48:10.750 --> 48:15.780 It's no longer possible to think in terms of adapting the 48:15.784 --> 48:19.654 Bible to local beliefs and circumstances. 48:19.650 --> 48:24.140 This is a moment in which the complexity of the attitude of 48:24.137 --> 48:26.457 the colonized is brought up. 48:26.460 --> 48:30.100 There's the attitude of the suborned missionary, 48:30.099 --> 48:33.449 and there's the more complicated and interesting 48:33.447 --> 48:37.367 attitude of the people he encounters sitting under these 48:37.367 --> 48:38.077 trees. 48:38.079 --> 48:49.849 48:49.849 --> 48:55.049 Turn to page 1881, the left-hand column. 48:55.050 --> 48:57.800 This is a very difficult passage. 48:57.800 --> 49:00.310 Everything in Bhabha is difficult. 49:00.309 --> 49:05.509 I think I want to gloss it by suggesting to you that what he's 49:05.505 --> 49:09.505 talking about is that the ambivalence which-- 49:09.510 --> 49:13.720 and we might as well say right out that he has a term for this 49:13.722 --> 49:16.132 ambivalence, and it's "hybridity"-- 49:16.130 --> 49:21.560 is the double consciousness of the colonized hovering between 49:21.561 --> 49:23.871 submission-- that is to say, 49:23.869 --> 49:27.199 submission to authority but with a difference, 49:27.199 --> 49:30.179 submission to authority on one's own terms, 49:30.179 --> 49:35.039 and on the other hand, acquiescence in authority as 49:35.043 --> 49:37.633 given, which of course is basically 49:37.628 --> 49:39.578 the position of the missionary. 49:39.579 --> 49:43.249 With that said, I'll read the passage in which 49:43.248 --> 49:48.218 Bhabha describes this hybridity in the double consciousness of 49:48.221 --> 49:51.241 the colonized: The place of difference and 49:51.244 --> 49:53.104 otherness, or the space of the 49:53.101 --> 49:56.641 adversarial, within such a system of "disposal" 49:56.643 --> 50:00.023 as I have proposed, is never entirely on the 50:00.016 --> 50:02.886 outside or implacably oppositional. 50:02.889 --> 50:06.499 [Not just, in other words, again as a question of us 50:06.496 --> 50:08.896 versus them.] It is a pressure, 50:08.900 --> 50:11.510 and a presence, that acts constantly, 50:11.510 --> 50:14.480 if unevenly, along the entire boundary of 50:14.483 --> 50:17.683 authorization [which is also authority], 50:17.679 --> 50:22.159 that is, on the surface between what I've called 50:22.159 --> 50:27.499 disposal-as-bestowal [I take that meaning submission-- 50:27.500 --> 50:31.130 simply "okay, fine, I give in"] 50:31.134 --> 50:36.044 and disposition-as-inclination [which is "hey, 50:36.039 --> 50:38.069 I kind of like that, I go along with it, 50:38.070 --> 50:40.330 I give in spontaneously"]. 50:40.329 --> 50:45.229 Now to give in simply as a form of recognizing that one's 50:45.233 --> 50:48.393 beaten, as a form of submission, 50:48.391 --> 50:53.531 puts one in the position of what Bhabha calls "sly 50:53.527 --> 50:55.237 civility." 50:55.239 --> 51:00.079 This is the position that I'd like to go back to for a moment 51:00.083 --> 51:05.173 as being very closely related to what Gates calls signifyin'. 51:05.170 --> 51:09.240 Bhabha gives a number of examples of this sly civility in 51:09.237 --> 51:12.407 his text, but of course it's all present 51:12.411 --> 51:16.861 in the clever and wonderfully rich ironies of these figures 51:16.864 --> 51:20.784 sitting under the trees in his opening anecdote. 51:20.780 --> 51:26.560 Let me just give you an example of how sly civility works as a 51:26.561 --> 51:32.441 form of signifyin' and as a stance of colonized resistance, 51:32.440 --> 51:36.970 a recuperation of the will, perhaps in a post-modern sense, 51:36.969 --> 51:40.379 which is nevertheless not rebellious, 51:40.380 --> 51:46.070 not in any way envisioning an overthrow of authority, 51:46.070 --> 51:50.240 but is a means of living in the framework of authority. 51:50.239 --> 51:53.799 Just a quick example and then I'll let you go. 51:53.800 --> 51:57.630 Two African-American people are having a conversation in the 51:57.630 --> 52:02.610 presence of a white person, and they cheerfully and with 52:02.612 --> 52:09.332 broad smiles on their face refer to this person in his presence 52:09.327 --> 52:10.517 as Bill. 52:10.518 --> 52:14.798 Now "Bill" is a derisive and derogatory 52:14.800 --> 52:19.200 term for white people, and the white person standing 52:19.197 --> 52:23.007 there has two choices in response to hearing himself 52:23.007 --> 52:27.637 referred to as "Bill": he can either take umbrage and 52:27.641 --> 52:29.641 say, "Why are you saying that 52:29.639 --> 52:30.069 about me? 52:30.070 --> 52:31.170 I'm a nice guy. 52:31.170 --> 52:36.040 You don't want to say that," in which case the 52:36.038 --> 52:40.418 needling effect of the term has taken hold; 52:40.420 --> 52:45.120 or he can play the fool and pretend that he doesn't know 52:45.121 --> 52:49.311 that he's being signified on and pretend that, 52:49.309 --> 52:51.739 well, it's perfectly okay to be called "Bill." 52:51.739 --> 52:56.049 Either way you see it's a win/win situation. 52:56.050 --> 53:00.020 This guy, Bill, is the slave owner, 53:00.016 --> 53:00.946 right? 53:00.949 --> 53:02.999 He likes to get along with people, 53:03.000 --> 53:06.330 so he's sitting around having this conversation and he hears 53:06.331 --> 53:08.201 them calling him "Bill," 53:08.195 --> 53:08.755 right? 53:08.760 --> 53:13.530 Because there is an element of good nature in his slave-owning 53:13.527 --> 53:15.557 personality, he's stuck. 53:15.559 --> 53:19.279 He can either complain that people are treating him 53:19.284 --> 53:22.704 unfairly-- which of course is neither here 53:22.695 --> 53:27.235 nor there in terms of the structure of power involved-- 53:27.239 --> 53:31.819 or he can play the fool and pretend that he doesn't even 53:31.824 --> 53:34.914 notice that he's being made fun of. 53:34.909 --> 53:40.699 Either way, this is an example of that sly civility which 53:40.695 --> 53:46.785 signifies on the man and which makes it clear that while the 53:46.791 --> 53:52.681 structure of power can't be overthrown anytime soon, 53:52.679 --> 53:56.189 there nevertheless is a way of living-- 53:56.190 --> 54:01.090 at least of keeping one's sense of humor within the existing 54:01.092 --> 54:05.412 structure of power-- while giving the man a hard 54:05.407 --> 54:05.957 time. 54:05.960 --> 54:11.840 That is the set of attitudes that Bhabha is articulating in 54:11.842 --> 54:16.712 his notion of the hybridity of the colonized, 54:16.710 --> 54:20.050 which takes the form in performance-- 54:20.050 --> 54:23.970 we're going to have a lot more to say about performance on 54:23.972 --> 54:27.492 Tuesday-- in performance of this sly 54:27.487 --> 54:28.547 civility. 54:28.550 --> 54:32.230 I think it's on page 1889 that he gives us that expression, 54:32.230 --> 54:33.870 which I think you should keep hold of-- 54:33.869 --> 54:36.949 which I would compare very closely with what Henry Louis 54:36.954 --> 54:39.034 Gates calls "signifyin'." 54:39.030 --> 54:40.090 Okay. 54:40.090 --> 54:41.070 See you on Tuesday. 54:41.070 --> 54:47.000