Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 09:08:26 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: i may have posted this before, but 


i'm posting it to share with a new e-friend of mine on this list...
(and all new members - if any)
_____________________________

Looking for a point of entry     
[or, what's the `point' of what i say ?]
------------------------------------------------
I remember talking to  a younger
woman
who they say 
grew up in Brooklyn
but
masks it well.

		Told her what  i might have
		needed
		to hear ten years 
		ago.

The Academy does 
not speak
to us.
We have to make
It
speak
to us.		
		If we can.
		(But *can* we?)

			[And what's the `Us' about
			when I may have grown up with 
			more
			material privilege
			than her?]

Us with less
confidence
perhaps

			[at least that's 
				a start...]

Us who are easily
overwhelmed
overawed
by words that
float 




[phallic signifiers?

				very often.
				very often.]

on ether
or not.

			[Are we stupid,
			 perhaps
				?]

what does it 
mean
when 
how the people around
us
use words
wields power?

			
What kind of comments
am i
			allowed 

to make
here?

			am i literate 
			enough?

Seeking expression 
and relevance
in
"Theories"
(Practice)
of  Gender
of  Postcolonialism
of  `Post'-modern
ism

	I experience the 
	jagged  ends
	of  the words
	floating on ether.


If
there is pain and
personal investment
			that incites
			discussion

(and often, implicitly, 
perhaps.
couched,
perhaps.			there is.)



Can we not 
speak
of  it.

			In our ivory towers of
			ether?


I cannot wave 
aside
			with statements
			and  hopeful expectations
			of a promised future

the question of
access.

				Very often i
				*feel*

				a "woman"
				the "other" -

not only because of my
physical body
or
skin colour

			the words i use
			will betray me
			soon enough

On ether too
i have no
mask

				for long.





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homepage::  http://www.pitt.edu/~gajjala/

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