Colonial Modernity A Critique

Sahitya Akademi
Colonial Modernity: A Critique

Author(s): Kanchana Mahadevan
Source: Indian Literature, Vol. 46, No. 3 (209) (May-June, 2002), pp. 193-211
Published by: Sahitya Akademi
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23338618
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LITERARY
Colonial
CRITICISM
Modernity: A Critique
Kanchana
Mahadevan
The point is rather that the Enlightenment must examine

itself... The task to be accomplished is not the conservation
of the past, but the redemption of the hopes of the past.
(Adorno
and Horkheimer,xv)
Between patriarchy and imperialism...the

figure of the
woman disappears... into a violent shuttling which is the
displaced figuration of the 'third-world woman' caught
between tradition and modernization.
(Spivak,
102)
the predicament
of colonial
attempts to articulate
paper
modernity. Since modernity was ushered in India under British
colonial
it be renounced?
After all this was a period
rule, should
marked by severe forms of violence and exploitation,
and retaining
institutions and ideas such as the nation-state, parliamentary
secular
etc., derived from this
political life, rule of law, university education
This
period requires some reflection on their origins. Further, many of

these institutions
have for most part catered to the elite sections
of our
the reach of the masses.

society and have been beyond
shown
have
their
the
Moreover,
they
insensitivity to accommodate
in
others
a
substantive
these
'others'
are
those
underprivileged
way:
marginalized
by race, caste, class, gender and even the empire.
Further, the current period is marked by an increasing North/
South divide consisting
of an international
of labour that
division
the economic exploitation, wars and insecurity in the non
encourages
western world where those marginalized
by gender, caste and class
fall a prey
to this logic
of exploitation.
The
international
division
of labour
to the
paradoxically
appeals
freedom
of
as the
negative
personhood
harkened by nineteenth century European
colonization.
It is precisely its indifference
of abstract
very principle
freedom from constraint,
for
modernity responsible
to vulnerability
of human
the
axes
of
and
or
that
class
caste
makes
beings
gender
along
it so powerful.
the
for
Consequently,
scope
suspecting
modernity
as responsible
for the ills of humanity has increased in the twenty-first
century. In short, the difficult questions
confronting a postcolonial
situated
society are as follows: Can one equate modernity with westernization

and hold it responsible
for our ills? Or can one reconstruct it in a
concrete way so that its promise of freedom does not turn into a
for most people? This predicament
is explored
on gender issues in the Indian context.
nightmare
emphasis
with special
I
Internal
Modernity
in Europe1
One could briefly characterize modernity as the belief in the autonomy

of the individual
who is skeptical
about the claims of traditional
Immanuel
Kant
characterizes
as the maturity
enlightenment
authority.
The modern age

by a person who reasons autonomously.
lines
in rooting all
these
of
consisted
along
autonomy
attained
modelled
culture, morality and institutions in the freedom of the

knowledge,
rather
than tradition. The spirit of modernity maintains
individual,
that instead of upholding
truth on the basis of heritage, one should
arrive at truth through reasoned
critical reflection and examined
of the subject
commitment
to the sovereignty
Modernity's
in
all
enshrined
of
western
practically
aspects
society by the
nineteenth century. At the cultural level modernity led to the for
evidence.
was
of what
mation
has called three distinct spheres

Jrgen Habermas
experience: science, morality and art. Societal modernization
in economics
and admin
efficient systems of specialists
of human
produced
istrative politics who pursued the goals of money and power leading
to the growth of instrumental rationality (1996a). Although large parts
of the world have acquired
modern institutions today the process
of modernization
the apex
has not been
uniform.
of modernity in the nineteenth

while the non-western
world
process,
institutions
The western
reached
an internal
century through
had a painful transition
an external
of freedom
world
of colonization
to
through
process
countries.
by European
The late sixteenth century initiated a gradual process of internal
in Europe calling the authority of tradition into question
modernization
and replaced
it by reason
and freedom.
sciences,
Experimental
194
/ Indian
Literature
: 209
and political life took a new turn

literature, economic
philosophy,
in locating themselves
from the sixteenth century onwards
within
the framework of human freedom. Humanism
was indeed the spirit
of this outlook
that was concretely expressed

in institutional
forms
in the following
way:
1.
An economic
order based on the principle of accumulation
of
wealth rather than inheritance.
2.
A democratic
of free choice
3.
4.
and secular
political
order founded
of citizens.
A social order where the right to form associations

was accorded
primacy.
on principles
in civil society
A nuclear
family grounded for most part in consensual

marriage
as the basis of civil society.
Yet one of the biggest pitfalls of modernity at this point was
its patriarchal attitude where it treated only men as free citizens and
excluded
women from subjectivity. Women were seen as the property

of men, they neither had the right to vote nor the right to associate
instead of being
freely in the public space of civil society. Moreover,
subjects, they were the objects of scientific inquiry. In this denial
of citizenship
and rights they were confined to the private space of
domestic life ordained as their natural condition. Yet such patriarchal
relations were not allowed
to complacently
continue as nineteenth
century English
Mill championed
such as Harriet
philosophers
the emancipation
of women
Taylor and John Stuart

from the point of view
the education
of women
of the well-being of mankind. They favoured

and even granted them the right to suffrage to bring about a qualitative
in the British civilization.
Yet their philosophical
treat
improvement
ment
of the gender issue contained

some patriarchal
assumptions.
Mill and Taylor believed that women required education
and voting
to
become
better
for
men.
also
confined
rights
companions
They
women to their domestic sphere as the natural realm, but permitted
them the right to cultivate their talents. In addition, they spoke on

of the middle class European
woman who could keep maids,
and universalized
her problems. In this they overlooked
the 'others'
behalf
who
served
her within the nation. Yet these philosophers

are im
in
far
so
as they initiated the problem of subjugation
of women.
portant
The writings of Mill and Taylor spurred a series of gender reforms,
which are important for initiating the woman's
question, but prob
not unlike
lematic for their underlying
patriarchal
assumptions
the approach
of these utilitarian philosophers
to the woman's
ques
tion.
The
modernity
awareness
and
of an
the exclusion
between
the ideals
of
inconsistency
of women
was rectified in the form
Kanchana
Mahadevan
/ 195
reforms in England
mary Hennessy and Rajeshwari
of the patriarchal assumptions
during the nineteenth century. Rose

Mohan offer a very interesting analysis
underlying nineteenth century British
of various
in the private sphere

reforms (1993).2 The English state intervened
of the family in response to the demands of women and developments
inheritance
to
from landed
such as the transition of the economy
capital. For instance, The Married Women's Property Act,

money-based
(1882) reformed the condition of women who were required to forfeit
after marriage by
and their property to their husbands
them to retain their property even after marriage. Such state
landed
inheritance
within a family
were possible
because
themselves
allowing
reforms
ceased
class
basis of economic
to be the exclusive
force included
work
included
talent
and
both
education
men
rather
and
relations.
women
than
The new middle
whose
inheritance.
expertise
The new
reforms gave women property rights but under strict male protection.
even
Further, single women's
rights were severely curtailed because
not
enter
had
to
could
a
right
property they
though they legally
the same. Thus,
into male bastions in the public sphere to accumulate
their
The Married Women's Property Act, did grant women
although
them
it
did
not
to
legal personhood.
earnings,
give
right
separate
The state emerged as the protector of women who legally were the
until
a legal status which continued
of their husbands,
properties
1928 when women voted for the first time. If the married women's
life and gave her legal protection in the

the woman's
the
Law Amendment Act (1885) changed
The
Criminal
sphere,
act regulated
private
age of consent
for girls from 13 to 16 to protect them from sexual

about
The
offenders.
by discourses
passing of this act was preceded
the threats from rich, foreign procurers to poor English girls. Thus,
the state exercised control over single working women who entered
industries and
by developing
public places to take up jobs produced
so forth by treating them as a sexual commodity whose consumption
can be reasonably
justified from the point of view of an age-limit.
the view of a woman
Both these acts despite their merits legitimized
women
in the private sphere.
ornament
a domestic
(Married
forfeited their right to consent and offenders under 23 could get away
with child prostitution if the girl was over 16.) Rosemary
Hennessy
Mohan rightly observe that the two acts should be
and Rajeshwari
as
taken as complimenting
than in isolation makes
rather
"Seeing them in adjacency
of woman's
the mutual determination
owner and as sexualizea
subject outside
one another
visible
position as married property

the home. Taken together, they comprise two sides of the same coin
control under capitalism."(473)
of patriarchal
Thus, women became
that made
advance
of
with
the
of
capitalism
legal protection
objects
196
/ Indian
Literature
: 209
for them to take up previously

it possible
prohibited
occupations.
But we need to investigate the relation between gender questions
in a modernized
that were articulated
society such as Britain and
its colony India. This because

just as gender played a crucial role
in
in the march of capital, it simultaneously
became
significant
in the colonies.
the empire and forces of nationalism
cementing
II
The
Indian
Context
of Colonial
Modernity
from a colonial context is how "...the

The point worth investigating
on the shift to
of the tertiary sector in Britain depended
emergence
of production
and exploitable
labour no longer viable
in the metropole"
and
Mohan).
(Hennessy
Gayatri Spivak has rightly
that although
a lot of attention has been paid to how
observed
the colonies
on education
the colonized
minutes
(1835) produced
Macauley's
of
attention has been given to the codification
subject, not enough
the Hindu
law that established
a system of brahminical
Sanskrit
the British system (77). The latter has contributed
studies alongside
to the production
of a homogeneous
colonial subject in a gendered
context by excluding the peasants, tribals and so forth an exclusion
that has persisted to this day in a very violent form. The prime task
India was of course to further the colonial
of representing
empire,
but as feaid has

was
in his Orientalism this

so perceptively
documented
and history.
also done through the control of knowledge
Colonization
the
raw
and labour to
material
cheap
provided
possible both industrial life and markets that women entered

in the nineteenth century England. Thinkers as diverse as Hegel and
Rosa Luxembourg
have observed
that modernity, which develops
make
the accumulative
societies
principle of wealth, colonized
premodern
in search of raw materials
and
Africa and Latin America
3
labour.
and
so
forth
were
Laws,
education,
cheap
bureaucracy
in colonies
introduced
to maintain
them. Thus, the
subsequently
in Asia,
possibility
patriarchal
connection
was
of women's
equality (which is important despite its strong

in England
overtones)
depended
upon the empire. The
clearer when we see how the woman's
becomes
question
articulated
in India
The encroachment
in the mid-seventeenth
in the context
of colonial
modernity.
of the British empire into India which began
in the nineteenth
century was consolidated
were foregrounded
in
century. During this period gender questions
the battle between orientalists, utilitarians and, nationalists.
Explicit
of women were initiated both by
legal and cultural representations
the British
rulers
and
the nationalists.
Feminists
Kanchana
such
as
Pandita
Mahadevan
/ 197
Ramabai
the patriarchal
(who was also a nationalist)
questioned
of
A
their
at
the
social
scenario
aspects
representation.
glance
during
this period reveals a society trapped between tradition and modernity.
Many traditional evils haunted Indian women which were of a cast
specific nature. Upper caste women faced problems such as ostracization
and domesticity.
of widows
Lower caste women
who performed
caste-based
which
occupations,
were
involved
intensive
and
manual
so on.
labour
washerwomen
potters, sweepers,
Many of
in subsistence
crafts such as the making of poultry,
engaged
and food products.
All these jobs used local material, crude
and were unspecialized,
and with the introduction
of modern
and
them
milk,
tools
trans
to
mechanization,
port system, capital
men. Consequently,
women were confined to the
many lower-caste
sectors of domestic
service and agriculture
or were even driven to
these
were
transferred
prostitution because this transitional stage did not uproot caste totally
to permit occupational
it was
mobility to the lower castes. Moreover
men for most part who moved to the urban areas in search of jobs,
in the village to look after home and
leaving behind their spouses
children
under
very insecure
slowly gave way to a colony
as the public/private
divide:
Traditional
family conditions.
society
with some modern dimensions
such
the state and the family, the secular

law governing crime and business and personal law based on religion
civic life where women
domestic
matters, an economic,
governing
had a marginal presence and a domestic sphere where women were
as the property of men.
The forging of an ideal femininity or Indian womanhood
contestation
of patriarchy took place in a society that retained
of its traditional problems despite undergoing
major changes.4
defined
and
many
Susie
and K. Lalitha rightly observe..."we

find all the grand abstrac
tions of the times Empire, Human Nature, Ethical Responsibility,
each with important
Tradition, Nationalism,
Indianness,
Masculinity,
in
unfamiliar mirror
the
stakes in the woman's
question
imaged
Tharu
For gender, as we shall see, was far

of these changing subjectivities.
the
from being marginal to
new world. It had a major role to play
in the structuring of a whole range of social institutions and practices.
authorial
can,
selves, nor the readers
they address,
female.
in
mode
or
as
be
of
an
ahistoric
therefore,
primordially
thought
from the specific
Their self-hood or subjectivity cannot be separated
the
Neither
historical
and political conjunctures that constituted their world."(153)

the
and proscribed
and orthodox
religion prescribed
Colonization
there were
Among the British colonizei
the
India
which
their
two approaches
to
gender analysis:
shaped
and
H.T.Colebrooke
Orientalists
such as Max Muller
(1823-1900),
limits
198
for Indian
/ Indian
women.
Literature
: 209
William
Jones (1746-1794) picked up ancient sacred texts and defined

India as having a golden age in the past in brahminical and Sanskritized
Said has documented
this process
of constructing
epoch (Edward
the colonies by the West as its Other in his Orientalism)
who glossed
over the past because
often
relied
Brahmin
upon indigenous
they
condition
pandits. Max Muller did not explicitly write on the woman's
of the past, but his research served as the backdrop for Mrs Speir(1856)
and Ciarisse
Bader (1867)to make observations
(of the golden
age
the
The
as conducive
to
orientalists consolidated
well-being of women.
the view
that the Vedas and the Upanishads

represent the essence
of everything Indian and their contribution was intended to give the
natives a sense of their own heritage. They celebrated
so-called
the
Indian
womanhood
sati was
that prevailed
act of supreme
a spiritual
of the Faithful
the duties
Indian
Hindu
in the golden era by claiming that

sacrifice. Colebrooke's
piece "On
Widow"
served as the basis for
women
as burning on the pyre. Chakravarthi

stereotyping
"Colebrooke's
account
of sati highlighted an 'awesome'
writes,
aspect
of Indian womanhood,
of a barbaric
carrying both the associations
society and of the mystique of the Hindu woman who 'voluntarily'
and
the pyre of her husband."(31)

Their con
'cheerfully' mounted
tribution was "...the transformation
of the Hindu
golden
age into
an Aryan golden age wherein men were free, brave, vigorous, fearless,
themselves
civilized and civilizing others, noble and deeply spiritual;
and the women
were learned, free and highly cultured;
conjointly
they offer sacrifices
preferring
to the gods,
spiritual
and
listening sweetly to discourses,
to the pursuit of mere riches. Addi
upliftment
the best examples
of conjugal love, offering
tionally they represented
the supreme sacrifice of their lives as a demonstration
of their feeling
for their partners
An alternate
in the brief journey of life."(46)

of the Indian past can be seen in the
conception
attitudes of the utilitarians such as J.S.Mill and his father James Mill
Indian society as debased
who deplored
and in need of reforms that
only the British could provide. They argued for India's colonization
claiming that Indian society was barbaric which was especially testified
in the inferior condition
of Indian
as taking to sati and the

men. The connection between the gender
women
effeminacy of Indian
in England and the empire which sustained
is obvious
in the
of
Mill
the
who
wrote
the
J.S.
figure
philosopher
pioneering
essay
of Western
feminism
"On the Subjugation
of Women"
was in
his early years an officer with the East India Company.
In the latter
alleged
debate
some stern legal and other measures

capacity he also recommended
for reforming the allegedly poor condition of India. He also expressed
his pessimistic
views on the Indian population's
ability to govern
Kanchana
Mahadevan
/ 199
itself in philosophical
treatises. In this context, the project of empire
is
directed
to
the protection of Indian women whose status
building
was
to be inferior.
perceived
such as Raja Ram Mohan Roy and Swami Dayanand
Nationalists
Saraswati rebutted this utilitarian critique by internalizing the mindset
of the orientalists.
alien
rule
a nationalism
that could counter
They advocated
and
virtues such as vigour conquest
by promulgating
The rejuvenation
of Indian society was left to the women
expansion.
whose task it was
to produce the sons for the country. Vivekananda

asceticism and courage to the picture of Indian
went on to add
also
womanhood.
Indian
women
He argued that sati went against spiritual learning which

are capable
of and in India alone according
to him
women
men. The nationalists

religious duties alongside
performed
the shastras to suit a changing
that
society by claiming
sati
and
women
for
moksha
there is no vedic support for
are eligible
modified
undermining the popular belief in pativrata or devotion to the husband.

Women had to perform a more urgent task of courageously
defending
like
the nation like their predecessors
in the golden age. Feminists
Pandita
Ramabai
these
claims
about
Hindu
(1858-1922)
questioned
women.
pointed out that there was no golden age of Indian

and both Western and Indian societies were anti-woman.
Ramabai
womanhood,
She analyzed
three phases
Childhoodone
(a)
of Indian
suffering
womanhood:
and
overcoming
the curse
of in
fanticide.
(b)
(c)
and absence
of
ill-treatment
Lifechild-marriage,
as mothers but condemned
in other ways.
freedom, honoured
Widowhoodchild
widows and at stage seen as a retribution
Married
(d)
Unlike
for past crimes.

Satia
event.
sporadic
utilitarians
Ramabai
maintained
Indian
nation
is not due
to a degradation
it is because
of the subjugation
who have been in this condition
a subjugated
nation (against
strong women for nationhood
etc., that would
As Chakravarthi
riage
Indian
that the low
to any inherent
of a golden age. Rather
womanhood
status
of the
nor is it due
barbarism,
if Indian men are weak
mothers
especially
women produce
for years. Subjugated
like Tilak) and to create
nationalists
we need education,
freedom, remar
of Indian
women,
give them more freedom.

the above
observes,
regarding
controversy
as its focal point,
takes the high caste woman
either to glorify her as a role model or condemn her status as needing

reforms. One needs to add here that in both instances she is established
as an object of protection from either the colonial or nationalist point

to as the
of view. The very modern notion of nation is appealed
200
/ Indian
Literature
: 209
either women
telos of womanhood:
masters
were appealed
to as objects of
for their own project of empire
to them for fighting
appealed
protection by their colonial

or indigenous
nationalists
building
on behalf of a new nation. The stereotyping of femininity
colonization
were almost
ensured
that "...Indian
women
built up as super
a combination
of the spiritual Maitreyi, the learned Gargi,
women:
the suffering
Sita,
the faithful Savitri
and
the heroic
Lakshmibai"
(Chakravarthi,
79). Yet as this superwoman
fought for her nation,
her own others, namely, the washerwomen,
the domestic
servants,
the wet-nurses,
the lowercaste,
Muslims and Christian women were
in short the 'vedic dasi' was overlooked
in the homog
forgotten
enization
of Indian women
in the project of modern nationalism.
In this, the discourse
on sati that was abolished
by the British
in 1829, is very interesting. Gaya tri Spivak observes
that sati was
an exception,
and many a time when it did exist in Bengal it was
to
who had inheritance rights from exercising
prevent widows
only
them. Moreover, the term sati literally meant good wife, and the British
a "...greater ideological
constriction"
on Indian women by
imposed
it
with
at
the
self-immolation
husband's
funeral pyre. Thus,
equating
whether
in condemnation
free-will
of the women
or in praise of the supposed

courage and
who went to the pyre, an attempt was made
a sexed subaltern subject as an object of protection.

to produce
"It
is thus of much greater significance that there was no debate on this
fate of widowseither among the Hindus or between

non-exceptional
and the British - than that the exceptional
the Hindus
prescription
of self-immolation
was actively contended."
1993)
(Spivak,
In the twentieth
movement
to the nationalist
century, women contributed
through complex roles that straddled the frontiers of ideal
and free personhood.
The nineteenth century represen
femininity
tation of womanhood
India,
about
which
Indian
The
was not relinquished

even in post-Independence
still has to go a long way in deconstructing
its myths
womanhood.5
nation-state
definitions
is a modern
of nations
There are many

phenomenon.
that rival one another. But one can
scholarly
unravel three major features in nationalism:
or liberation
autonomy
from external constraints to pursue one's own ideas of freedom etc,
unity where internal divisions of race, caste and gender are dissolved
into a single historical territory and identity the people
identify
with their culture and territory by right c nd pass it on from generation
to generation.6
In this process women
occupy a peculiar
position:
on the one hand they are abstract citizens in the eyes of a law that
is quite formal and indifferent to their specific needs, on the other
Kanchana
Mahadevan
/ 201
in a distinct and substantive

their identity is evoked
way as
in
the
latter
the
nation.
The
essentializations
contained
of
preservers
hand
makes
to difference
it close
constructions
position
contradictory
relation to the nation.
Anthias
and
as
was
and
femininity
is still occupied
from
above.
by most women
five ways
delineate
(1994)
to nationhood:
is clear
discussed
the
This
in
in which
of ethnic collectivities
reproducers
of ethnic/national
of the boundaries
groups:
Reproducers
the
etc.
where
of
children
symbolic
proper way
having
identity of the group is reproduced.
1.
Biological
2.
3.
of ideology
Reproducers
As symbolic
4.
duction
Indian
women's
in national,
relation
in a colonial
dimensions
and
transmitters
of culture.
or repro
for the construction

representatives
of ethnic boundaries
As participants
5.
economic
traverses
to nationalism
context.
Since
and military struggles.
colonial
each
modernity
of these
with its
has not been particularly

sensitive,
gender
it totally as many postmodernists
one repudiate
suggest? In
case one would also* have to renounce the woman's
question
notion
of nationhood
should
which
as
otherness
Yuval-Davis
contribute
women
and
of British and Indian
well
since the
origins. Moreover,
in
in Britain were implicated
issues
century gender
matters
as
well.
have
to
be
forfeited
would
Clearly,
they
because
nineteenth
colonization
it too
has
colonial
are not so simple. Since one does not live in a perfect world nothing
and poststructuralist
from existentialist
is pure, as philosophers
Instead of looking for some unconditional
traditions have maintained.
as the solution to the dilemmas

point outside the sphere of colonization
it
and homogenization
of exploitation
poses, one has to work within
and plu
it to move towards an alternative that is both egalitarian
ralistic. The challenge confronting Indian society, is one of salvaging
the constructive
or the woman's
such as the free institutions

of phenomena
that have profane origins in imperialism.
question
comprehend
modernity as a dialectical phenomenon
aspects
Thus, one would

that is on the one
'
problematic
instead
hand
oppressive
of rejecting
but
is also
modernity
at the same
time
tout court.
Ill
New
Given
202
the context
/ Indian
of colonial
Literature
Directions
oppression,
a nationalism
that aspired
: 209
for self-determination
was
important.
The
forces
of cultural
nationalism
and
a
notwithstanding,
spawned
that brought divided and heterogeneous
people together
in a common project (who were unfortunately divided again through
the painful experience of Partition whose roots also lie in the policies
religious
movement
chauvinism
also
of the British empire).7 This movement

picked up the concept of the
modern nation and turned it around to apply it in the colonial context
at the expense of the empire. The rulers
to the subjects of imperialism
of the empire certainly did not visualize
the possibility of nationhood
of
to
the
the
leading
disintegration
empire! The British had confined
the term nation
to their own
terrains
unfit to have the status of nationhood.
and
considered
The national
their colonies
liberation movement
to come out in the open to participate

in
women
permitted
life.
from
various
caste
and
class
hierarchies
Further, people
political
worked side by side in public spaces during the freedom struggle
also
to the formation of civil society. A secular civil society is

leading
an important
antidote
to the duty oriented
caste and communal
hierarchies, and is also the basis of a democratic

political life. Since it was formed in tumultuous
will formation
times
efforts of the Indian
and
through the
be perceived
the civil society cannot

people,
a gift of the British rulers! These gains cannot be renounced
because
further constructively.
specially
they need to be developed
The tasks of nation-building
with the spirit of internationalism
are
as
along with the accomplished

yet to be completed,
and
an
of the democratic
parity
expansion
space
non-hierarchical
der
issues
otherness
and
where
goals of gender
of civil society in
and non-casteist directions. Thus, nationalism,
gen
civil society have to be sensitized
to the issue of
the voices
of those
and caste can be heard.
One
traditional
no
otherness
mould
raised
has
by colonial
marginalized
by class, religion
resort to revivalism
because
the
cannot
answers
for resolving
the question
of
to
revivalism
is
modernity. Turning
very
society such as India where there prevails
in a pluralistic
problematic
what Max Weber has termed as the polytheism
a blind espousal
of premodernism
Moreover,
conditions
of the 'others'
excluded
that a considerable
of gods and demons.

would jeopardize
the
by colonial modernity even further

in India is the
part of modernity
by ignoring
outcome
of the efforts of the Indian
masses.
about the
Questions
problems confronted, say, the dasi or the tribal woman, are questions
about social justice and freedom which certainly are modern ideals
which require the context of a modern civil society.
Yet one has
or gender issues
whose
identity
to recognize
have
has
that the nation-state

catered
unfortunately
been homogenized
or civil society
a
to
few
only
privileged
and imposed
the
upon
Kanchana
Mahadevan
/ 203
'others'.
Abstract nationhood's
indifference to otherness is very explicit

of the paradigmatic
Indian womanhood
off all difference in the form of occupations,
class and
in the case of the construction

who
closes
caste. The problem with the notion of abstract citizenship in a modern

nation state is precisely that it is insensitive to the limits that some
of society would have moved in reaching towards its abstract

In a parallel way the European
citizen was also insensitive
to its others in the colony. Despite
these very corrupt origins in
the notion of free citizenship can be retheorized
in ways
colonialism
sections
ideals.
that can take differences

and
into account.
non-essentialist
This would
of civil society
require a concrete
and nationhood
understanding
do not have an imagined
antiquated
past and
are never closed. There should be sensitivity towards
its boundaries
of race, caste and class and
those who are limited by circumstances
where
its members
gender running across these to exercise their freedom. Thus, the

would
have to be
from which freedom is exercised
circumstances
theorized, so that the obstacles that prevent underprivileged
subjects
In rethinking
from translating their rights into reality are addressed.
it in constructive
have to understand
the nation one would
ways
so that the political lives of concrete citizens are enhanced
whereby
they contribute to it and it contributes to them. The critique of abstract

and even diverse
ahistorical subjectivity made by many contemporary
can inform these
such as Jacques Derrida or Habermas
philosophers
A solution
to the problems
of colonial
modernity
to ask for more, rather than less, freedom! But the specific
A brief
have to change.
way in which freedom is tackled would
made
in
what
follows.
attempt to this effect is
of the modern
notion of
and reconstruction
The expansion
reconstructions.
will have
is an urgent task.
in the light of the colonial predicament
of freedom developed
modernity, namely
by European
and
in empire-building,
the freedom to own property, culminated
freedom
The
notion
the exhaustion
of the
of proclaiming
project of modernity. After all, the critique that one does level against
of some
is not that it is committed not to the supremacy
colonization
cannot
be affirmed as the basis
to the freedom of those

specific culture or group, it is committed
who have been excluded from decision-making
processes. One critiques
the violence underlying the exclusion of women and colonial subjects
or one critiques the
definitions of legal personhood,
from colonial
definitions
women from mainstream
of say peasant/tribal
in order to improve the status quo. One need not
of womanhood,
have a blueprint of a perfect society but one can still have the Utopian
Thus, the notion of freedom does not just mean the right
impulse.
to own property, or the standard
maintaining
negative conception
exclusion
204
/ Indian
Literature
: 209
the separation from obstacles to pursue one's goals of profit etc. Thus,
as Habermas
can also
puts it, "if the process of social modernization
be turned into other non-capitalist
directions, if the life-world can
institutions of its own in a way currently inhibited by the

develop
and administrative
of the economic
autonomous
system dynamics
the
Habermas
means
the realm of
life-world
(1996a)
By
system."
shared everyday life, which the economic and administrative
systems
One has to critique existing modernity in order to

conquered.
a
better
future for it. This critique is not done from some
envisage
or some perspective
the sphere of
outside
premodern
perspective
have
taken recourse to the principles

modernity, since it has paradoxically
in viewing
of modernity
themselves.
One could follow Habermas
are corrections
to make
modernity as an unfinished
projectthere
and promises
to keep. There is no absolute meaning attached to the
word
since words
do not have
absolute
meanings.
modernity,
and advanced
to a
Modernity
developed
through its commitment
individualistic
idea
of
freedom
as
the
individual's
to
own
very
right
property which relied upon the notion of instrumental
rationality
as an efficient means of securing goals. Consequently,
freedom pro
duced terror in the form of gratuitous
advancement,
technological
fascism, expert cultures and colonization.

Thus, the very antithesis
of democracy
in
the
colonial
and
even post-colonial
prevailed
epoch
and it still persists. But one need not constrain the term freedom
to this narrow definition, since the above critique of modernity
an
alternate
of freedom.
Structuralism
conception
reveals
and
in the
post-structuralism
among many other linguistic approaches
twentieth century have taught us that words do not have ontological
referents i.e. there is no ultimate
reality out there viz. colonial
which
to
alone
freedom
should refer. One can extricate
modernity,
the word
freedom
and
even
to rethink them in new ways.

or karmic order of necessity
from their impure origins

modernity
This is because there is no metaphysical
the emergence
of any phe
governing
in the universe.
The phenomenon
of modernity
is no
- its
and
its
further
are
to
some
exception
origins
development
degree
it
contingent. This contingency
opens up the promise of reshaping
in concrete ways. Words are not bound
to some ultimate context;
nomenon
nor are they bound to the intentions of a

cut across
speakerthey
contexts and subjectivities.
the
British
Thus, though
may not have
intended
the use of freedom
a
collective
as, say,
project in the
there is no ultimate law preventing the colonized
ex-colonies,
people
from transgressing
the British. Indeed, it is precisely through such
a transgression
that one can envisage
a radicalized
modernity in the
context.
Mahasveta
Devi's
contains
post-colonial
story "Draupadi"
Kanchana
Mahadevan
/ 205
some openings in this direction by poignantly revealing how a concept

can be put to use in ways that have been unintended
by its origin.
is
a
character
from
the
traditional
"Draupadi"
myth Mahabharata.
She is the wife of five Pandavas
recognition
in a game
with the Kauravas.
who
are fighting for their land and

lose
They
everything to the Kauravas
their wife Draupadi.
She is brought
of dice, including
into the public court and disrobed to humiliate the Pandavas
further.
Yet she is constantly redraped by an infinite quantity of yarn so that
her oppressors
are forced to give up. Divine providence(or
Krishna)
comes to the rescue of Draupadi.
The key themes quite painfully
as the property of men the

us of the gender: the woman
as having her rightful position in private space so that her
target of humiliation
visibility in public space makes a vulnerable
and further that a chaste woman will always be protected by Divine
remind
woman
Providence.
belonged
Draupadi
in premodern
India
Let us see what happens
of women
lines.
the fortune of caste

century rewriting
of a poor, Santhal
the tribal dialect)
taken to custody
extract
and
class
to the Kshatriya caste and chastity

often established
through caste
was
who does
to a Draupadi
Devi's
privilege. Mahasveta
of the same
not have
twentieth
into relief the situation
story brings
in
tribal woman
(pronounced
Draupadi
Dopdi
whose husband
is killed by the police before bing
her to
for naxalite activities. The police gang-rape
information
about
the whereabouts
of her tribe which
she
refuses
to divulge. Further when she is ordered to wear her clothes

she refuses to do so, saying that she cannot be clothed and unclothed
tribal name
as per the wishes of the police officer. Draupadiher
not saved by Divine Providence
which did not consider
is Dopdiwas
and
tribal women
untouchable
women
to be chaste!
She
was
also
to this type of assault because

being a poor tribal
in
a
sacred
class
she
could
not
lock
herself
woman,
private spherea
divide
the
by
public
private
privilege. She was forced to straddle
in public matters. Moreover,
her victimizers,
her active involvement
the policemen,
treated her as a piece of property. And sinc Draupadi
more
vulnerable
order of karma to protect

any body or any providential
her, she had to evolve her mode of resistance in refusing the mainstream
definition of chastity and fear by asserting her wounded
body as
did not have
a strong dignified being to contend with. In

the appellation
of shame and fear
dissociates
to a rape
to the woman's
body, especially
an
site
of
the
empowered
reconstructing
body,
this refusal, Draupadi

that is always attached
victim.
We
that enables
see
in the
the woman
the rejection of the body as an object of consumption

a property that can be abused.8
a parallel from the Indian judicial
Consider
system, which
to act and
206
/ Indian
Literature
: 209
or
in
some
ways
Deol Bajaj,
harassment
is deeply
an Indian
in caste, class and gender. Rupan

Administrative
Officer, got redress for sexual
entrenched
Indian Police Service Officer. This is

by a subordinate
an achievement,
the
judgement
yet
tellingly highlights her
class status by maintaining
that given her high class background,
Ms. Bajaj could have behaved in a way as to elicit immodest behaviour
no doubt
from men. The judgement

in the Bhanwari
in
an
inexorable
manner.
Ms. Devi,
logic
marriage, could
caste opponents
Devi
case
an activist
continues
against
this
child
not get justice for vindictive

due to her caste and class
gang-rape by her upper

status. The Jaipur High
Court judgement
so
far
to
that higher caste men
as
goes
proclaim
can never molest lower caste women!9 Ms. Devi's
own testimony
of the humiliation
she had
to undergo to register a case against her

offenders tragically shows the condition of the 'Dopdis'
of India. The
of
in
evoked
both
the
cases
is
the
image
femininity
superwoman
Ms. Bajaj got justice by having the

by Uma Chakravarthi:
fortune to be included in the stereotype, Ms. Devi was excluded
from
described
the stereotype and denied justice. Premodern

hierarchy's
into modern institutions is often a source of disadvantage
sections of Indian society.
In order
context
to rethink
one would
have
freedom
to delink
intrusion
for many
and modernity in a postcolonial

these terms from their formalism
whereby they endorse any point of view whatsoever

thereby denying
access to those occupying
a marginalized
position in society. Con
and freedom in ways that take the
necting gender, embodiment
of the underclasses
in India is an urgent necessity. As
in the lives of tribal Draupadis
and Bhanwari Devi reveal,
the premodern
era was hardly one of openness
to women's
sexuality
experiences
its vestiges
and
so forth. Tharu
and
Lalitha's
as embodying
Muddupalani
sexuality which was curbed
generalization
of the courtesan
an open-mindedness
towards
by British law oversimplifies
women's
the mat
It is quite apparent that women do not form a homogeneous

category. There are differences among women which are the outcome
of their participation
in other axes like race, class, caste and nation.
has
to
Gender
be historicized to comprehend
these differences instead
ter(l-9).
of being
women's
treated
as
an
abstract
in India
of
Thus, the regulation
category.
the
British.
But
the
woman
predates
sexuality
emerges during the British period as a case of what Spivak calls "white
men saving brown women from brown men"(101).
British
Conversely,
women were also viewed as protection cases by gender laws enacted
in Britain during approximately

the same period. The possibility of
a critique of the limitations of colonial modernity and its complicity
with pre-modern
hierarchical
structures is made possible
through
Kanchana
Mahadevan
/ 207
in turn presupposes
language.
Language
fluid terms that can be used in diverse
relations and
intersubjective
contains
contexts. Dialogue
for extricating modernity from the context of coloni

the openings
and Horkheimer
have
zation to explore and rethink what Adorno
called its promises. Articulating the point of view of the others, such
as Dopdi, marginalized
from the project of constructive nationalism,
with them and

equality and civil society involves dialoguing
of
listening to them. For one cannot revert back to the outlook
gender
an
imposing
century colonial
modernity
by externally
restruc
and
first
towards
on
the
others.
The
contesting
step
identity
turing colonial modernity entails making the effort towards linguistic
nineteenth
activity of dialogue
The challenge
with
the excluded
others.
provided by colonial modernity is that one needs

to take differences amongst human beings seriously while reconstruct
have to be
of freedom would
ing freedom. Clearly atomic models
rejected in favour of collective ones that are sensitive to otherness.
such
In this context one could examine the writings of philosophers
the crisis
who have diagnosed
and Habermas
as Adorno, Horkheimer
of modernity
modernization
in the
and have labelled

capitalist
Since these
of the enlightenment."
western
in an exclusive
context, their
western
as the "dark
context
side
have written
philosophers
writings are silent on the issue of colonization.
This is where
perhaps
can step in to write their own philosophy
by seeing the relation
in India and the basic principles
between the history of modernization
and
Horkheimer
What
of capitalist/colonial
Adorno,
modernity.
Indians
of modernity
the paradoxical
position
human
of
beings from
liberating
instilling
in
India.
is very starkly visible
obscure forces and dogmas
Hence,
task of
as the children of colonial modernity, we have the arduous
freedom
of
the
side"
modernity by looking upon
"bright
developing
as an ongoing task rather than an accomplished
project, where modern
excluded
to
the
'others'
freedom can entail openness
by colonial
Habermas
have
labelled
terror and
as
fear instead
modernity.
A focus
on abstract individual
rights for all citizens is quite
of
the
from
view, since it does not take
point
gendered
problematic
Yet to
and situation of women.
into account the specific problems
women or Indian women as a uniform category cannot
homogenize
be the basis of their freedom, since they depend upon what Habermas
422). Women can exer

classifications"(1996b,
"overgeneralized
cise their individual
autonomy in both the private and public spheres
exist in all spheres.
and equality
of
if
conditions
solidarity
only
would consist in
Further, an integral aspect of exercising autonomy
if the situation
distinction
the
women
public
private
contesting
calls
208
/ Indian
Literature
: 209
had to suffer indignities

it. After all Dopdi
only because
the two spheres, since as a woman
between
of strict demarcation
to occupy only the private sphere, her being seen
she was supposed
demands
in public space made her a vulnerable

target for assault. Rajeshwari
in urban
Sunder Rajan has observed how the practice of eve-teasing
naked women (an oppression
inflicted on Dalit
areas and parading
in the rural areas reflect the patriarchal

that
women)
assumption
men have the license to abuse women who are seen in public places
for making women
to them. An assumption
responsible
prescribed
objects of protection; clearly what is lost in all this, which even Spivak
to modernity,
is not prepared to concede for fear of making concessions
This
of
women
as
free
issue
needs to
is the undermining
subjects.
be theorized in a detailed way by rethinking the very modern notion
of freedom
in contexts
Habermas
to some
of exclusions.
rightly argues that even though women have gained
with the modern notion of abstract freedom and
degree
equality, the biggest challenge of differences among women has not
As he argues, "What is meant to promote the equal
been addressed.
status of women in general often benefits only one category of (already
at the cost of another
because
women
category,
privileged)
are correlated in a complex and obscure
inequalities
gender-specific
manner with membership
in other underprivileged
(social
groups
If the basic
class, age, ethnicity, sexual orientation,
etc.) (1996b)."
premise of feminist theory and struggle is that in a society controlled
by men one cannot arrive at equality between
the power to frame laws etc., that are sensitive
Liberals
sexes, women require

to their disadvantages.
the relation between freedom

like Mill have not investigated
and circumstance
in their abstract conception of liberty as the freedom
to own property. Hence, in the name of gender there were only
cosmetic changes that included women into the category of abstract
liberty. The notion of abstract liberty itself needs to be renounced
since it generates
hierarchical
relations available
to the elite. Now
if the notion of circumstances
of freedom is extended
to the issue
on
a
of
of privilege
women
based
essentialization
among
critique
are affected by a law should have the opportunity
to it in this case underpriviledged
women. Freedom
is thus not individual
freedom
to
atomic
pursue profit, its exercise
then all those
to contribute
in a public world gives it an intersubjective

or collective
character.
Further, freedom also implies the ability to construe one's life projects
and so forth. In the Indian context, since tribal, peasant
and Dalit
women are often marginalized
from discussions
of gender-sensitive
would have
rights, a public discussion
towards
their
concerns
step
articulating
manner.
As
stereotypes
to be generated
as the first
in a free
disadvantages
defined
observes,
gender
"Institutionally
must not be assumed without question. Today these social
and
Habermas
Kanchana
Mahadevan
/ 209
constructions
can be formed only in a conscious,

deliberate
fashion;
to conduct public dis
they require the affected parties themselves
in which they articulate the standards
courses
of comparison
and
the
relevant
425).
aspects."(1996b,
justify
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
I am indebted to Richard Winfield for the terms 'internal' and 'external

modernity'.
These changes are discussed in Offen (2000)
Also see Winfield (1998) for a discussion of this problem.
The historical discussion of this issue is based on Banerjee(1989)
Chakravarthi(1989).
See Tharu and Lalitha (1993) for a discussion of the same. A very
interesting analysis of this point in its relation to metaphysical issues
is made by Verma (1993).
This point is derived from Hutchinson and Smith (1994).
Habib (1997) gives an overview of these developments.
Sunder Rajan(2000) makes a somewhat analogous point in her detailed
account of Draupadi.
I am indebted to Hutokshi Rustomfram for providing access to
information on these court judgments.
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Colonial Modernity A Critique

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Colonial Modernity A Critique

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Sahitya Akademi

Colonial Modernity: A Critique

The point is rather that the Enlightenment must examine

Between patriarchy and imperialism...the

period requires some reflection on their origins. Further, many of

the reach of the masses.

society are as follows: Can one equate modernity with westernization

One could briefly characterize modernity as the belief in the autonomy

The modern age

culture, morality and institutions in the freedom of the

has called three distinct spheres

has not been

of modernity in the nineteenth

and political life took a new turn

that was concretely expressed

A social order where the right to form associations

family grounded for most part in consensual

women from subjectivity. Women were seen as the property

Taylor and John Stuart

of the well-being of mankind. They favoured

of the gender issue contained

them the right to cultivate their talents. In addition, they spoke on

her within the nation. Yet these philosophers

during the nineteenth century. Rose

in the private sphere

capital. For instance, The Married Women's Property Act,

The new middle

life and gave her legal protection in the

for girls from 13 to 16 to protect them from sexual

position as married property

for them to take up previously

its colony India. This because

from a colonial context is how "...the

but as feaid has

in his Orientalism this

possible both industrial life and markets that women entered

equality (which is important despite its strong

the state and the family, the secular

and K. Lalitha rightly observe..."we

For gender, as we shall see, was far

and political conjunctures that constituted their world."(153)

Jones (1746-1794) picked up ancient sacred texts and defined

that the Vedas and the Upanishads

in the golden era by claiming that

as burning on the pyre. Chakravarthi

the pyre of her husband."(31)

in the brief journey of life."(46)

as taking to sati and the

some stern legal and other measures

to produce the sons for the country. Vivekananda

He argued that sati went against spiritual learning which

men. The nationalists

undermining the popular belief in pativrata or devotion to the husband.

pointed out that there was no golden age of Indian

for past crimes.

that the low

give them more freedom.

either to glorify her as a role model or condemn her status as needing

as an object of protection from either the colonial or nationalist point

protection by their colonial

the faithful Savitri

or in praise of the supposed

a sexed subaltern subject as an object of protection.