From: NADEEM OMAR <AJXNOT-AT-ccn4.ccc.nottingham.ac.uk>
Date:          Tue, 23 Jan 1996 15:08:09 GMT0BST
Subject:       Re: testing water::plunge!


Few days back, I mailed a question which generated a number of 
responses. To follow up the discussion, I would reieterate my postion 
to emphasizs the question of "positionality". All responses refered 
implictly or otherwise to the first part of the original/earlier mail. 

In either case, I can but agree with ARINDAM DUTTA that Spivak 
niether wants nor pretends to "rise above" the "fw theory".Nor I can 
pretend ignorance to the point made by TERRY GOLDIE & VICTOR RAM RAJ 
that  niether fw nor anyother theory & crticism is "untainted" or in 
Bhaba's terms "is hybrid". DANNY's position is acceptable as well,ie 
there are "no superheroes anymore", guys.

Perhaps one can instigate an unending chain of quotes from Derrida & 
friends to substantiate the point and to deflate the myth of purity, 
authenicity, origin, innocence, and whatever. Since this stuff is all 
too obvious for the intelligent readers on the list, I would suggest 
a change of "context" to ask the question of "inscribing her 
geneologu outside " fw/tw theory"". As  many of you made it 
clear in your comments and I referred to it in the second part 
of earlier mail, this question as such cannot be asked to Spivak or 
Bhaba. Now should we take it as an excuse to drop the question or 
find some way of putting it in a manner acceptable to the "theorist" 
and readers alike. We must inhabit the structure which inhabit us. 
Therefore I am not seeking an answer, at the moment, but looking for 
multiple ways in which this question must be put. Our immediate or 
perhaps, a knee-jerk response is NO, there is "hybridity of 
forms",master and slave are naked together in the bath of theoretical  
contamination. 
 "Abb ais shaher mein rahah basafa kon hai. "[ Faiz A Faiz, an Urdu 
poet] TRANS. "there is no pious in the city"..... 

So we have reached at the hybridity of forms, but can we imagine the 
"multiplicity of hybridy forms" ?? Or in what ways we can speculate 
the various forms a hybridity make take "within" the strucutre of 
binary oppposition or "preserving yet dismatling them" [spival in OG, 
Derrida]. This must be thought without leaning towards East or 
West,becasue all are hybrid so the following example should not be 
taken as my leaning but a mere example [ in trying to ditch "logic of 
example"]

Like for instance, Spivak in an interview `Post colonial 
Critic'  [ in PCC] refused to acknowledge the distance & proximity 
between herself & "native intellectuals", and emphsized that both of 
us are "disaporic intellectuals" and share the "same predicament".
To what extent one can agree to her or them? 
Can qualify the "fact" ?

[For your handy use, I am re-mailing the part of original/earlier 
mail.If its more of inconvenience than of a use than I appologise in 
advance]
                           I
> To open up the problematic, in what ways an academic post colonial 
> critic can speak about post/neo-colonialism. To be specific, lets 
> refer to Edward Said (of Orientalism), Homi K Bhaba(of Location of 
> Culures, henceforth LOC ) and GC Spivak ( of Post Colonial Critic & 
> The Other worlds, hf.PCC & TOW).[these limits are not to restrict the 
> scope of discussion but to express my breadth of information].She can 
> talk in Oppositional or in Ambivalent terms. She can either trace her 
> geneology to Focault/Nietsche or to Derrida/Lacan. But can she ever 
> inscribe her geneology outside the space of First World Theory??
> 
> No doubt Bhaba (ref: Ist chapter, LOC) and Spivak (ref:post colonial 
> critic in PC) the space which post colonial critic occupies 
> is legitimized/defended/justified on the basis of very discourse on 
> Cultural Differences. At that level this question cann't be asked. 
> Having said that should we drop the question or try some ways by 
> dipping ourselves deep into the text in order to put the question 
> legitimately. 
> I don't want to prempt the answer, & leaves the floor open for 
> the discussion.  
 
 N.Omar
 School Of Critical Theory.
 
 
 


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