Document Type
Review Essay
Abstract
[First paragraph]
In this powerful book Lata Mani argues that the sati debate in the early nineteenth century marginalized its very subject, i.e., the widow. The book systematically dissects the ideas of colonialists, nationalists, traditionalists and Christian missionaries and attempts to draw a simile between them. Taking a clearly subaltern feminist approach, it provides a post-colonial critique of all forms of knowledge to date. The most vehement critique is reserved for the very idea of modernity itself. "Nationalist ideology secularized and domesticates the rationality of colonial modernity" (p. 6) contends the author. Through the medium of post-nationalist, post-orientalist, and post-colonialist feminist approach, Mani challenges the notion that sati was a voluntary and religious act of wifely devotion. The book makes a serious attempt to bring to the forefront the subaltern agency of the widow and the materiality of her suffering.
Repository Citation
Satya, Laxman D.. "The Question is Not, 'Can the Subaltern speak?' The Question is, 'Can She be heard?': A Review of Lata Mani's Contentious Traditions: Debate on Sati in Colonial India." Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture vol. 6, no. 4, 2006, pp. 1–5. https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/reconstruction/vol6/iss4/15
Included in
Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Hindu Studies Commons, History of Religions of Eastern Origins Commons