Rethinking the subaltern and the question of censorship in Gramsci's prison notebooks

Postcolonial Studies

Volumn 14, Issue 4, 2011, Pages 387-404

  Green, Marcus E ^a  

^a OTTERBEIN UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 84855570782     PISSN: 13688790     EISSN: 14661888     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/13688790.2011.641913     Document Type: Article

References (98)

1. Ranajit Guha, 'Gramsci in India: Homage to a Teacher', Journal of Modern Italian Studies 16(2), 2011, pp 288-295.
2. Ranajit Guha, 'Preface', in Ranajit Guha (ed), Subaltern Studies I: Writings on South Asian History and Society, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1982, p 7.
3. To date, the Subaltern Studies Editorial Collective has published 12 volumes of Subaltern Studies. Guha acted as the principal editor of the series from 1982 to 1988 and edited the fist six volumes.
4. Guha, 'Preface', in Subaltern Studies I, p 7.
5. Joseph A Buttigieg, 'Sulla Categoria Gramsciana di "Subalterni"', Critica marxista 1, 1998, pp 55-62.
6. Dipesh Chakrabarty, 'Subaltern Studies and Postcolonial Historiography', Nepantla: Views from South 1(1), 2000, pp 9-32.
7. K Sivaramakrishnan, 'Situating the Subaltern: History and Anthropology in the Subaltern Studies Project', in David Ludden (ed), Reading Subaltern Studies: Critical History, Contested Meaning and the Globalization of South Asia, London: Anthem, 2002, p 234.
8. On the theoretical development and transformation of Subaltern Studies.
9. Gyan Prakash, 'Subaltern Studies as Postcolonial Criticism', American Historical Review 99(5), 1994, pp 1475-1490.
10. Kate Currie, 'The Challenge to Orientalist, Elitist, and Western Historiography: Notes on the "Subaltern Project", 1982-1989', Dialectical Anthropology 20(2), 1995, pp 219-246.
11. Dipesh Chakrabarty, 'Marx after Marxism: History, Subalternity, and Difference', in Saree Makdisi, Cesare Casarino and Rebecca E Karl (eds), Marxism Beyond Marxism, New York: Routledge, 1996, pp 55-70.
12. Vinayak Chaturvedi, 'Introduction', in Vinayak Chaturvedi (ed), Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial, New York: Verso, 2000, pp 7-19.
13. Sumit Sarkar, 'The Decline of the Subaltern in Subaltern Studies', in Chaturvedi, Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial, pp 300-323.
14. Nalini Persram, 'Spatial and Temporal Dislocations of Theory, Subjectivity, and Post()Reason in the Geocolonial Politics of Subaltern Studies', Cultural Studies l Critical Methodologies 11(1), 2011, pp 9-23.
15. David Ludden, 'A Brief History of Subalternity', in Ludden, Reading Subaltern Studies, pp 5+15.
16. Antonio Gramsci, Quaderni del carcere, 4 vols, Valentino Gerratana (ed), Torino: G Einaudi, 1975, Notebook 25, 'Ai margini della storia (Storia dei gruppi sociali subalterni)', pp 2277-2294.
17. Following what has become the international standard of Gramscian studies, I cite the critical editions of Gramsci's Prison Notebooks by providing the Notebook number, followed by the section symbol (§) to identify the note number. To date, Columbia University Press has published the first three of five volumes of Joseph A Buttigieg's critical English translation of the Prison Notebooks (1992, 1996 and 2007). A concordance table that cross-references the critical edition with the major English-language anthologies of the Prison Notebooks is available on the International Gramsci Society website: www.internationalgramscisociety.org/
18. Gramsci used the actual word 'subalternity' (subalternità) only once in the Prison Notebooks, in relation to Giovanni Gentile's position of 'intellectual subalternity' (Notebook 10II, §14). However, the term nicely complements his use of the term 'subaltern social groups'.
19. See the special issue of Postcolonial Studies 8(4), 2005, on 'The Subaltern and the Popular', edited by Swati Chattopadhyay and Bhaskar Sarkar.
20. The 'philosophy of praxis' codeword thesis originated in the way Gramsci's prison notebooks were first edited and published in Italian and then translated into English. For the earliest examples.
21. Antonio Gramsci, Il Materialismo storico e la filosofia di Benedetto Croce, Felice Platone (ed), Torino: Einaudi, 1948, pp 19-20.
22. Antonio Gramsci, The Open Marxism of Antonio Gramsci, Carl Marzani (trans), New York: Cameron Associates, 1957, pp 13-15.
23. Antonio Gramsci, The Modern Prince and Other Writings, Louis Marks (trans), New York: International Publishers, 1957, p 57.
24. Valentino Gerratana, 'Prefazione', in Gramsci, Quaderni del carcere, pp 36-37.
25. On Gramsci's translation of Marx and Engels' writings.
26. Joseph A Buttigieg, 'Notebook 7: Description of the Manuscript', in Gramsci, Prison Notebooks, Vol 3, Joseph A Buttigieg (trans), New York: Columbia University Press, 2007, pp 487-489.
27. For instance, in Notebook 3, §31, Gramsci openly discusses Marxism and refers to Marx, Antonio Labriola, Plekhanov, Otto Bauer's book Socialism and Religion, and Luxemburg, but then disguises his reference to Trotsky with the pseudonym 'Leon Davidovich'.
28. Currently there is no external evidence to support or refute the possibility that prison authorities tightened their surveillance of Gramsci's writings in mid-1932. Because of this, as Haug points out, it is difficult to rule out this possibility. However, as Haug also shows, the nature of Gramsci's prison letters changed during the period of mid-1932 as well, and it is not certain if the changes were due to prison pressure or due to Gramsci's state of mind.
29. Wolfgang Fritz Haug, 'Gramsci's "Philosophy of Praxis"', Socialism and Democracy 14(1), 2000, pp 1-19.
30. Derek Boothman, 'A Note on the Evolution-and Translation-of Some Key Gramscian Terms', Socialism and Democracy 14(2), 2000, pp 115-130.
31. Gramsci's notes and bibliographic references in Notebook 4, §1 (n 2), §3, §28, §37; Notebook 5, §127; Notebook 7, §18; Notebook 7, §35; Notebook 8, §61, §198, §220, §232, §235.
32. Antonio Labriola, Socialism and Philosophy, Ernest Untermann (trans), Chicago: C H Kerr & Company, 1907, pp 60-61.
33. Roberto M Dainotto, 'Gramsci and Labriola: Philology, Philosophy of Praxis', in Joseph Francese (ed), Perspectives on Gramsci: Politics, Culture and Social Theory, New York: Routledge, 2009, pp 50-68.
34. Wolfgang Fritz Haug, 'From Marx to Gramsci, from Gramsci to Marx: Historical Materialism and the Philosophy of Praxis', in Marcus E Green (ed), Rethinking Gramsci, New York: Routledge, 2011, pp 205-216.
35. Peter D Thomas, The Gramscian Moment: Philosophy, Hegemony and Marxism, Boston: Brill, 2009, p 107.
36. David Arnold, 'Gramsci and Peasant Subalternity in India', Journal of Peasant Studies 11(4), 1984, p 162. This article is reprinted in Chaturvedi, Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial, pp 4-49.
37. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, 'Negotiating the Structures of Violence', in Sarah Harasym (ed), The Post-Colonial Critic: Interviews, Strategies, Dialogues, New York: Routledge, 1990, p 141.
38. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, 'Interview with Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak: New Nation Writers Conference in South Africa. Interview Conducted by L. De Kock', Ariel: A Review of International English Literature 23(3), 1992, p 45.
39. David Lloyd, Anomalous States: Irish Writing and the Post-Colonial Moment, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1993, p 126.
40. David Lloyd, 'The Subaltern in Motion: Subalternity, the Popular and Irish Working Class History', Postcolonial Studies 8(4), 2005, p 425.
41. Neil Rogall, 'Subaltern Studies', London Socialist Historians Group Newsletter 4(Autumn), 1998, p 2.
42. Others have made similar claims.
43. Alex Tickell, Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things, New York: Routledge, 2007, p 82.
44. John Beverley, Subalternity and Representation: Arguments in Cultural Theory, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999, p 12.
45. Later in the same text, Beverley states that 'for Gramsci the subaltern is a kind of euphemism for the working class and peasantry' (p 102). Beverley repeats a similar claim in Testimonio.
46. On the Politics of Truth, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004, p 10.
47. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, 'The New Subaltern: A Silent Interview,' in Chaturvedi, Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial, p 324.
48. In addition to the authors cited above.
49. Khair Khair, 'Amitav Ghosh's the Calcutta Chromosome: The Question of Subaltern Agency', in Tabish Khair (ed), Amitav Ghosh: A Critical Companion, Delhi: Permanent Black, 2003, pp 142-161.
50. Ronald Niezen, A World Beyond Difference: Cultural Identity in the Age of Globalization, Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2004, p 158.
51. Vinayak Chaturvedi, 'A Critical Theory of Subalternity: Rethinking Class in Indian Historiography', Left History 12(1), 2007, pp 9-28.
52. Tickell, Arundhati Roy's the God of Small Things, p 82.
53. Christian Lee Novetzke, and Laurie Patton, 'Subaltern', in Sushil Mittal and Gene Thursby (eds), Studying Hinduism: Key Concepts and Methods, New York: Routledge, 2008, pp 378-393.
54. James A Sandos, 'Does the Term "Subaltern" Apply to Colonial California? "Testimonios" in Context', Reviews in American History 36(2), 2008, pp 160-170.
55. O P Dwivedi, 'The Subaltern and the Text: Reading Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things', Journal of Asia Pacific Studies 1(2), 2010, pp 387-394.
56. Timothy Brennan, 'Antonio Gramsci and Post-Colonial Theory: "Southernism"', Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies 10(2), 2001, p 158.
57. Timothy Brennan, Wars of Position: The Cultural Politics of Left and Right, New York: Columbia University Press, 2006, p 249.
58. Only Spivak (2000) and Brennan (2001 and 2006) refer to the critical English edition of the Prison Notebooks, but their familiarity with the integral text is unclear. Spivak makes reference to Volume 1 of Buttigieg's critical edition of the Prison Notebooks, which includes only Notebooks 1 and 2. Brennan makes reference to Volume 2 of Buttigieg's edition, which includes Notebooks 3, 4, and 5. However, neither Spivak nor Brennan consult the critical Italian edition of the Prison Notebooks or Notebook 25. Brennan alludes to the volume Past and Present, which is a thematically organized Italian volume of Gramsci's prison notebooks and not a component of Gerratana's critical Italian edition (Wars of Position, p 242).
59. Notebook 1, §42, §150; Notebook 2, §47; Notebook 3, §1, §4, §18, §124; Notebook 4, §56; Notebook 5, §126; Notebook 7, §33, §35; Notebook 9, §142; Notebook 10II, §2, §41x, §61; Notebook 13, §29; Notebook 23, §14. For the dating of Gramsci's notes.
60. Gianni Francioni, L'officina gramsciana: Ipotesi sulla struttura dei 'Quaderni del carcere', Napoli: Bibliopolis, 1984, pp 140-146.
61. Notebook 1, §43, §61, §62, §122, §135; Notebook 3, §1, §4, §5, §9, §10, §26, §44; Notebook 4, §8, §31, §52, §53; Notebook 8, §100; Notebook 9, §8, §110; Notebook 13, §20; Notebook 16, §11, §21; Notebook 19, §6, §7, §26; Notebook 22, §6, §10, §11, §14. To be clear, I am not suggesting that these references indicate instances in which Gramsci replaced the word 'proletariat' with a different word or phrase. I only want to highlight the fact that he did indeed use words and phrases that could be interpreted to have the same meaning as proletariat.
62. Gramsci, Notebook 5, §147. Cf. Notebook 5, §123; Notebook 6, §13; Notebook 13, §1; Notebook 19, §1.
63. Martha C Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999, especially ch 1.
64. Catharine A MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified: Discourses on Life and Law, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987.
65. Antonio Gramsci, 'Morality and Standards (Ibsen's "A Doll's House" at the Carignano)', Avanti, 22 March 1917.
66. Antonio Gramsci, Selections from Cultural Writings, David Forgacs and Geoffrey Nowell-Smith (eds), William Boelhower (trans), Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1991, pp 70-73.
67. Notebook 1, §62; Notebook 22, §3; Notebook 22, §9.
68. Marcia Landy, 'Culture and Politics in the Work of Antonio Gramsci', Boundary 2 14(3), 1986, pp 49-70.
69. Gramsci, 'Morality and Standards'.
70. Jane Slaughter, 'Gramsci's Place in Women's History', Journal of Modern Italian Studies 16(2), 2011, pp 256-272.
71. Nelson Moe, 'Production and Its Others: Gramsci's Sexual Question', in Green, Rethinking Gramsci, pp 131-146.
72. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, 'Scattered Speculations on the Subaltern and the Popular', Postcolonial Studies 8(4), 2005, p 479.
73. th Centuries, New York: W W Norton, 1965, pp 65-73.
74. Notebook 25, §1. Here Gramsci is paraphrasing and quoting the words of Domenico Bulferetti taken from a review article on Lazzaretti.
75. Domenico Bulferetti, 'David Lazzaretti e due milanesi', La Fiera Letteraria, 26 August 1928, 4, 35.
76. Antonio Gramsci, The Southern Question, Pasquale Verdicchio (trans), West Lafayette, IN: Bordighera, 1995, pp 20-21.
77. Frank Rosengarten, 'The Contemporary Relevance of Gramsci's Views on Italy's "Southern Question"', in Francese, Perspectives on Gramsci, pp 134-144.
78. Antonio Gramsci, Letters from Prison, Vol 2, Ray Rosenthal (trans), Frank Rosengarten (ed), New York: Columbia University Press, 1994, p 67.
79. Notebook 8, §145; Notebook 13, §1; Notebook 21, §5.
80. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, 'Can the Subaltern Speak?' in Cary Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg (eds), Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1988, p 287.
81. Notebook 3, §18, §90; Notebook 25, §4.
82. Notebook 4, §38.
83. On the levels of subalternity.
84. Marcus E Green, 'Gramsci Cannot Speak: Presentations and Interpretations of Gramsci's Concept of the Subaltern', in Green, Rethinking Gramsci, pp 68-89.
85. In his biography of Gramsci, Dante Germino demonstrates that the leitmotif of a 'new politics of inclusion' is apparent throughout the Prison Notebooks and in Gramsci's political practice.
86. Dante Germino, Antonio Gramsci: Architect of a New Politics, Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1990, see especially pp 1-24+253-262.
87. Benedetto Fontana, 'Political Space and Hegemonic Power in Gramsci', Journal of Political Power 3(3), 2010, p 351, n 14.
88. Notebook 3, §48.
89. Marcus E Green and Peter Ives, 'Subalternity and Language: Overcoming the Fragmentation of Common Sense', Historical Materialism 17(1), 2009, pp 3-30.
90. Spivak, 'The New Subaltern: A Silent Interview'.
91. Vasant Kaiwar, 'On Dipesh Chakrabarty's Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference and Ranajit Guha's Dominance without Hegemony: History and Power in Colonial India', Historical Materialism 12(2), 2004, pp 189-247.
92. Pranav Jani, 'Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial Edited by Vinayak Chaturvedi', Historical Materialism 11(3), 2003, pp 271-288.
93. Vinayak Chaturvedi, 'A Critical Theory of Subalternity: Rethinking Class in Indian Historiography', Left History 12(1), 2007, pp 9-28.
94. Persram, 'Spatial and Temporal Dislocations of Theory, Subjectivity, and Post()Reason in the Geocolonial Politics of Subaltern Studies'.
95. On Gramsci's understanding of political space.
96. Benedetto Fontana, 'Political Space and Hegemonic Power in Gramsci', Journal of Political Power 3(3), 2010, pp 341-363.
97. Peter Mayo, 'Gramsci, the Southern Question and the Mediterranean', Journal of Educational Studies 17(2), 2007, pp 1-17.
98. Cesare Casarino, 'The Southern Answer: Pasolini, Universalism, Decolonization', Critical Inquiry 36(4), 2010, pp 673-696.