Interviews

Interviews with Dr. Robert J.C.Young, Dr. Cheikh Anta Babou, Dr. Bartholomew C. Dean and Dr. Ania Loomba. In these interviews, academics from Penn and various universities across the United States discuss the issue of defining Postcolonial, Subaltern and Transnational Studies. These academic were chosen because of both their influence in their respective fields and the innovative work they are engaging in. The interviews were conducted separately. This journal article is available in Penn History Review: http://repository.upenn.edu/phr/vol16/iss1/2 In these interviews, academics from Penn and various universities across the United States discuss the issue of defining Postcolonial, Subaltern and Transnational Studies. These academic were chosen because of both their influence in their respective fields and the innovative work they are engaging in. The interviews were conducted separately. Dr. Robert J.C. Young (D.Phil. Exeter College, Oxford 1979) is Silver Professor of English and Comparative Literature at New York University. Dr. Young focuses on the history of colonialism and anti-colonialism, as well as postcolonial literatures and cultures. He is the General Editor of Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies. Dr. Young’s first book (White Mythologies: Writing History and the West) argued that Marxist philosophies of history were not world histories, as they claimed, but instead served as repositories of Eurocentric thought. Dr. Cheikh Anta Babou (Ph.D. Michigan State University 2002) is Associate Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Babou focuses on francophone WestAfrica from the 19th century onwards, as well as theAfrican diasporas in France and the United States. His recent research includes work on the history of the Muridiyyah, an Islamic Sufi order based primarily in Senegal and The Gambia. Dr. Bartholomew C. Dean (Ph.D. Harvard University 1995) is Associate Professor of Socio-Cultural Anthropology at the University of Kansas. Dr. Dean focuses on critical theory, kinship, symbolic forms and material culture of Amazonia and Latin America. Dr. Ania Loomba (Ph.D. University of Sussex 1988) holds the Catherine Bryson Chair in the English department at the University of Pennsylvania. She is also faculty in Comparative Literature, SouthAsian Studies, Women’s INTERVIEWS Robert J.C. Young Cheikh Anta Babou Bartholomew C. Dean Ania Loomba 8 1 et al.: Interviews Published by ScholarlyCommons, 2008 Penn History Review 9 Studies, and Asian-American Studies. Dr. Loomba focuses on Early Modern Studies, postcolonial studies, feminist theory and South Asian studies. She is currently editing an edition of Shakespeare’s play Antony and Cleopatra and also writing a book on how global travel shaped theater in Shakespeare’s time. Penn History Review (PHR): How would you define Postcolonial Studies? How would you define Subaltern Studies and Transnational Studies? Dr. Robert J.C. Young (RY): The first has a literary provenance, the second a history provenance, the third comparative literature. Dr. Cheikh Anta Babou (CB): Postcolonial Studies is, as the name suggests, history as viewed at the end of colonialism. It is a discipline that moves away from the nationalistic discourse of the 1960’s, and is also a result of disenchantment with post-colonial policies [enacted byAfrican countries]. It no longer views history as simply a clash between a dominant Europe and weak Africa; rather it looks to the responsibility of Africans in making their history. Postcolonial Studies borrows from literary methods, and one also sees the impact of post-modernism through the use of scholars such as Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault. Postcolonial Studies brings new perspectives, in particular the importance of analyzing texts rather than simply sources. Often they will not look at archives or documents from European explorers. Instead, they believe that the reader itself gives meaning to the text. There is no embedded meaning; it is created by the reader. It also brings a kind of relativism that could be seen as a sort of nihilism. Subaltern Studies came from India, of course. It had a precursor in England with E.P. Thompson – he tried to write ‘history from below.’ That is, that history is not only made by the powerful, but that it can be made by the powerless. His writings were shaped by Marxism. Subaltern Studies worked with not just the working class, but the peasant class – how they have their own history and way of resisting.And not just against Europeans, but against local bourgeoisie as well. The peasant class had their own way of waging resistance. Not simply through strikes, which is what much of the history of resistance focuses on – but when a peasant burns their house or sings a song that shames people, this is a form of resistance as well. Those who work in Subaltern Studies say that this way of fighting has the same value as striking [in industrial settings] does. 2 Penn History Review, Vol. 16, Iss. 1 [2008], Art. 2 http://repository.upenn.edu/phr/vol16/iss1/2