The journey of subalternity in Gayatri Spivak’s work: Its sociological relevance

Introduction

This article explores the journey of subalternity in Gayatri Spivak’s work. By highlighting the sociological connection between the theoretical, epistemic and empirical aspects of her reflections on subalternity, it analyses and evaluates the development of her thinking on this issue. Moreover, it understands the various iterations of this conception within a cohesive interpretative framework, demonstrating that Spivak’s subalternity is a philosophical, literary but also empirical and sociological category with potential for increasing our understanding of society and bringing about social change.

Thus her theory of subalternity is recast as a matter of sociological interest, highlighting its sociological applications and applicability. Contesting recent scholarship which has assumed a fracture between the epistemic and empirical aspects of Spivak’s subalternity, this sociological perspective offers an interpretation of her texts that goes against the grain of her own reluctance to understand subalternity sociologically: along with its undeniable epistemic deployment, subalternity is also used to analyse the situation of subaltern groups under colonialism and neoliberal globalisation, with the potential for exploring how the trajectory of subordination of contemporary subalterns can be altered. As such, the article demonstrates that a ‘sociological reading’ of Spivak’s subalternity, with its interweaving of theoretical, epistemic and empirical aspects, is not only possible but also well-founded.

The discussion initially considers the interplay between her two early conceptions of subalternity (the subaltern-effect and the subaltern-as-difference). These are discussed in terms of those epistemic and theoretical underpinnings that became central to early postcolonial studies: the aporias of aesthetic and political representation in hegemonic narratives. These issues are applied empirically in Spivak’s ‘old’ idea of subalternity, defined as an exclusion from lines of social mobility, which she deploys as a sociological tool to describe the condition of colonial and postcolonial subordinated groups or individuals, e.g. tribal (Adivasi) groups in India. This demonstrates that her early conception of subalternity maintains sociological specificity vis-a-vis more vague characterisations of social subordination (i.e. oppression or inferiority). The article also argues that this early conception implies a sociological deadlock that disentangles subalternity from class exploitation, and that this deadlock is resolved in one of Spivak’s later definitions of subalternity, where the ‘new’ subaltern is included within contemporary capital and, more generally, neoliberal globalisation.

Conceptualised in Spivak’s late 1990s/early 2000s work, this transition towards subalternity, class and neoliberalism can be contextualised within the ‘new’ phase of postcolonial studies that was concerned with critiquing ‘global capitalism in the late imperial moment’ (Huggan, 2004, p. 27). In fact, Spivak’s work during this period was integral to this phase (Huggan, 2004), with her reflections on subalternity exercising an enduring influence on it (e.g. Franco, 2010).

More generally, Spivak’s conceptual transition coincided with a capitalist conjuncture fuelled by specific processes of accumulation by dispossession relying on various neoliberal practices, particularly the privatisation/commodification of nature and life (Harvey, 2005, pp. 160–161). This exploits a ‘“free” injection of resources’ found in spaces both included and excluded from capitalist modes of production – or, ‘spaces of lesser or no “productivity”, spaces that may be deemed “nature” although they are saturated in human activity’ (Bhattacharyya, 2018, p. 106). These spaces are inhabited by ‘edge populations . . . with occasional entry to insecure waged work . . . yet unable to gain recognition or secure entry to the terms of capitalist citizenship’ (Bhattacharyya, 2018, p. 26). It is from this angle that the sociological salience of the transition from ‘old’ to ‘new’ subalternity can be appreciated: it maps the subordinated condition of these edge populations within contemporary capitalism, along with the ways in which subordination is challenged, such as when the ‘new’ subalternity frames the current situation of Native American and Dalit women’s movements (Sarker, 2016).

By focusing on this transition and exploring the complementarity between her older and newer conceptions of subalternity in terms of agency and subjectification, this article interprets subalternity as a space that encompasses a spectrum of political inclusion/exclusion, accounting for the contemporary subaltern groups discussed in her work (e.g. specific fractions of Adivasi people, social movements in the Global South). Following these considerations, Spivak’s early and later approaches are combined in a discussion of her overall perspective on subalternity. Against current interpretations, this reading highlights the sociological entanglement of theoretical, epistemic and empirical aspects in her work, highlighting both a composite explanatory matrix of subalternity that cannot be reduced to its theoretical and epistemic vectors and its potential for guiding efforts to transform the subaltern condition.

In this way, a systematic account of Spivak’s subalternity demonstrates that her ‘high’ theory of subalternity is sociologically compelling, since it elucidates (and responds to) concrete socio-political problems and struggles. As such, this analysis of Spivak’s journey of subalternity calls for an exploration of the boundaries between sociology, philosophy and literary criticism. Here discussions on subalternity, diverging from politically ambiguous uses that obliterate or communicate little about this social condition, highlight the analytical and transformative potential of Spivak’s matrix. This can stimulate future study about subaltern groups under colonialism or neoliberalism and the use of subalternity as a methodological tool for research.

‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’: Subalternity as difference/narrative effect

This section addresses Spivak’s early approach to subalternity, in preparation for examining the sociological link between its theoretical, epistemic and empirical aspects. While other scholars have exhaustively explored the theoretical, political, ethical and aesthetic problems of her early approach (e.g. De Jong & Mascat, 2016; Morton, 2003, pp. 45–69; Ray, 2009, pp. 127–134), the discussion here is about its conceptual features, particularly their relevance to the empirical issues raised by her sociological use of subalternity. As such, this reading departs from the scholarly consensus which identifies a fracture between the empirical applicability and the theoretical features of her approach.

More generally, this sociological perspective goes against the grain of Spivak’s own texts, which have criticised approaches to subalternity that can be understood as broadly sociological. For example, she has questioned Foucault and Deleuze’s portrayal of oppressed groups as monolithic and undivided subjectivities, claiming that this approach confers upon them a sociological homogeneity (the masses, the workers, the homosexuals, etc.) that is legitimised by a ‘representationalist realism’ (Spivak, 1988, p. 274). Grounded on the concrete/immediate experience of empirical subjects with uniform political interests, this ‘realism’ disavows its own ideological stance: what appears as the ‘real’ experience of these homogeneous subjects is actually mediated by intellectuals in hegemonic positions, who produce representations that render these subjects homogeneous, thus erasing the tensions within their social composition (e.g. workers in the centre/periphery) and their political interests. As such, representing subalternity is an aesthetic and political question, because speaking of the subaltern implies speaking for them (Spivak, 1988, pp. 272–275; 1999a, pp. 252–256). This also suggests that the subaltern in Spivak’s work does not describe or cannot be reduced to a singular essence or subject as operationalised in sociology or politics.

Similarly, in her critique of Subaltern Studies (which, as will become clear, is fundamental to her understanding of subalternity) Spivak highlights the ambiguity of Ranajit Guha’s conception of subaltern classes, defined as the demographic difference between the total population and the elite (Guha, 1982, p. 8). Though Guha’s differential definition postpones identification, rather pointing to a demographic difference, it is nevertheless problematically informed by a ‘positivistic’ attitude that presents a demographic difference through ‘the ostensible language of quantification’ (Spivak, 1985, p. 340; see also 1988, pp. 284–285; 1999a, pp. 270–272). From this perspective, it might be reasonable to assume that, for Spivak, the subaltern is not a taxonomically identifiable demographic: it does not identify people, groups or classes, and thus does not aim to empirically describe social stratifications.

At first glance, these observations appear to undermine any sociological reading of Spivak’s subalternity due to a fundamental assertion of inaccessibility and unrepresentability (Li, 2009, p. 278; Varma, 2015, pp. 106–107). This almost-Wittgensteinian injunction refuses the possibility to speak of the subalterns (Thomas, 2018, pp. 871–873), hindering all attempts at aesthetic representation of subalternity (as well as sociological description) while also condemning forms of political representation that, from a hegemonic position, speak for subalterns, thus re-codifying/overwriting their interests.

However, in spite of this need to be silent about that whereof one cannot speak, Spivak is not silent about subalternity. Rather she discusses it extensively and directly. As will become clear, she does not rule out the possibility of speaking about (or even for) concrete subaltern individuals or social groups, e.g. Adivasis or social movements in the Global South (Spivak, 1995, pp. 115–117; 1999b). Indeed, her reflections on subalternity are entangled with sociologically relevant issues, like the division of labour under neoliberal globalisation (Spivak, 1988, pp. 287–288). She also considers subalternity through categories that are eminently sociological, as when she claims that ‘subalternity is like a strict understanding of class’ (Spivak, 2005, p. 476), arguing that class should not be jettisoned ‘as a descriptive and analytical category’ (Spivak, 2000, p. 330, my emphasis).

This suggests that though Spivak portrays her concerns as primarily literary (Spivak, 2012c, p. 214) and not sociological, she draws on sociological categories and issues – in addition to anthropology (Piu, 2016), organisation theory (Campbell, 2005) and political theory/philosophy (e.g. her discussions on Foucault, Deleuze and political representation). Extending Campbell Jones’s claims in this journal (2005, p. 237), it can be argued that ‘Spivak is doing [sociology] whether or not she uses the name’. As such, the present article will systematically demonstrate what has just been assumed as prima facie evidence. A discussion of the conceptual features of Spivak’s subalternity, particularly those emerging from her early work, presents the first step in this process.

It is well established that Spivak’s early understanding of subalternity was inspired by Gramsci and Subaltern Studies’ reading of Gramsci (Guha, 1982; Spivak, 1996, p. 288). In the 1980s, Spivak laid the foundation for her observations by criticising Subaltern Studies in ‘Subaltern Studies: Deconstructing Historiography’ (1985). Using the philosophical tools of deconstruction, she discussed the double bind haunting Subaltern Studies. The project attempts to recover the point of view of Indian subalterns, as an objective archival reference that can be known directly, while at the same time implicitly suggesting that this attempt is always doomed to failure: the archive never returns a pure subaltern perspective. Rather, knowledge of this perspective is always mediated by ideological formations, particularly the ways in which the elite (not least, the academic historian) have represented this perspective (Spivak, 1985, pp. 338–344; 1988, pp. 283–286).

The representation of the subaltern perspective in Subaltern Studies is thus a fiction of true subalternity: the subaltern voice as an object of direct knowledge is a narrative effect. Therefore, the subaltern perspective is a perspective that differs from its representation; or, it is an irretrievable excess whose definition consists in being different from a narrative effect. For Spivak, in Subaltern Studies (particularly Guha’s differential definition of subalternity), ‘“Subaltern” . . . was the name of a space of difference’ (Spivak, 2005, p. 476).

Two conceptions of subalternity emerge from her early work: the subaltern-as-difference, a conception of subalternity as an irretrievable residue of hegemonic narratives; and the subaltern-effect, which understands subalternity as a position internal to those hegemonic narratives that produce representations of ‘the subaltern’.

Spivak illustrates the interplay between these two conceptions in ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’ (1988) where she discusses sati (or suttee), the ritual practice of widow self-immolation in India, and its re-codification in the story of Bhubaneswari Bhaduri. Spivak (1988, pp. 297–305) addresses the role of sati (and thus of ‘the subaltern’) in both British colonial discourse and Indian religious (and patriarchal) discourse. In her account, colonial discourse re-codified the self-immolating widow as an object: the Indian woman is constructed as a passive victim that must be rescued from a barbarian practice perpetrated by ‘brown men’. This interpretation provided the British colonisers with the racialised ideological justification for intervening in India, while effacing the women’s free will. On the other hand, the Indian religious discourse manipulated the woman’s subjectivity to confirm the subjectivity of the (Indian) man, with sati understood as an act of extreme love towards the husband. The woman’s agency is thus re-codified from the perspective of the man’s subjectivity, becoming internal to patriarchal discourse. In this way, ‘[b]etween patriarchy and imperialism, subject-constitution and object-formation, . . . [t]he case of suttee . . . mark[s] the place of “disappearance” with something other than silence . . ., a violent aporia between subject and object status’ (Spivak, 1988, p. 306).

The (subaltern) woman is not simply silenced. Rather, her silence is re-inscribed as the trace of an absence which derives from constructing the representation of the woman as the object and subject of discourse. The subaltern woman is thus the excess of signification: she is the non-retrievable difference at the intersection between subject and object. The differential definition of subalternity maps the symbolic space (a third space) of this intersection, illustrating the function of the subaltern woman as a symbolic signifier within hegemonic narratives.

In any case, Spivak continues (1988, p. 307), ‘[t]here is no space from which the sexed subaltern subject can speak’. But what if sati works as a practice against colonial and patriarchal discourses? The story of Bhubaneswari is relevant in this respect.

A young woman of sixteen or seventeen, Bhubaneswari Bhaduri, hanged herself in her father’s modest apartment in North Calcutta in 1926. The suicide was a puzzle since, as Bhubaneswari was menstruating at the time, it was clearly not a case of illicit pregnancy. Nearly a decade later, it was discovered, in a letter she had left for her elder sister, that she was a member of one of the many groups involved in the armed struggle for Indian independence. She had been entrusted with a political assassination. Unable to confront the task and yet aware of the practical need for trust, she killed herself. (Spivak, 1988, p. 307)

Therefore, Bhubaneswari re-codified women’s suicide in India against patriarchal and religious discourses, since they forbade suicide while menstruating. She was concurrently involved in the struggle against the British when she committed suicide: her actions thus conceivably challenged the colonial discourse that denied agency to women. Does this example of agency suggest that a subaltern can speak, thus representing ¹ herself beyond the double effacement?

It is outside the scope of this article to reconstruct the ways and reasons for which Spivak produced different answers to this same question when responding to wider debates within and outside the postcolonial field (for a cursory overview, see Morton, 2003, pp. 66–68). What is significant for this article is that the uses of subalternity in the case of Bhubaneswari and sati thematise the discursive function of subalternity, the problems concerning its representation and, more generally, the power/knowledge entanglement – issues that resonate with the main interest of early postcolonial studies: the representation of third-world subjects in Western narratives (Piu, 2020, p. 149). Crucially, the conception of subalternity emerging from these examples is not empirical (Nilsen & Roy, 2015, p. 7), but epistemic; or, subalternity is not used to describe social contexts. Rather, the subaltern-as-difference sheds light on the implicit code that organises hegemonic narratives, their silencing and othering mechanisms and the blind spots in their representations (i.e. the impossible reproduction of the original and the inevitably failed retrieval of a subaltern perspective). Is there a link to the empirical within this epistemic perspective? The answer is not straightforward, considering that in Spivak’s work

. . . the concept of subalternity . . . has constituted a position of radical, and indeed an irretrievable, alterity . . . [T]here is a taken-for-granted inaccessibility of the subaltern to the investigator and the intellectual. (Varma, 2015, pp. 106–107)

The subaltern-as-difference is thus non-representable by hegemonic knowledge (Li, 2009, p. 278): the subaltern cannot be fully appropriated by hegemonic narratives so that, as will become clear, subaltern political autonomy is not recognised, rather only re-codified in ways that are functional to these narratives. As such, the subaltern cannot escape from these narratives, because they actively produce subalternity (Bracke, 2016, p. 846) as a subaltern-effect. This effect emerges from a fundamental erasure, that of the subaltern-as-difference, and it thereby occupies and conceals a position of radical alterity. Or, the subaltern-effect is the trace of an absence that results from an act of epistemic violence. In this way, Spivak’s focus on subalternity ‘is . . . directed to that . . . which is [the] inevitable casualty and detritus [of capital logic]’ (Varadharajan, 2016, p. 732). Where, then, is the empirical link?

Whereas the subaltern-effect is internal to hegemonic narratives, the subaltern-as-difference is structurally excluded, since it is silenced or subject to epistemic violence. This is the detritus suggesting ‘a position of absolute exteriority in relation to hegemonic formations’, an exclusion from hegemonic narratives but also, as Nilsen and Roy put it, ‘the condition of being cut off from the lines of social mobility’ (2015, p. 11). The subaltern-as-difference is therefore related to being cut off from the lines of social mobility, linking the conceptual features of subalternity with sociological issues. ² As the next section will illustrate, this is central to understanding the empirical aspects of subalternity in Spivak’s early work.

The ‘old’ subalternity

Spivak’s early work understands Guha’s conception of subalternity as a space of difference which is external to hegemonic formations.

In the essay [‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’] I made it clear that I was talking about the space as defined by Ranajit Guha, the space that is cut off from the lines of mobility in a colonized country. (Spivak, 1996, p. 288, my emphasis)

This understanding of the subaltern-as-difference underpins the definition of her ‘old dispensation of the subaltern’ (Spivak, 2012a, p. 225), from now on, the old subaltern: those excluded from the lines of social mobility (Spivak, 2004, p. 531), that is, from cultural imperialism and the logic of capital (Spivak, 1992, p. 45; 1996, pp. 288, 292). This exclusion from economic and discursive/cultural logics is an exclusion from hegemonic/elite formations. As with Guha’s differential definition of subalternity, the subaltern is non-elite. Moreover, this difference is mapped onto a hierarchy: the subaltern is also subjected to the elite.

In fact, the old subaltern is silenced – or, is subjected to the epistemic violence of hegemonic narratives. That is, these narratives exclude and re-codify subaltern groups who are not recognised as autonomous political formations. In (post)imperialist narratives, the subaltern figures as the trace of an absence, whereby the absence works as the implicit code that organises these narratives. Moreover, the old subaltern is subjected from a social perspective. Subaltern groups are excluded from the logic of capital, or it affects them, but only remotely and, as will become evident, in complex ways (Spivak, 1996, p. 292). This remote influence can be understood both as a social force that blocks the upward social mobility of subaltern agents, and as a process similar to formal subsumption in Capital (Marx, 1990, pp. 1019–1035). Formal subsumption refers to the subjection of labour to the valorisation of capital without revolutionising the technical conditions of production: capital as a form is applied to pre-existing social content so that, for example, artisans become salaried workers, even though their production relies on artisanal techniques. In other words, capital influences social contexts and integrates them within the relations of production, yet without modifying their internal organisation.

Bringing this discussion back to subalternity, the old subaltern condition is affected by the unevenness of capitalist economies, resulting in poor living conditions, a lack of education, no access to citizenship, etc. Nevertheless, the old subaltern is not completely integrated within the economic system, as they operate within networks of informal economies, etc. This suggests that there are areas of disconnection between subalternity and the capitalist logic, highlighting the unfolding of hegemonic–subaltern relations within pre/non-capitalist modes of production. More specifically, it points to the subaltern condition of the underclass and of ‘most of the world’s disposable workers’ for whom ‘informal economies . . . provide a parlous refuge’ (Harvey, 2005, p. 185), because these social groups are excluded from productive activity and the labour–capital conflict. They are excluded from the logic of capital.

Therefore, if Spivak’s differential definition of subalternity is connected with the old subalternity, then the subaltern condition can be understood as both a difference that differs from the logic of capital, and as a deferred difference: a condition that tends to be separated from the logic of capital, though it is never external to it. As such, Spivak’s differential definition of subalternity is not devoid of sociological nuance: her early work approaches subalternity in terms of a narrative effect or theoretical/epistemic device for textual analysis, but also in terms of concrete subordinated groups or individuals, and the sociological instruments through which the specificity of their condition can be understood.

Moreover, Spivak’s conception is sociologically significant because it departs from generic notions of subalternity, such as the vague denotation of ‘oppression’ (Didur & Heffernan, 2011, p. 2) or ‘experience of inferiority’ (Spivak, 1999a, p. 271 note 18) that informs some academic contributions (e.g. Glenn, 2007; Orelus, 2018) which address the condition of subaltern professors, community college teachers or sociologists. For Spivak (1999a, p. 271 note 18) these generic notions lack the sociological nuance of the subaltern-as-difference, particularly the question of inclusion/exclusion from the logic of capital: ‘“subaltern” has lost its power to indicate people from the very bottom layer of society, excluded even from the logic of the class structure’ (Spivak, 1997, p. 121). These ‘sociologically poor’ notions no longer communicate anything of the subaltern social condition; the vague denotation of oppression/inferiority saturates the sociological space of subalternity, so that marginalised groups, i.e. ‘the discriminated-against minorit[ies] on . . . campus’ (Spivak, 1992, p. 46), are not distinguishable from subalterns.

How does Spivak de-saturate this sociological space without conflating marginalised and subaltern groups? The ability to know and speak about one’s own condition (i.e. the question of representation within hegemonic narratives) is central:

. . . just by being in a discriminated-against minority on the university campus, [people] don’t need the word subaltern, . . . they can speak . . ., they’re within the hegemonic discourse. (Spivak, 1992, p. 46)

More generally, the exclusion from the lines of social mobility disentangles (the old) subalternity from its reduction to a vague oppression/inferiority. Nevertheless, the extent of this disentanglement raises some political and practical problems.

After ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’: The ‘new’ subaltern

‘The working class is oppressed. It’s not subaltern. It’s in capital logic’ (Spivak, 1992, pp. 45–46). If understood through Spivak’s old subalternity, the working class would not qualify as subaltern. Moreover, this would imply that exploitative class relations are not part of the subaltern condition. This ambiguous relationship between subalternity and class suggests a sociological impasse in Spivak’s approach: can subalternity be conceptualised without reference to class exploitation? Around 1999–2000 Spivak broke this deadlock by further developing her understanding of subalternity and class. In resonance with ‘later’ postcolonial studies, less concerned with past colonialism than with present imperialism (Huggan, 2004, p. 32), she contemplates a new form of subalternity which is directly related to class issues – the ‘new . . . subaltern’ (Spivak, 1999a, p. 102; see also p. 102 note 43) – thereby addressing subordination within current neoliberal processes of accumulation by dispossession (particularly, the privatisation and commodification of life),

Today the ‘subaltern’ . . . is no longer cut off from lines of access to the centre. The centre, as represented by the Bretton Woods agencies and the World Trade Organization, is altogether interested in the rural and indigenous subaltern as source of trade-related intellectual property . . . . Marxist theory best describes the manner in which such ‘intellectual property’ is made the basis of exploitation in the arenas of biopiracy and human genome engineering. . . . [T]his new understanding of subalternity leads to global social movements supported by a Marxist analysis of exploitation . . . . Although the terrain of the colonial subaltern cannot be explained by capital logic alone, this cannot mean jettisoning . . . class . . . as a descriptive and analytical category. (Spivak, 2000, pp. 326–327, 330)

Who are Spivak’s new subalterns? This category encompasses the bottom layers of the urban underclass, the illiterate peasantry, homeworkers, sweatshop workers, labouring children, undocumented immigrant workers, aboriginal people, and so on (Spivak, 1999a, pp. 67–68, 101–102, 220 note 38, 242–243, 267, 276, 380, 394–404, 415–421; 2000, pp. 333; 2005, pp. 483–485; 2012a, p. 225).

The point is not to enumerate ‘new’ subalterns, but to highlight that Spivak’s new subalternity supplements the old one. The old subalternity entails questions like epistemic violence, although it is ambiguously related to class. As this section will illustrate, the new subalternity has a distinctive focus on class (it is included within the economic system) though it does not downplay questions of epistemic violence. Therefore, Spivak’s old and new subalternity are complementary. Moreover, each conception is linked to a distinctive feature:

. . . [i]n the old dispensation the subaltern allowed us to stop outside of capital logic. In the thinking that I am now describing . . . we step . . . from . . . citizenship, the circuits of hegemony, in other words, agency . . . into subjection. From agent to subject. (Spivak, 2012a, p. 225)

The old subalternity thus points to questions of agency and citizenship, whereas the new subalternity entails the problem of (political) subjectification – or, the problems of political subjection and the (political) subject.

As will become clear, for Spivak those who are excluded from the lines of social mobility (the old subalterns) do express historical forms of agency. Moreover, they are only formally subsumed to the logic of capital, and are thus not included within the elite’s hegemonic project. They have never been part of an encompassing national project and are thereby excluded from exercising their power within the state’s institutional spaces (Spivak, 2012a, p. 222). They become citizens only through political-pedagogical work, which renders them able to speak and to be heard within a political arena.

The new subalterns within the logic of capital can potentially fight back against exploitation, because the objective conditions for this struggle are already in place. In the context of neoliberal capitalism, under constant subjection to epistemic violence ³ and material exploitation, subaltern struggles challenge ‘old’ forms of exploitation (in the Marxist sense), as well as ‘new’ ones – the exploitation of women’s bodies and indigenous knowledges. For women’s (re)productive work and the appropriation of collective intelligence are central to the international division of labour: the new subalterns are a necessary social support for neoliberal globalisation (Spivak, 1999a, pp. 67, 276; 2012c, pp. 213–215).

The question is then to express forms of agency that turn this social necessity into a political opportunity for social change – to create political subjects that counteract epistemic violence and put forward emancipatory responses to the exploitation of reproductive work and intellectual cooperation. As such, the ‘new subalternity’ conceptualises not only the conditions of material and epistemic subordination of subaltern groups, but also the forms of agency and political subjectification that can challenge this subordination.

More generally, old and new subalternity are asymptotically related, since they map onto agency and subjectivity, whose relation is gradual.

If you think of the subject as something that goes beyond the profile of individual intention, and if you think of agency as an action that is institutionally validated, one can conceive of . . . their relation as asymptotic. . . . They relate to each other, but they will never coincide. (Spivak, 2007, pp. 43–44, own translation)

This asymptotic relation maps the political space between old and new subalterns, which includes subalternities hung in the balance ⁴ between agency/citizenship and political subjectification. Spivak’s subalternity can thus be imagined as a conceptual space encompassing a large spectrum of political inclusion/exclusion that is covered by her two understandings of the subaltern condition. The examples of subalternity in her work and political biography corroborate this argument, as they describe the conditions of edge populations who inhabit the spaces included and excluded from capital: those spaces of accumulation by dispossession that fuel neoliberal globalisation.

The one end of the subaltern political spectrum points to Spivak’s political biography, at least, what she calls ‘[p]rivate voluntarism’ (Spivak, 2002, p. 29): her activity as a teacher and teacher trainer in some Adivasi rural areas of West Bengal, where she is also involved in agricultural projects (Spivak, 1999b, p. 594; 2003, p. 35; 2004, p. 543; 2005, p. 483; 2010, pp. 229–230). The Adivasi tribes with whom she works (respectively, the Kherya Sabars from Purulia and the Dhekaros from Birbhum) are part of the so-called Denotified and Nomadic Tribes (DNTs) who live

. . . [in] ghettos where outside light hardly penetrates. No educational or employment opportunities worth mentioning are available to the[m]. . . . [T]hey . . . wander carrying out odd jobs which have practically lost relevance in the present day world. Most of them are forced to wander into cities in search of livelihood which is hard to find as they are not trusted. (Spivak, 1999b, pp. 592–593)

Therefore, the subordinated condition of DNTs (Kherya Sabars and Dhekaros included) can generally be understood as that of the old subalterns removed from the logic of capital and the lines of social/cultural mobility (although, as will become clear, this account omits the Adivasis’ capacity for political mobilisation, ⁵ and the fact that fractions of these groups can be understood as existing in between the old and new subalternity): they live in segregation, they do not receive an education, they do not have access to the job market, etc. Moreover they live at the margins of Indian society, because they are not socialised to the state’s political mechanisms and thus cannot make their claims visible in a political space (Spivak, 2005, p. 483). In this way, they are neither subjects of rights, nor do they perceive themselves as such. They are not effective citizens of the Indian postcolonial state, although theoretically they belong to it (Spivak, 2004, pp. 547–548, 558–559). From this angle, Spivak’s teaching in West Bengal aims to build a sense of citizenship that can foster their agency within institutional spaces. Their effective condition as citizens/subjects of rights cannot be separated from their perception of themselves as citizens/subjects of rights.

The other end of the subaltern political spectrum points to Spivak’s relations with ‘counter-globalizing networks of people’s alliances in the so-called global South’ (Spivak, 2003, p. 35): the collective forms of the new subaltern (Spivak, 1999a, p. 276; 2000, p. 327; see also Piu, 2016, pp. 300–304). These are, firstly, the non-Western movements for ecological justice that, for example, fight against those agribusiness multinationals which commodify knowledges of nature by patenting seeds that result from the collective intelligence of indigenous communities. Moreover, these movements are committed to constructing social alternatives, for example, by developing ecological agriculture projects (Spivak, 1995, pp. 115–116; 1996, pp. 300–301, 308; 1999a, pp. 380–385; 2010, p. 230; 2012c, pp. 212–213). Secondly, Spivak makes reference to a plethora of subaltern women’s movements, for example, those that devise homeworking alternatives to sweatshop labour. ⁶ Moreover, she mentions how political organisations such as FINRRAGE (Spivak, 1999a, p. 390) tackle reproductive engineering (i.e. reproductive justice, surrogacy and demographic control). In particular, these organisations are integral to movements opposing those pharmaceutical companies that test contraceptives on subaltern women’s bodies or commodify their egg cells for scientific research without concern for their well-being (Spivak, 1995, pp. 116–117; 1999a, pp. 67–68, 385–392, 414).

Therefore the non-Western ecological movements and the subaltern women’s movements are subjected to, but also struggle against, forms of bio-exploitation (Lettow, 2018). Similarly, they are subjected to and struggle against ‘old’ forms of exploitation, as the organisation of alternatives to sweatshop labour illustrates. Political subjectification (i.e. the interplay between subjection and the creation of political subjects that challenge this subjection) is thus an integral feature of Spivak’s new subalternity.

However, the subaltern political spectrum contains a large in-between space. For Spivak, the DNTs are not merely outside the lines of social mobility. In fact, the term ‘DNTs’ covers more than 100 million Indian people with heterogeneous ethnic compositions (Government of India, 2008) and different degrees of political mobilisation, spanning from those Adivasi groups who belong to wider social movements (e.g. Nilsen, 2010) to those who, as with Spivak’s case, fight to become subjects of rights. In this respect, other examples in Spivak’s work and political biography, such as her participation in struggles for recognising Adivasi rights, point to groups that can be understood as in between the old and new subalternity.

This is illustrated by the petition to the UN Commission of Human Rights that Mahasweta Devi, Ganesh Devy and Spivak presented in 1998 on behalf of the DNT-RAG, the Denotified and Nomadic Tribes Rights Action Group (Piu, 2016, pp. 304–305; Spivak, 1999b). Considering Adivasis’ segregation and exclusion from public life, this petition flagged their condition of epistemic and material subordination, pushing the Commission to exert pressure on the Indian State in the name of justice and human rights (Spivak, 1999b, pp. 591–593). Significantly, this petition resulted from the autonomous deliberation of Adivasi communities during an assembly in Ahmedabad, in the Chharas’ constituency. As Spivak (1999b, p. 596) notes,

. . . [i]t was in Chharanagar that I saw this initiative [the petition] taking shape with a kind of national scope. It was a problem-solving approach. As problems arose people began to be aware that there was this initiative here that could help them.

This illustrates the asymptotic convergence between agency/old subalternity and subject/new subalternity. As the petition highlights, the Adivasis in Chharanagar are not included within cultural and capital logics. Nevertheless, they are not entirely excluded from the lines of social mobility, because they have agency and they speak, asking for political recognition from an international institution. As such, the challenge for the old subaltern groups is not speaking, but being heard (Spivak, 1996, pp. 288–289, 292). This requires a political infrastructure that counteracts the silencing effect of epistemic violence while addressing the complexity of listening processes – or, processes of representation. But this was exactly the outcome of the assembly in Ahmedabad. Participants deliberated about the way in which they should stand up for their rights: a petition. These Adivasi groups had thus autonomously constructed a political infrastructure to support the circulation of their claims within a political space, addressing the complexities related to representation: firstly, the petition was produced by a small number of Adivasis, although it spoke for millions of them. Secondly, Spivak, Devi and Devy spoke for the Adivasi people in front of the Commission. Nevertheless, the assembly was facing the challenge of being heard within political institutions, and therefore needed some form of representation. The political work towards agency and citizenship was already constitutive of the practices in Ahmedabad: these Adivasis could act as citizens within the Indian postcolonial state and perceive themselves as subjects of rights, thus starting to alter the trajectory of their subordination.

Obviously, the degree of organisation of this Adivasi assembly is not comparable to that of political subjectivities that organise localised resistance to capitalism (i.e. the collective new subaltern). Moreover, this assembly represents only a small fraction of 100 million disenfranchised people; a sense of citizenship is not a given among Adivasis. Nevertheless, the assembly points to a socio-political form that is in-between exclusion and inclusion in the lines of social mobility.

In this way the subaltern political spectrum encompasses different (and, at its limits, opposing) instances of subalternity. How do these definitions hold together? What is the guiding thread that links these varying accounts of subalternity?

Spivak’s journey of subalternity: Its sociological and transformative potential

Many commentators have recently analysed the aporias of Spivak’s deployment of subalternity by, for example, discussing the impossibility of delineating the space of the subaltern. According to these scholars, Spivak uses subalternity through negation, as a differential category, rather than affirmatively, as a social one (Bracke, 2016, p. 840; De Jong & Mascat, 2016, p. 718; Varadharajan, 2016, pp. 732, 739). They question the extent to which Spivak applies her conception of subalternity towards understanding empirical situations – or, they consider the tension between the concept’s empirical applicability and its theoretical aspects (De Jong & Mascat, 2016, pp. 718–719; Legg, 2016, pp. 797, 810; Li, 2009, pp. 277–278; Mascat, 2016, p. 778; Nilsen & Roy, 2015, pp. 7, 13). That is, they suggest that she has not operationalised the theoretical aspects of subalternity (e.g. the question of difference), so that these do not effectively support empirical analysis.

In fact, according to these commentators, the theoretical space of Spivak’s subalternity is defined by its inaccessibility and unrepresentability (Bracke, 2016, p. 846; De Jong & Mascat, 2016, pp. 718–719; Legg, 2016, p. 811; Mascat, 2016, p. 778; Varma, 2015, pp. 106–108). These aporias of representation are coextensive with aporias of description, thus undermining the empirical validity of analyses informed by her theoretical understanding of subalternity. Nevertheless, these scholars have observed that Spivak deploys subalternity to analyse the power/knowledge relation within (post)colonial archives and hegemonic knowledge (Bracke, 2016, p. 846; Nilsen & Roy, 2015, pp. 7–8). Therefore, while these commentators have questioned whether Spivak uses the theoretical aspects of subalternity to understand empirical situations, they have considered this concept central to a project of cultural critique. Crucially, this implies that subalternity as a theoretical/epistemic device for textual analysis is disentangled from its empirical and sociological aspects. As such, these commentators seem to have accepted the fracture between empirical applicability and theoretical/epistemic features in Spivak’s subalternity. This is not to suggest that they have not used her understanding of subalternity for empirical purposes. However, they assume that this empirical/theoretical fracture is palpable, and their studies have subsequently discussed ways to mend it.

The present article contests this assumption in scholarship. As illustrated, the epistemic use of subalternity in Spivak’s work is undeniable. She uses subalternity as a position from which to analyse the regulative code that implicitly organises hegemonic narratives. Nevertheless, her work includes the empirical applications of her concept of subalternity. In fact, the theoretical and epistemic aspects of this approach are sociologically entangled: her reflections on subalternity can be considered both in terms of her theoretical framework and her experiences with subaltern groups. These experiences challenge the opposition between old and new subalternity, thus suggesting that Spivak’s approach might not consist in applying old or new categories to concrete cases, but in combining these categories. Empirical cases lie at the intersection of a conceptual device that provides the coordinates for analysing socio-political situations and understanding how subordination can potentially be altered.

In this respect, Spivak’s conception of subalternity accounts for the social position of individuals/groups who are not necessarily politically aware of their condition (Spivak, 2005, p. 476). Their social position has a distinctive class character: Spivak’s subalternity cannot be separated from class issues, as the question of the new subaltern has illustrated. And yet, class is not exhaustive of the social dimension of subalternity, because her concept describes everything that is not included within strict class analysis: according to Spivak, subalternity exists at the intersection of class, race, gender, etc. This is exemplified by the sati widow caught in between the racialised ideological justifications of the British colonisers and Hindu patriarchal discourse.

Moreover, Spivak’s subalternity is not reducible to a generalised condition of inferiority or oppression. Rather, her work has illustrated that ‘[the] subaltern is oppressed, yet not all oppressed are subaltern’ (Bracke, 2016, p. 839). Spivak is aware that the concept’s politically ambiguous uses hinder its sociological applicability. She uses different understandings of subalternity to highlight the political ambiguities of situations that would not appear ambiguous if interpreted through the category of ‘oppression’.

The ability to speak and know one’s own conditions (i.e. representation) is one criterion for disambiguation. The example of individuals and groups who claim marginality in the academy illustrates this situation. These ‘marginals’ can represent themselves beyond the effacement of epistemic violence, accessing the political infrastructures through which their claims circulate within an institutional space. As such, they have access to the hegemonic discourse. Or, they are not excluded from the lines of social mobility, particularly from discursive and cultural logics. Therefore, they are not subaltern, rather they are oppressed.

However, exclusion from or representation within discursive formations is not an absolute criterion for disambiguation. It highlights the political ambiguities implicit in the academy situation, but is not an absolute measure of what is subaltern or not. The groups in between the old and new subalternity, as well as the new subalterns, are particularly relevant here. For they can speak, organise as political subjects and thus, potentially, challenge their subordinated condition, but they are nevertheless excluded from the logic of capital (e.g. the Adivasis in Chharanagar), subjected to the initiative of the ruling classes, or exploited (e.g. the non-Eurocentric movements).

In this way, political subjectification and exclusion from the logic of capital are further, but by no means definitive, criteria for evaluating the subaltern condition. Even those who are to some extent included within the logics of capital can be subaltern, because Spivak’s subalternity does not describe an absolute position. Rather, it is a location of individuals/groups that depends on their position within hierarchies. For example, Bhubaneswari was not simply a woman, but a middle-class educated woman involved in the anti-colonial/bourgeois movement (Spivak, 1999a, p. 308; 2010, p. 228). Being part of the educated middle class, she was not excluded from the lines of social mobility. She had agency. However, her voice was not heard, thus resonating with the challenge of the old subalterns who struggle to represent their interests vis-a-vis dominant narratives or social formations.

Overall, Spivak has analysed specific situations by deploying different understandings of subalternity, none of which are valid from a general perspective. These different criteria are entangled, so that her texts highlight a composite matrix for explaining the subaltern condition and potential ways to challenge it. Here, specific cases of subalternity are interpreted and evaluated according to the weight attributed to each vector of this matrix: intersectionality, ability to represent, exclusion from and re-codification within hegemonic narratives (epistemic violence), exclusion from and inclusion in social formations, political subjectification, exploitation and (localised) social position. As such, these vectors point to the spaces of cross-fertilisation among social sciences and humanities (e.g. Clifford & Marcus, 1986) by mixing sociology, philosophy and literary criticism.

Within these spaces, the tools of philosophy and literary criticism undergo a process of sociologisation, and vice versa. This is evident when the subaltern-as-difference is understood as cut off from the lines of social mobility, when the differential (and demographic) definition of subalternity maps the implicit code that organises hegemonic representations, when eminently sociological questions (e.g. exploitation) are conjoined with epistemic violence (the exclusion from and re-codification within hegemonic narratives), or when autonomous subaltern subjectivities who are opposing their subordination deal with questions of representation. Through this matrix of mobile lenses social scientists can approach subalternity from different perspectives, a condition that echoes C. Wright Mills’s (1959, p. 214) exhortation to ‘let [the sociological] mind become a moving prism catching light from as many angles as possible’.

As such, by connecting the theoretical and epistemic aspects of subalternity with its material determinants and expressions of autonomy (i.e. agency and forms of political organisation), Spivak’s matrix has the capacity to advance sociological debates, including those in this journal. Firstly, it clears the field of those politically ambiguous uses of subalternity that communicate little of this social experience. Secondly, it enriches the analytical possibilities of sociological research on subaltern groups (e.g. Lal, 2011; Nilsen & Roy, 2015) by addressing the material and epistemic conditions/expressions of their subordination, agency and political subjectification. Thirdly, it can guide studies that have a methodological interest in representing subalternity through research with/about subalterns (e.g. Darder, 2018; Edwards, 2020) but which do not elaborate on how including sociologically-specific subalterns in these investigations influences epistemic questions, research and the subaltern condition itself. With Spivak’s matrix instead, the problem of representing subalternity to counter epistemic violence in research is inextricable from asking who exactly these subalterns are: their sociological concreteness stimulates theoretical, methodological and political/practical questions with transformative potential.

How does research with/about the collective form of the ‘new’ subaltern differ from research with/about the ‘old’ subalterns? How are research objectives and methodologies influenced by the specific exigencies of these groups, so as to challenge their subordination without silencing them? From this perspective, Spivak’s matrix stimulates research with/about subalterns that is affected by their situation, but can potentially alter it. Indeed, transforming the subaltern context without silencing subaltern voices requires understanding the processes that generated this context while recognising the role of subaltern groups within it. But this is what Spivak’s matrix does; representing the conditions of subaltern autonomy and subordination is the prerequisite for strategies that aim to transform subaltern contexts without obliterating subaltern agency and subjectification. In this way the epistemic and empirical entanglement in Spivak’s subalternity not only accounts for social change, but can also be functional to it, allowing us to move further beyond the assumptions of the literature that has informed much of the criticism surrounding her deployment of this concept.

Conclusion

This article has offered a systematic account of Spivak’s journey of subalternity, highlighting its empirical and sociological salience as well as its transformative potential. It has mapped different notions of subalternity (the subaltern-effect, the subaltern-as-difference, the old and new subalternity) and evaluated their theoretical, epistemic, empirical and sociological implications. More generally, it has argued that Spivak’s work presents a composite matrix that entangles sociological, philosophical and literary tools and issues, explaining subalternity in terms of intersectionality, the ability to represent, exclusion from/re-codification within hegemonic narratives, exploitation, political subjectification, a spectrum of inclusion/exclusion from social formations, and localised social positions.

In this way this article contributes to the literature by extensively mapping the journey of Spivak’s subalternity across her work and in relation to the development of postcolonial studies. Moreover, against recent interpretations, it demonstrates that her perspective on subalternity is not reducible to its epistemic aspect, rather, it has current and relevant empirical applications; for example, it conceptualises the situation of edge populations who are subjected to and/or oppose the accumulation by dispossession that fuels contemporary capitalism, thereby highlighting the material and epistemic conditions of their subordination and the expressions of agency and political subjectification that potentially alter this subordination. Therefore Spivak’s subalternity is intrinsically theoretical and sociological as well as sociologically compelling, but by no means politically ambiguous. Given its analytical perspective and its potential for increasing understanding about how subordination can be challenged, it can stimulate sociological debate about the subaltern condition and the methodological uses of subalternity.