Theses on Antagonism Hybridity and the Subaltern

7/27/2019 Theses on Antagonism Hybridity and the Subaltern

1/12

Dispositio/n2,voLXXV47-158 2005DepartmentfRomanceanguagesnd iteratures,niversityfMichigan

THESES ON ANTAGONISM, HYBRIDITY,AND THE SUBALTERN IN LATIN AMERICA*

Bruno BosteelsCornellUniversity

1

atin Americansubaltern tudiesemergeout of two relatedbut

apparently eterogeneousources.Thefirst

ource,which s

pri- 4 marilyof a historico-politicalature, omes in responseto thelast successfulrevolutionary xperienceon the continent,with the rise topowerandthe subsequentelectoraldefeatof the Sandinistas n Nicaragua.More generally, he strandof subaltern hinking hatcorrespondsto thisfirst ource is forced oregister he ossof referentiality f most, f not all,politicalprojectsthatweredirectly r indirectly elatedto the rational oreofMarxism.

* This aper asfirst resentedt he 001Annualeetingf heModernan-guagesssociation,hich as heldnNewOrleans.hadhopedoexpandeachhesisoas to ncorporatemuchmore ainstakingeplyo he extshatservesthe onstantnterlocutorsor his ebate: ohneverley,ubalternityandRepresentation:rgumentsnCulturalheoryDurham:ukeUniversityPress,999),lberto oreiras,heExhaustionfDifference:hePoliticsfLatinAmerican ulturaltudiesDurham:ukeUniversityress, 001),Gareth illiams,heOther ideof he opular:eoliberalismnd ubalter-nity nLatinAmericaDurham:ukeUniversityress, 002),nd he woeditionsreparednd ntroducedy leanaRodrguez,he LatinAmericanSubalterntudieseaderDurham:ukeUniversityress,001)ndConver-genciaetiempos:studiosubalternos/contextosatinoamericanosstado,cultura,ubalternidadAmsterdam:odopi,001).Maythis irst ndonlyfootnotee a token,owevernsufficient,fmy remendousndebtednessothis ollectiveork,s well sanearnestor utureepayment.


2/12


3/12

THESESONANTAGONISM,HYBRIDITY,...149

seenas having ed thewayfor he first rientation, hileAlbertoMoreirasandGarethWilliamsshouldermuch of the burdenof the secondone.Asidefrom he circumstantial ut perhapsnotwholly ndifferent ssueof genera-tional distinctions, owever,what seemsabsolutelycrucial to me is thequestionof how we oughtto understand heencounter etweenthese twostrands f thought nd, thus,how weshouldunderstand hepeculiararticu-lation of the theoretico-philosophicalnd the historico-politicaln LatinAmericansubaltern tudies.That is something, f course,that n earlier

days who knows if they can stillbe called the

"goodold"

days mighthavebeencomparedto the fusion of theory nd practice.From both sides,however, hepossibility f such a fusionnowadays appearsto be compro-mised,not in the leastbecausethe typicalformsof politicalorganizationthatwerethought obringaboutthis fusion-above ll, the party-form, utalsothe vanguardminority r the guerrillagroup-seemohavecompletelyexhausted heirhistorical otential.

LatinAmericansubaltern tudiesthusbring ogether deepsenseofcrisis, f not of outright efeat, n the wake ofpast revolutionary prisingsandan acutesenseof failure, r at thevery eastthe closureof a longstand-ingtradition f metaphysical hinking, till operativen the dialecticandinthe accompanyingphilosophyof consciousnessin general.Both of thesedevelopmentsmerge t the precisepointwheretheproblematic f subalternstudiescomesto coincidewith the impassesof modernformsof politicaltheory ndpractice. ndeed,as the name for relatively ewfieldofexperi-enceandthought, he subaltern mergeswhenthe deconstruction f meta-physical thinking nd the critique of the philosophyof the subjectas

consciousnessclash withpersistent abitsof dialecticalthinking,while atthe sametimehavingto cometo terms with all the traditional resupposi-tionsregardinghistory nd subjectivity hat still underpin ven, or espe-cially, he ntervening octrine f Marxism.

In sum,even whilecontinuing o be distinguishableoth ndividuallyand generationally,he two strands hat togetherprovidethe groundforLatinAmericansubaltern tudiesare, on the one hand,Marxistand his-torico-political,nd on the other, econstructivend philosophico-theoreti-

cal. Thus,whenFlorenciaMallon,in a now famousreference, omparedthe major theoristswho influenced heemergenceof subaltern tudiesinLatinAmericato the fourknights f theApocalypse,she couldhaveadded-as was already implicit n her critique-that heseimposingfigurescameriding nby pairs ontwohighhorses,withGramsciandFoucaultsitting n


4/12

150 BRUNO BOSTEELS

one,and Derrida andSpivakon the other. However, do not think hat t sa matter of choosing, say, in favor of "good" historicalwork over andagainsttoo much "evil" deconstruction. ather, he wholepointof subal-tern tudies ies in the combination,no matterhow uneven in its develop-ment, of both strands. In other words, and to return to the knightlymetaphor: nsteadof checkingwitha hammerwhich horse's armor s betterequipped againstthe onslaughtof criticisms, ncludingself-criticisms,hetask s to putboth underone and the sameyoke.

Theproper

articulation f these two sourcesof subalternhought,then, llows the critic n new and unheard-of waysnot onlyto theorize he

demiseof revolutionary olitics,but also to politicizethe theory f differ-enceand the deconstruction f metaphysics.The mostthorough-going as-sage through his double movement is in my eyes not only useful butabsolutely ndispensablefor anyonewho is critically ngaged today withquestionsof literature, ulture, nd politics-inLatin America as much aselsewhere.

3

What I would call the subaltern redicamentderivesfrom he para-doxicaltensionsand incompatibilitieshat,despitetheir ttempted usioninto a uniquehistorical nd theoretical onjuncture, eset the two sourcesof subaltern tudies n Latin America.

These two strands f subaltern hinking ime and again splitoff ndbecome discerniblepreciselyat the point where one eitherputs forth he

wagerof a decision or remainsfaithful o the aporiasof a deconstruction fall suchwagersanddecisions,by pushing hem o the imit f their nherentimpossibilityn the name of what theynecessarilyhave toexclude,or leavebehind,as a stubborn emainder. ubjectivelyor affectively peaking, thisforced hoice makes itselfheard n different ays,whether y a pessimisticor nostalgic judgment regardingthe possibilityand durabilityof newcounter-hegemonicocial agents,or by a more radical, even messianicexpectation, utside of all establishedhorizons,for n end to all traditionalforms f

agencyand

hegemonyn

general, ncludingboveall the

promiseof reconstituting populist counter-hegemony.


5/12

THESESONANTAGONISM,HYBRIDITY,...151

4

Despite this predicament, n the realm of cultural practiceswithwhich they are most commonlyassociated,the two strands of subalternthinking hare a commonopponentn the recent proposalsfor, nd hopefuldescriptionsf, phenomenaof culturalhybridity.

Instead of interpretingheexchangesbetweenhighandlow,betweenelite and mass culture,between the modernand the native or indigenous,

wherebythe latter

lwaystend to be considered more

primitiveut also

moregenuine,proponents f "hybrid ultures" uchas Nstor Garca Can-cliniprivilege he nventivenegotiationshat akeplace,in both directions,betweenthese binaries.From the standpoint f the subaltern, owever, uchprecarious exchanges,no matterhow flexible and creativetheymay wellappeartobe,nevertheless emain nscribed nd contained n a longstandingand dominantreconciliatoryradition f dealingwith social, economical,political, nd cultural ontradictionsn Latin America.

Hybridity, n other words,not onlywhen seen as normative r pro-grammatic utperhapseven from purely, f disingenuously,escriptive rphenomenologicalpoint of view, remainssuspiciouslyclose to the mucholdermodernizing deological projectsthat were aimed at forging n all-inclusive nationalor even continentaldentity, asedon theovercomingofdifferences.n sharpcontrast, he notion of the subaltern, ollowingts his-torico-politicalnflection,s inseparablefrom he basic factof antagonisticsocial relations nd theunequaldivision of labor andpower,while,follow-ing its morestrictly econstructiverientation, he subaltern s in fact pre-cisely that which always already resists sublation in any process ofhybridism, hether ultural r otherwise.

5

The polemic over hybridity nd the subaltern s perhaps nothingmorethan n updatedrevision, n the context f rampant eoliberalism,f amajorearlierdebate,the one regarding henotions of transculturation nd

heterogeneity.Here,too, the former ategorypretended o accountfor the renewalofmostlydominant ultures y the ncorporation f elementsfrom he mar-ginsor from opularsocial strata.A canonicalexample,oftendiscussedbyngelRama and confirmed y Josefina udmer n her ownanalysis,would


6/12

152 BRUNO BOSTEELS

be the integration nd, ultimately, hecompleteabsorptionof various oraltraditions f gaucho songwritingntohigh so-calledgauchesqueliteraturefor hepurposesof nation-buildingnd its cultural r ideological legitima-tion of a modern entralized tate pparatus.Suchprocessesof transcultur-ation, s the examplecanbarelybeginto illustrate, ere of course never farremoved from tate-sponsored rojects oproducea similarunity, histimein terms f ethnic nd racialidentity-projects hichin realitymeanta sys-tematicwhitening f the populationand the spreadingof nation-wide oli-cies of assimilation and

miscegenation.The

categoryof

heterogeneity,n

contrast othat of transculturation,s presentedby way of acknowledgingthe nsuperableplurality nd diversity f social,cultural, thnic, nd racialcomponentsn the contradictoryotality f all societiesof Latin America-even if theprincipal ite of emergencefor uch attempts t recognizing hefact of heterogeneitys found in the Andes,as in the work of AntonioCornejoPolar,rather han, ay, n Argentina r Mexico.

6

If we compareboth debates,we can state that heterogeneity as totransculturation hat the subaltern s to hybridity, hat s to say, a radicalproposalto resist the erasure and/or einscriptionf antagonisms-whetheronbehalfof the state or even)through he deological supportf civil soci-ety. n fact, n yet another urn f the screw,unlikely o be the ast,AlbertoMoreiras haspoignantly edirected he notion of the subaltern gainsttheverycategory f heterogeneity evisedbyolder critical raditions.

All hitherto xistingforms r models of cultural politics,whether ntermsof transculturation, ybridism, r heterogeneity, ould thus in thefinal nstance give up on the radical desire of somehow comingto termswiththe recalcitrance f the subaltern n Latin America.Today,allpropos-als for he negotiation, r even the bare affirmation, f difference,nprinci-pleyet most often lso in spiteof themselves, emainuncannily loseto, fnot complicitouswith,the otherwiseuniform rend owards the globaliza-tion of capital.Difference, o be moreprecise,risksalways already being

nothingmore than the intrinsic ounterpart, r necessaryunderside,f the

homogeneoustendency oward the ravaging dentity f the world marketand itsattendantdeologyof wall-to-wall onsumerism. ifference s todayperhaps onlythebarely disguisedform f apparition f the aw of general-izedequivalence.


7/12

THESES ONANTAGONISM,HYBRIDITY,...153

LatinAmericancultural tudieswouldstillhaveto learn to forego hehumanist ndprofoundly iberalheritage a heritage t work even in therev-olutionarymovements n Cuba andNicaragua whichputs a conciliatoryunderstandingf culture t the service of the modern tate or civil society,all the while ignoring or continuingto exclude the subaltern lliterate,indigenous,peasant,andurbanpoor-whethern the name of progressanddevelopment, r by wayof pasticheand nomadicplay.Thus,whereastran-sculturation, ybridism, nd even the proposalof heterogeneityll risk to

havebecomeideologiesof failed modern

nation-building,ollowed

bythe

reignofpostmodern ransnationalapital, only the sustainedrecognition fthe ubaltern nd of the antagonistic tructuring f any givensocialinstanceholds thepromiseof a radical-democraticociety.

7

Behind the nterplay f difference nd identity, hen,what s actuallyat staketurns ut to revolve around n unspoken, r insufficientlyheorizedlogicof contradiction including he ogicof how a givencontradiction is-torically ecomesantagonisticobeginwith. Even morebroadly speaking,the possiblerenewal of such a theory f antagonistic ontradictions s anunfinished ask s boundup withthe still relatively bscurefateof dialecti-cal reasonafter he crisis and historical emise of Marxism.

Dialecticalthinking, ccording to a first ritical reformulation, olongerproceeds by wayof the objectivealienation ndsubsequentreappro-priation f histoiyby a unitary ubject but by way of the internal cission,or division,of any subjectiveforceby its structural eterminations,s wellas by the possibletorsionof the former ack upon the latter a torsionorforced wisting hat s symptomatict the outset nd destructive n the end.

In a second and moreopenlydeconstructiveeformulation,ll think-ingceasesto be dialectical,or continues o be dialecticalonly n a negativesense,when t no longerproceeds bythe final ublation of difference ntoahigher piritual nity hat s ultimately mbodied n the figure f the nation-state or the sovereign,but by the interminable cknowledgement f what

thisveryprocessofovercoming lways necessarilyeaves behind s a stub-bornremnant r supplement namely, hatwhichbydefinition as nopropername butonlya genericone,and whichmight s well be called the ndivis-ible subaltern emainder.


8/12

154 BRUNOBOSTEELS

8If the two strands f subaltern hinkingmentioned arlierfind com-

montarget n the contemporary ropositions f transculturation nd hybrid-ity, hen shouldaddthat hey lso sharea commonally in the doctrine foverdetermination,r structural ausality,which n one of the atest vatarsof dialecticalmaterialism at the very point of its imminent ollapse wasborrowedfrom he theory f the subjectin psychoanalysis.Accordingtothis doctrine,

ny givensocial formation s overdetermined y a cause

whoseeffects anish completely nto the very structure f whichit is theabsentcause.Whatgivescoherenceto a socialorder s thus a paradoxicalterm r class,in a fairly trict echnicalense ofthe word as usedin set the-ory, which has no propertieswhatsoeverother han those that can be readoff symptomatically ut of the structure from which it is inherentlyexcluded.

Followingthe doctrine f absent or structural ausality,which n myeyes still marks one of the most productivepointsof transition ot onlybetweenstructuralism nd poststructuralism ut also, and more impor-tantly, etweenthedeconstructionf metaphysicsnd thepsychoanalyticalcritiqueof the humanist ubject,the subaltern an then be defined as thatwhich stands n a relation f internal xclusionto the hegemonic.

In this ense,the fundamental utcomeof the variousprojectsof sub-altern tudiescomesdownto the recognition f preciselysuch inevitableantagonismsnd relationsof internal xclusionthat definethe socialfieldfromwithin.Eventhe Maoist line,so often uotedby JohnBeverley, bout

"contradictionsn the midst of the people"is aimedhistorically t the per-sistenceof antagonismwithin henational-popular loc including, r espe-cially,undersocialistrule.Finally, helogicof internal xclusioncan alsobe phrasedin terms of a constitutive utside. The subaltern s then thatwhichparadoxicallylies both inside and outsidethe sphereof the hege-monic social regime being the wild embodimentof all that has to beincludedout in order for there o be a socialorderandthe possibility f apoliticaldecisionto beginwith.

9

Anyattempt o articulate hesubaltern s the constitutive utsideofthehegemonicnto a viablepoliticalor artistic rojectruns n myeyesthe


9/12

THESES ONANTAGONISM,HYBRIDITY,...155

risk of fallingback into the melodrama of consciousness and thepredica-mentsof the beautiful oul.Of course,in principle, herecan be no suchthing s subaltern on-

sciousness,et alone a subaltern lass consciousness,nsofar s the dialecticof consciousnesshas since its very inceptionbeen woundup in its owninherent imit, nd in the relation of internal xclusion between the cogitoand the unconscious.In this sense,the subaltern s that which should radi-callybreak with all melodramatic emptations.However,there remains a

tangiblerisk that the increasing self-reflexivityboutthe inevitable

pres-ence of a subaltern emainderwould become in turn he rrefutable uaran-tee of radicalism in the purest sense. This wouldexplainthe trend tocontinueuppingthe ante in the debateregarding ll hitherto xistingformsof cultural olitics n Latin America.

Every social order is ultimatelyoverdetermined y that which itsimultaneouslyexcludes and includes as its constitutiveoutside. Anyprojecttobring hisremainder nto thepoliticalarena,though, unsthe riskofalways alreadybeing nothingmore than reaction ormation hat s suchremains nscribedwithin he bounds of the existing tateof affairs.What ismore, nsofar s all hegemonic regimesare inherently uilt uponthe con-trolled production and reproduction of marginal counter-hegemonicprojects, nsofar s powerand the moral law too are inherently uilt andfortified y their nfraction nd transgression, ny straightforward ffirma-tiveprojectmust cceptthepossibility f already being partof the cycleofwhat a social order needs for the sake of its sustained existence. Whatremainsproblematic bout this otherwise cute insight s that ny specificchangewill inevitably ecome liable to the criticism hat t misrecognizesits own conditions f possibility, nsofar s these are also at the same timeconditions f impossibility.n many quarters, n fact, radicalphilosophyhas indeedalreadycome into existence thatderives ts irrefutable trengthfrom recisely ucharguments. heightenedmetacritical warenessof thisliability, evertheless,hould neither erve as an alibi for radical quietismnor allow the critical hinker o hide behind the mask of the beautiful oul,free f allworldlyguilt.

10

Faced with he relation f internal xclusion,withheterogeneityromwithin, r with the constitutive utside nherent n any given identity, hat


10/12


11/12

THESES ONANTAGONISM, HYBRIDITY,...157

subaltern emainder as been instrumentaln theunmasking f the deolog-icalcomplicity etween the formation f a vibrant national culture nd thereproduction f the entire state apparatusin its properlymodern guise.However,the fact that here re past sequenceswhen art and politicswereindeedsutured y statist orms f thinking hould not make us forget hat,in principle nd withoutwanting oringthe formalist ell, art and politicswork with different materials and accordingto a different equencingoftheir hought rocedures.Politics,for xample,deals withthe collective or

multiples its material nd with the subtraction f

inegalitariantatements

as itsprocess;but art nd literature eal rather withthe imits f representa-tion as their nd and with formalization s their means,and in this sensethey endto carry ut a figurative ndoing of the socialbond.

Thus,for ubaltern tudies to continuewithout n exclusivelypresen-tisi agenda,the specificity nd relativeautonomyof the proceduresof artandpoliticsmustbe establishedhistorically r genealogically,rather hanformally r transcendentally. therwise, n the search f not exactlyfor nillustration han t least for proper nactment r exposureof the subaltern,art nd literature isk to become the site for purely esthetic r evenarch-aesthetic ct, whilepolitical thinking s a process,if t does not fall for hetemptation f an equallyradical or arch-political ct, becomesobjectifiedinto mere political philosophy, s the questcontinuesfor regime capableof assumingthe fundamental egativity f the subaltern s the constitutiveoutsideof each andevery ociety.

Moregenerally, ecause of thepredicamentmentioned arlier, ten-sion hasyet to be solved in subaltern hinking etween,on the one hand,a

logicthatremains structural nd transcendental o the pointof its extremelimit and imminent xhaustion, nd, on the other hand,formsof thoughtsuch as art nd politicsthat re sequentialandeventmental,nd thusaretobe thoroughly istoricizedwithoutgiving n an inch on the rigorof decon-structive egativity. hus far, ubaltern tudies often eem to have avoidedthetrapsof historicism nd aestheticism nlyby havingrecourse oradical,arch-politicalr arch-aesthetic,cts. Art nd politics,however, an andper-hapsmustbe capturedhistorically orwhat theyhavebeen,whatthey re,and what

theytill could be in the future: orms f

thoughtwith their wn

kernelof truth nd of the repressed.Otherwise, he fact that ll tends to bepoliticalfor ertainforms f subaltern hinkingmight ead one to concludethat, paradoxically,the thought hat claims to criticize both aestheticism


12/12

158 BRUNO BOSTEELS

andhistoricism, ndsup aestheticizinghepoliticalby failing o historicizepolitics.Concretely,hen, et me suggestwhat see as someof the tasks ahead

of a larger radition n the practiceof critical heory hatwould have to becapableof traversing heproblematic f the subaltern n Latin America:

1) unsuture rt and politics,without implyfallingback on their nstitu-tional autonomywhich is itself of course a historical and not astructural ondition;

2) reconfigurert andpolitics,as well as theirpossiblesuturing s singu-lar thought rocedures, ccordingto their pecificsequences,con-cepts,andtheories;

3) revisit he problemof thepresentation nd transmission f these formsof thought, f notby remaining utside,which s of course impossi-ble, then at the very least by adamantly going against the con-straints f purely cademicpower.

In thefuture, hough,

cannotimagine

the continuation f such aprojectwithout he possibility f its collectivereappropriation.

Theses on Antagonism Hybridity and the Subaltern

Documents