Subaltern Studies as Postcolonial Criticism 1485
the representation of the history of these societies . So much so that even contestatory projects , including Subaltern Studies , Chakrabarty acknowledges , write of non-Western histories in terms of failed transitions . Such images of aborted transitions reinforce the subalternity of non-Western histories and the dominance of Europe as History . 28
The dominance of Europe as history not ' only subalternizes non-Western societies but also serves the aims of their nation-states . Indeed , Subaltern Studies developed its critique of history in the course of its examination of Indian nationalism and the nation-state . Guha ' s reconstruction of the language of peasant politics in his Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India is premised on the argument that nationalist historiography engaged in a systematic appropriation of peasants in the service of elite nationalism . Chatterjee ' s work contains an extended analysis of Jawaharlal Nehru ' s Discovery of India , a foundational nationalist text , showing the use of History , Reason , and Progress in the normalization of peasant " irrationality ." 29 The inescapable conclusion from such analyses is that " history ," authorized by European imperialism and the Indian nation-state , functions as a discipline , empowering certain forms of knowledge while disempowering others .
If history functions as a discipline that renders certain forms of thought and action " irrational " and subaltern , then should not the critique extend to the techniques and procedures it utilizes ? Addressing this question , Chakrabarty turns to " one of the most elementary rules of evidence in academic historywriting : that your sources must be verifiable ." 30 Pointing out that this rule assumes the existence of a " public sphere ," which public archives and history writing are expected to reproduce , he suggests that the canons of historical research cannot help but live a problematic life in societies such as India . The idea of " public life " and " free access to information " must contend with the fact that knowledge is privileged and " belongs and circulates in the numerous and particularistic networks of kinship , community , gendered spaces , [ and ] ageing structures ." If this is the case , then , Chakrabarty asks , how can we assume the universality of the canons of history writings : " Whose universals are they ?" 31
IT IS IMPORTANT TO NOTE THAT " Europe " or " the West " in Subaltern Studies refers to an imaginary though powerful entity created by a historical process that authorized it as the home of Reason , Progress , and Modernity . To undo the authority of such an entity , distributed and universalized by imperialism and nationalism , requires , in Chakrabarty ' s words , the " provincialization of Europe ." But neither nativism nor cultural relativism animates this project of provincializ-
28 Chakrabarty , " Postcoloniality and the Artifice of History ," 4-5 . In this essay , Chakrabarty
includes the initial orientation of Subaltern Studies toward the question of transition , as reflected in Guha ' s programmatic statements in " On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial India " and Chakrabarty ' s own Rethinking Working-Class History .
29Jawaharlal Nehru , Discovery of India ( New York , 1946 ); Chatterjee , Nationalist Thought and the
Colonial World .
30 Chakrabarty ," Trafficking in History and Theory ," 106 .
31 Chakrabarty ," Trafficking in History and Theory ," 107 .
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW DECEMBER 1994