[Discussion] Book review - Feminism without Borders

[gpultar@cstgroup.org]

Chandra Talpade Mohanty. Feminism without Borders: Decolonizing Theory,
Practicing Solidarity. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2003. viii +
300 pp. Notes, bibliography, index. $79.95 (cloth), ISBN 0-8223-3010-5; $21.95
(paper), ISBN 0-8223-3021-0.

Reviewed by: Malia Formes, Department of History, Western Kentucky University.
Published by: H-Women (July, 2005)

Global Feminist Solidarity and Anti-Capitalism: Towards an Integration of Theory
and Activism

In this volume, women's studies professor Chandra Talpade Mohanty contextualizes
the development over the last two decades of her own concerns as a
scholar-activist within a larger history of feminism and anti-imperialism. An
influential theorist of Third World and transnational feminisms, Mohanty is best
known for two earlier collections she co-edited: Third World Women and the
Politics of Feminism (1991), and Feminist Genealogies, Colonial Legacies,
Democratic Futures (1997). Her new book moves beyond postmodernist relativism to
embrace historical materialism and validate marginalized women's experiences as
a site from which the workings of power can be made visible. Focusing on a
critique of global capitalism, the volume deserves particular credit for its
efforts to integrate theory and practice, most notably through advocacy of
"emancipatory knowledge" (p. 1) and "feminist solidarity" (p. 3). Both concepts
are theoretically and politically nuanced. Mohanty validates the multiple
sources of feminist ideas, whether academic or non-academic, experiential or
theoretical, urging readers to make such forms of knowledge the basis of
political consciousness and action. Her concept of solidarity moves beyond Robin
Morgan's idea of sisterhood, which Mohanty criticizes for assuming too much
homogenity among women and "seem[ing] predicated on the erasure of the history
and effects of contemporary imperialism" (pp. 110-111).[1] Solidarity, by
contrast, involves "mutuality, accountability, and the recognition of common
interests as the basis for relationships among diverse communities" (p. 7).

Feminism Without Borders consists of an introduction and nine chapters, most of
which have been previously published. Mohanty envisioned the book having a
"spiral structure, since the chapters move in and out of similar queries, but at
many different levels" (p. 12). They are arranged in three sections:
"Decolonizing Feminism," "Demystifying Capitalism," and "Reorienting Feminism."
Part 1 opens with the classic article, "Under Western Eyes." First published in
1986, it has been translated into eight languages and has been reprinted many
times. Part 3 consists of a single, new essay, "'Under Western Eyes' Revisited:
Feminist Solidarity through Anticapitalist Struggles." Here Mohanty addresses
criticisms of her earlier work and reflects upon the shift in her focus over the
years from Eurocentrism in Western scholarship about Third World women to global
capitalism, which she identifies as a crucial site of struggle against
patriarchy and racism.

This chapter addresses issues important to many women's studies faculty, namely
how to make our classes more global in content and how to encourage activism
among students. While feminist courses today incorporate differences of race,
class, and sexuality more fully than they did two decades ago, the focus has
tended to remain on how those experiences intersect in particular, typically
Western, contexts. Also, many feminist professors lament that undergraduates
today are much less likely to engage in political activism than their
predecessors in the late 1960s and 1970s, when women's studies emerged as a
force on many campuses. Mohanty responds to both concerns. She advocates a
Feminist Solidarity/Comparative Feminist Studies pedagogy linking the local and
the global in new ways that challenge prevailing power hierarchies and transcend
the limitations of earlier approaches. Those problematic but influential models
of internationalizing the women's studies curriculum include the
Feminist-as-Tourist model, which Mohanty dismisses as "additive" and
Eurocentric, casting Third World women as victims of exotic oppression such as
dowry deaths in India. Similarly, the area-studies-influenced
Feminist-as-Explorer model takes an inadequate "separate but equal" approach
marked by cultural relativism. The comparative model, by contrast, "allows for
teaching and learning about points of connection and distance among and between
communities of women marginalized and privileged along numerous local and global
dimensions" (p. 243). While specific examples of how to implement this
comparative model would strengthen the chapter, Mohanty's assertions are
intriguing. What she advocates would highlight "relations of mutuality,
co-responsibility, and common interests, anchoring the idea of feminist
solidarity" (p. 242) and encourage students to "envision the possibility of
activism and struggle outside the academy" (p. 243).

The most compelling parts of the book are those drawing upon the author's
analysis of what she has experienced first hand. Mohanty integrates theory and
practice most fully in these sections, notably chapter 5, "Genealogies of
Community, Home, and Nation," and chapter 8, "Race, Multiculturalism, and
Pedagogies of Dissent." Both chapters address the notion of "borders," a concern
informed by Mohanty's own transnational experiences growing up in Mumbai
(Bombay), teaching in Nigeria, conducting research in London, and now as a U.S.
citizen, post-September 11, 2001. In these different settings she has identified
with or been cast in a wide range of categories: "Indian," "Third-World
foreigner," "black," "Asian," and "person of color." Reading American feminist
authors in the early 1980s, such as Audre Lorde, Cherrie Moraga and many others,
had a profound impact on Mohanty. She explains that "in thinking through the
links among gender, race, and class in their U.S. manifestations, I was for the
first time able to think through my own gendered, classed, postcolonial history"
(p. 129).

The most important section of the book may be chapter 8, where Mohanty's
participant-observer skills are particularly sharp in her critique of the
corporatizing of academe. She traces the emergence of the corporate university
and its role in "naturalizing capitalist, privatized citizenship" (p. 173). In
this context, there has been a backlash against feminist scholars (p. 175) and
the development of a "careerist academic feminism," in which feminism has become
a way to advance individual careers rather than a call for collective activism
or radical transformation (p. 6). The discussion of institutional
prejudice-reduction workshops provides compelling empirical support for
Mohanty's views. By drawing on psychologically based notions of prejudice rather
than historically sensitive understandings of structural inequality, such
workshops identify racism and sexism in individualized terms subject to
behavioral modification rather than calling for collective political action (p.
209). Mohanty's critique of the inadequacies of an approach relying so heavily
upon individualized definitions of "experience" underscores the value of her own
analysis of "experience" as something requiring comparative context leading to
feminist solidarity.

The book offers insights that will appeal to feminist scholars working in a
variety of disciplines, and historians may be particularly appreciative of the
author's attention to historical context and change-over-time. The collection
would also be appropriate for graduate students in women's studies, feminist
theory, or postcolonial studies who would benefit from having so many of
Mohanty's writings collected in a single volume. By tracing the development of
important feminist concerns over the last generation, the sections originally
published in the 1980s and 1990s would be helpful to those new to the subject.
However, less-motivated undergraduate and non-specialist readers would likely
find the book's academic tone and densely argued prose difficult. This is
unfortunate given the author's commitment to reaching an audience of activists
as well as scholars (p. 10). Nevertheless, the book offers benefits to all
readers as a particular example of "emancipatory knowledge" forged in the
context of Mohanty's own experience as a border-crossing feminist academic.

Note

[1]. Robin Morgan, Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement
Anthology (New York: Anchor Press, 1984).




Citation: Malia Formes. "Review of Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Feminism without
Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity," H-Women, H-Net Reviews,
July, 2005. URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=18241127325050.

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