This talk attends to what the Subaltern Studies tradition begins to think and gives to our own times to think. The emergence of Subaltern Studies was part of the increasing prominence of the “New Social Movements,” new because they were focused more on oppression than exploitation. Recognizing this allows us to discern that the Subaltern Studies project is driven by a subaltern intimation of freedom—a freedom that recognizes that domination takes the form of not only exploitation but oppression, and a freedom that, even as it exits subalternity, seeks not to make a new group subaltern in either way. Revisiting my 1999 book, Hybrid Histories, I explore this subaltern intimation of freedom by focusing on 1) how it played a role in the turn away from a focus on subaltern autonomy; 2) how the community constituted by it differs from those constituted by claims to oppression such as those made by Hindu nationalists or white nationalists; and 3) how it allows us to read differently the claim to indigeneity involved in the identity “Adivasi.”

Ajay Skaria studied Political Science and History at Maharaja Sayajirao University, Vadodara, during which he also worked as a journalist for Indian Express. He teaches at the University of Minnesota. A member of the Subaltern Studies editorial collective from 1995 till its dissolution, he is one of the co-editors of Subaltern Studies Vol. XII, and the author of Hybrid Histories: Forests, Frontiers and Wildness in Western India (1999) and Unconditional Equality: Gandhi’s Religion of Resistance (2016). He is currently completing a collection of essays, Thinking With Gandhi and Ambedkar, and is also working on another book, Ambedkar’s Buddhism.

 The Center for Cultural Studies hosts a weekly Wednesday colloquium featuring work by faculty and visitors. We gather at 12:00 PM, with presentations beginning at 12:15 PM.

Staff assistance is provided by The Humanities Institute.