Gayatri Spivak: The Trajectory of the Subaltern in My Work

[AGNISHIKHA100]

i appreciate her standpoints about Colonialism. But my question is, why she adopts her White husband's title 'Spivak'??

Such a confusion!

[Skylishque]

a longstanding dream of mine starting to be realized (wow)!

[supersamzman1]

@ewanthesis Thank you, thank you, thank you.

[gen6k]

so basically theres weaks, and strongs and we dont listen to retarded bums. also women have inferior neurology, or at least nonattentive neurology or maybe more retentive by being predominant and subtle or how about its true that its a complex situation but we must listen to the retarded bum or the bimbo.

[ThewildRageofGordon]

Sounds like a racist concept designed to privilege people seen by the logic of European/American institutions to be distant. These kinds of materialist terms are bullshit. Only if subaltern is determined by alienation at level of being (outside political geographic, etc, criteria) can it be valid. This however is impossible (yet it is better then the colonial violence of the disgusting Enlightenment discourse: a repeat of Inquisition).

[BhavikaSicka1610]

I really admire her Derridean deconstruction, and her concern for the way in which postcolonial studies ironically re inscribe, co-opt and rehearse neocolonial imperatives of political domination, economic exploitation and cultural erasure (the very imperatives they are trying to dismantle). BUT. I'm from Calcutta, and I can tell you for one that her critics are correct when they say that Spivak wouldn't even recognize a subaltern if she saw one. The question then is: Can the subaltern spivak?

[salmajazz]

@BhavikaSicka1610 ur one of those copyright infringers (i.e. an intellectual robbers) who want to look smart using others' words. cite ur effing sources!

[charvesa]

It is told that Napolean's hemorrhoids were his undoing at battle.

How unfair.

Did Amazons not battle when their menstrual cycles kicked in? War would be so the different game in a more maternalistic society.

or maybe not

[Rut267]

she looks like a ompa lompa.

[Auz18]

@Rut267

ompa lompa dip-perdi-do I think your ignorant do-pa-di do

[starzrbrite]

@aajoshi1 Hey genius,

Aside from the fact that she has a PhD and written more papers than you have words in your vocabulary, going by your flawless logic she must still be smarter than you, since you probably don’t even know what Literature, English, Math or Astronomy even are. Don’t get all pissy just because you don’t understand ‘trajectory’, ‘subaltern’ and ‘work’—either look them up in the dictionary or close the page and watch TMZ or something.

[elroquero99]

Is there a way to get the transcription of this conference? I´m trying to subtitle it to spanish, but it´s very difficult with only hearing it (i´m a native spanish speaker)

[MrSpanky87]

I'm very green re Subaltern studies - I'm constantly coming across the word 'Subject' for instance in the phrase 'Subject formation exceeds the borders of the intending Subect'. What is meant exactly by the word subject? Very basically I understand it to be an ideological group/political entity that can influence/be influenced? I'd really really appreciate help on this.

[cuddlesducks]

bengali on platform

[tvmdevi99999]

excellent.... Gayathri...at her best...

[aimeeplltr]

Quite silly, some of the questions and their framing. Listening to the guy who uses "depasse" and the gal who uses "resentement" are so, so "comment dire," pretentious, circuitous, unimaginative. What a difference when you then hear Spivak. Spivak shows off dullness of mind with panache.

[aimeeplltr]

She's actually fabulous and right on target--meteoric and real! She dwarfs Bhabha and Said.

[beavorpigs]

I nearly caught fire, that was so dry!

[shackleton12]

A poor first year here. I think I understand the video, but not your comments. Does this mean:

a) My humour chip is faulty.

b) I don't understand the talk.

or c) You're talking about something completely different?

[BahmanG]

It seems to me that she is NOT suffering from low self-esteem.

[thyangarey]

a good piece indeed! a metonymised subaltern family gathering. narcissistic celebration of spivak's synecdochised self inhabited by to-and-fro of (re)new(able) subalterns before a bunch of idolaters hailing from various subaltern nooks. Thanks UCtelevision for posting it!

[joetyer]

'Twas the Night before Christmas,

And all through the House,

Not a Creature was stirring,

Not even a Subaltern.

She was a shy little thing, quiet as a subaltern.

If youze don't all fuckin be as audible as subalterns and get ter fuckin' sleep, I'll smash yers!

Now, those efforts were sub-par, and even though sub-prime mortgages are here, I try not to let that subalter me in any fundamental way.

Now, the audio preview function usually doesn't lie, but I'll post anyway.

[joetyer]

What would not be a boring talk, Gayatri, would be a focus on the problematic Sub(Pop)altern(ative rock) subject position formation. Hey, has anyone else here been denied access to the lines of social mobility? I have, dudes, and I'm down about it, but I'll see brighter days, I guess. I reckon things'll improve once I've metonymised meself, so that I can symbolically claim, as a fractured part of it, the abstract whole of the concept of the State. Bengali middle class.

[joetyer]

I propose this answer to the knotty linguistic bind that Derrida left us with. We simply get the firm who produced the StableTable to manufacture the word StableTable, and, by extension, all the other words that have ever been, are currently in use, or ever will be invented. Do YOU agree with this assertion, dude? If not, why not. If you DO agree with this assertion, don't type anything, and I'll take that to mean that you agree with me.

[GristleTit]

Your theoretico-hubristic antiindocentricity exposes what we always and already know: "reproductive heteronormativity [is] the broadest global institution".

[joetyer]

Fool. I have video evidence that proves that what I actually said was 'heterovisual case is DUDEclidean

[GristleTit]

I've told you time and time again that affirming your own subalterity is impossible. But given your assertion (at a recent fraternity kegger) that diacritical space is euclidean, I'm not surprised.

[GristleTit]

Listen and learn joetyer.

[moodrush]

tough in the sense that a boys club academic life must've been demanding, to say the least. & her anecdotes in this talk don't sound like it's been a walk in the park...

[moodrush]

i meant to address hectar, joe, rebel and co., but the reply thread malfunctioned, it seems. &, i may have unintentionally insulted hyenas.

in any case, i'm hardly her disciple, but leave her alone already. i'll give you three reasons - 1) judging from some of these comments, it's likely she's better read than most of you, in the sense that y'all are not presenting compelling objections. 2) cheap shots say more about you than her. 3) i think she's had it tough.

tbc if i have time...

[Chrlsrider]

The Goddess of blowhards? I think that's one of the better names for Spivak I've heard. She's a windbag for sure. Yet, while I'd prefer to hear almost every one of my colleagues present simple, planned speeches not to exceed 20 minutes, those papers would still be dull as dishwater. And while Spivak may be confused and messy, she's still much more interesting than any of the conference presentations you'll attend.

[Yatukih001]

They probably haven´t heard about multidimensional awareness so they use terms like ´subalterns´, I´ve heard about them here at the College where I do my studies,

Thingvellir,

[HectarCrawford]

We're planning to open an indian restaurant called 'Can The Subaltern Eat' with dishes named after prominent post colonial theorists. What dish should this bitch be?

[Rebellious108]

alu pronta

[moodrush]

were you raised by hyenas?

[amawest]

Go jump in a meatgrinder, buddy. But first call me; I want to watch.

[raynaharris]

what does she says at min 0:13:30- 0:12:48... Bhabha ?? culture ??? governance...??

que dice en min 0:13:30- 0:12:48

[f2509p]

the godess of blowhards...

[wasona85]

espero que alguna vez venga a México... espero que podamos escucharla alguna vez y conosca nuestra subalternidad subversiva!!!

[wasona85]

No solo es genial, tiene una lucides increible...quizas un día... quizas podamos traerla a Mérida en México

[anindo56]

Lousy and boring.

[gnanes2]

very nice,Gayatri Spivak smart

[higher7000]

Spivak is the sort of academic no normally intelligent person can be expected to take seriously. Not once does she cite a scholarly evidence. Her theory claims to be sociological/historical and yet she only makes unsupported and statistically unverifiable statements. She claims to 'be a literary person' and literature is conspicuous in its absence throughout her discourse. So we are left with a jargon that is designed to obscure the fact that she has nothing worthwhile to say. Academic fraud.

[Iamnotasuit]

I think that Spivak is at a point where she can effectually cite herself on the issue of Post-Colonial Theory. As to her being an intellectual fraud, you do realize that she was the first person to translate "Of Grammatology" into English. Oh, and that most of her lecture is based on derridian concepts that "no normally intelligent person" would immediately recognize. Because, you know, expecting some base-level understanding of the ideas behind the lecture would be just ridiculous.

[higher7000]

Since when did Derrida become an authority on "subaltern studies"? One can use his approach (against which most post 1970 non-US academics have their reservations) but he cannot be cited to support factual issues (if Derrida knew "facts" mattered in the first place). One can, for eg., indulge in a Marxist-style critique of folk dance, but that doesn't mean one can cite Marx as an authority on dance. Also, I have nothing against substance (Hegel's great) only against the pretence to substance.

[randylahey123]

He wasn't but, the connection becomes obvious when one looks to the binary opposites of centre and margin. What you call jargon is a language specific to its function.

[cvvemuri]

You're assumptions are based on a fairly flawed and mistaken yet common assumption of deconstruction and what Derrida says.

Saying that language is unstable is not the same thing as saying there are no facts or that truth doesn't exist.

Read the volume "Negotiations" and you will realize that Derrida radical thought was still very much concerned with facts and truth, though not in the ways you probably would expect it to be.

[higher7000]

That is an incidental remark; not the main argument I'm making.

[abiehakhawaja]

very helpful

[rubyredshoes77]

Thanks for this-it is really useful for my essay.

[djbutt63]

I think it's interesting that speakers who talks about the world as if their experience of it was the same as all of us, without making any reference to anyone else's work, will be acceptable to those who find Spivak's heavily citational style "egoistic"because she references her own work and the debates she's active in. This talk is probably tricky for anyone who hasn't read the works being referenced, but is a great gift for those of us tracking the trajectory of her work.

[Phoenixbird27]

Thanks UCtelevision for posting! Do you know if this lecture was published anywhere?

[sann2338]

Is she an egoist?

[gc65531941]

Thank you for this video.

[HJNitu]

thanks for posting this!

[ninadism]

please do not compare her with arundhati roy. roy is fluff.

[farscape2070]

I concur--Roy can no way be compared to Spivak. The latter is just brilliant.

[msumedanthro]

She and Arundhati Roy are two of my favorites.

[anothersunsetfalls]

yeah she's good. I like her way of analysis. She is always in the situation of having to prosecute herself against clichés. She always puts herself into the discussion, she is always participating.