This issue of Arachne includes the presentations of a group
of colleagues who were invited to Rutgers on February 23, 2001 to
participate in a one-day roundtable on Colonial studies. The main
purpose of this conference was to rethink the place of Colonial
studies at Rutgers, as well as within the college curriculum. We
invited three colleagues from other institutions--Rolena Adorno
(Yale), Margo Glantz (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México),
and Kathleen Ross (New York University)--and two of our own colleagues--Herman
Bennett (History) and César Braga-Pinto (Spanish and Portuguese).
We focused our discussion on the status of the field and on ways
to foster interdisciplinary collaboration to promote Colonial studies
at Rutgers.
Colonial studies is currently a complex field that
incorporates historical, sociological, anthropological, and literary
approaches. The degree of collaboration that exists between these
disciplines is variable and unstable. The way in which geographical
demarcations of this field are defined tends to follow a national
paradigm, instead of exploring other points of contact that respond
better to the internal structure of the colonial system as it was
established in Europe, Africa, and the Americas. On the other hand,
the colonial condition can also be defined from a temporal, geographical,
or contextual perspective. There are many contradictions that arise
from the fact that some scholars define the colonial as a homogeneous
period encompassing three hundred years, without recognizing internal
differences in the social and political contexts of the colonies
in the Americas. Therefore, colonial subjects and discourses are
conceived as ahistorical categories. Furthermore, regional differences
could account for the unequal process in the constitution of Creole
or colonial voices in the Caribbean and the Americas.
The purpose of this roundtable was to rethink the
place of Colonial studies within academic institutions. Our point
of departure was the recent proposal to establish programs of transatlantic
relations to question the way in which the field can be reconfigured
in order to enlighten our understanding of this period and its cultural
productions. The speakers were invited to explore some of the following
questions: How can we combine historical, anthropological, and literary
analysis to consider the constitution of a colonial subjectivity
in Europe and the Americas? Can colonialism be defined as a common
social structure in which a certain kind of discourse is produced?
How can we propose comparative studies on transatlantic cultural
relations that do not replicate Eurocentric models of understanding
the colonial subjects? How can we incorporate European, American,
Brazilian, and Hispanic cultural productions into our understanding
of Colonial studies as a field? How can we transcend national paradigms
in order to foster comparative studies that reestablish the internal
contacts between metropolitan centers and colonial territories?
In this issue we include the interventions of Adorno, Ross, Glantz,
and Braga-Pinto. In "Estevanico's Legacy: Rethinking Colonial
Latin American Studies from Postcolonial Africa," Adorno redefines
colonial Latin American studies "along broadly cross-Atlantic
lines," by juxtaposing "the insights from postcolonial
theory, particularly Africa, to the monuments of colonial Latin
American letters." As an example, Adorno discusses the way
in which Albert Memmi's The Colonizer and the Colonized illuminates
the reading of colonial texts and postcolonial theory in her undergraduate
courses.
On the other hand, Kathleen Ross's essay, entitled "Rethinking
Colonial Poetry in an Atlantic Studies Context," explores the
limited attention devoted to the study of poetry. Ross begins her
reflection by asking general questions about the status of the field:
"Why have we not written as much on colonial poetry as we have
on colonial narrative forms? What could move more of us to engage
colonial poetry with passion and critical rigor?" After assessing
the difficulties of reading and interpreting poetry, compared to
the ease with which we approach narrative, Ross reviews and comments
some of the most recent studies on epic poetry and popular poetry
of the eighteenth century that contribute to the redefinition of
the field and its objects of study.
The next essay, "El jeroglífico del sentimiento: la
poesía amorosa de Sor Juana" by Margo Glantz, analyzes
the rhetorical paradox present in Sor Juana's poetry as she opposes
the expression of passion and the artistic tradition of courtly
love. Glantz explores in her essay the following questions: "How
can one escape from that vicious circle set in stone by tradition,
rhetoric, courtly decorum and the difficulty of inventing a new
language of love? How can one transcend the limits of language in
order to express the inexpressible?" She provides some answers
to these questions by examining two metaphorical chains in Sor Juana's
poetry: the heart as tears and the broken heart as expressed in
its blood.
Finally, César Braga-Pinto's essay, "Brasil 500 anos:
An Incredible Miscegenation in the Park," closes our issue
with a critical commentary of the ways in which Brazilians conceived
the 1992 commemoration of the Quincentennial as an opportunity to
rediscover Brazil. After reviewing some of the few publications
on Colonial studies released in Brazil between 1992 and 1998, Braga-Pinto
describes and comments the "Mostra do Re-descobrimento,"
an exhibit that intended to show "a trajectory of 30,000 years
of history-of Brazilian history!" Braga-Pinto compares the
exhibit's intention of representing a harmonious "mestizo"
society with some of the "cracks" of that homogenizing
discourse as reflected on various incidents in which Indigenous
and other subaltern groups reminded the state and its intellectuals
about their constant marginalization and exclusion from Brazilian
social, cultural, and political life.
These presentations, along with the dialogue that followed the
roundtable during the afternoon session, included some interesting
suggestions to find new ways to incorporate Colonial studies into
our undergraduate and graduate curricula. I would like to mention
a few of them, to encourage the continuation of an interesting debate
that could very well redefine some of the main areas of inquiry
within Colonial studies. Ross pointed out the need to place colonial
discourse historically and geographically to acknowledge unequal
temporal developments in the colonial world of the Americas. On
the other hand, Adorno expressed her concerns about the ways in
which postcolonial theory can enlighten our understanding of the
colonial condition in Latin America. There seemed to be a consensus
among the participants in the understanding of Postcolonial theory
following Ashcroft, et. al.'s observation: "'Post-colonial'
as we define it does not mean 'post-independence,' or 'after colonialism,'
for this would be to falsely ascribe an end to the colonial process.
Post-colonialism, rather, begins from the very first moment of colonial
contact. It is the discourse of oppositionality which colonialism
brings into being" (117). Glantz pointed out the importance
of addressing the differences between the debates on Colonial studies
as they are conceived in the United States and in many Latin American
universities. The lack of real dialogue between institutions, scholars
and/or theoretical productions recreates a colonial condition that
limits the development of the field not only as an interdisciplinary,
but also as an international--and also transnational--intellectual
endeavor.
Herman Bennett's interventions were quite stimulating, as he presented
some concerns that were significant for the redefinition of our
common field of study. His essay, "Seventeenth-Century New
Spain: A Slave Society," emphasized the need to broaden our
critical inquiry of race and ethnicity in the colonial world
.
During his presentation Bennett pointed out that there are many
volumes on slavery and race relations still waiting to be studied
at the Archivo General de la Nación in México. He
also questioned the use of the term "Colonial" to define
our field of studies as well as the subjectivities involved in almost
three hundred years in the history of the Americas. He proposed
the use of "Early Modern," to allow for the inclusion
of other experiences and subjectivities--those that transcended
the traditional opposition between a metropolis and a colony due
to their voluntary or involuntary displacements between Africa,
Europe, and the Americas. This idea prompted an interesting dialogue
on the meanings associated with the word "colonial," and
the ways in which it incorporates the unequal relationship of power
that characterized the definition of the Colonial world. Bennett's
historical approach, on the other hand, brought forward the relationship
of this imperial order with modernity. By examining the different
ways in which we conceive and "name" our own discipline
of study, we also considered the importance of interdisciplinary
approaches as a defining trait of our research and academic projects.
Braga-Pinto posed another interesting debate when he invited us
to rethink Colonial studies not as a temporal category, but as an
interdisciplinary field of research similar to Ethnic, Gender, Queer
or Diaspora studies. He pointed out that "this field would
be concerned with issues of colonialism and decolonization across
temporal and geographical divides." At the same time, Braga-Pinto
argued that what could link Colonial studies with Gender and Ethnic
studies would be the similar, contestatory nature of the fields,
and not their object of study.
I would like to conclude this introduction by returning to an idea
suggested in the title of this issue of Arachne. By proposing
a "Colonial Atlantic," this issue wishes to focus on the
development of an Atlantic empire, as a "transcultural, international
formation" (4) which follows Paul Gilroy's provocative study,
The Black Atlantic. This broad geographical, social, and
political view would allow us to reconnect the Americas with Europe
and Africa, and to study the colonial, or early modern period, as
a transnational field of inquiry that should not be conceived as
pre-national or postnational, but as an international network of
ethnic, racial, political, cultural, and economic interactions.
This kind of approach constitutes a field of study that breaks with
national paradigms in order to explore those experiences that took
place long before and during the configuration of modern nations
as we know them today. A "Colonial Atlantic" could also
promote an interesting dialogue to consider the relationship between
Latin American Colonial studies and programs of Transatlantic studies
currently being organized in English and Comparative Literature
departments. Finally, this broad definition of the field also makes
evident the fact that we need to foster more internal dialogues
among university programs and departments to encourage the development
of interdisciplinary initiatives and to revitalize Colonial studies
here at Rutgers as well as in other academic and research institutions.
We hope this special issue of Arachne can be a contribution
toward the reconceptualization of such a vibrant field of study.
Notes
1 Bennett's essay will be included in his forthcoming book entitled
Slaves & Subjects: Iberian Expansion, Christian Colonialism
and New Spain's African Diaspora, 1450-1650.
Works cited
Ashcroft, Bill, et. al. "Introduction." Postmodernism
and Postcolonialism. The Postcolonial Studies Reader. London
and New York: Routledge, 1995. 117-118.
Gilroy, Paul. The Black Atlantic. Modernity and Double Consciousness.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press