Can The Subaltern Speak Analysis

Can the Subaltern Speak? “Can the Subaltern Speak?” by Spivak (1988) presents the ethical problems of investigating a different culture based on “universal” concepts and frameworks. The west is once again trying to impose their “voice” onto the “voiceless” women in the third world. This treatise critically deals with a line up of western writers such as Marx, Foucault, Deleuze and Derrida. The title, “Can the Subaltern Speak?” insinuates that western academic writings are often produced to support the western’s interest. Spivak (1988) holds that knowledge is never innocent and that it expresses the interests of its producers. People write with their own interest in mind, hardly the interest of others. However, Spivak in “Can the Subaltern Speak?” has the opportunity to engage in the colonial discourse that has been written by westerners. As a postcolonial critic, she is able to deconstruct what has been said. To

The fault was I did not tell anyone about this at home. I told them my father just held my hand. That was my mistake,” she said. Despite being the victim of the situation, the teenage girl decided to take the fault upon herself. Albeit a different scene than sati, this is an instance whereby woman is determined to be “helpless slave to lordly man’s control” as written by Robert (1830) in her poem. White men are not saving brown women from brown men by prohibiting sati, but depriving their freedom of choice in this instance. Therefore, however realistic the widows’ “voices” may seem, it may not be the same for all the women, as they are merely representations framed through the western’s lens. Although Sleeman (1915:20) assured that reader may rely upon the truth of the whole tale, the voice of the subaltern women may be diluted in the translation or becomes politically biased when it is written by others. This creates a rift between the truth of the colonised and the invented discourses by the