UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA WGS 498/GSJ 598

Reflection (M5)

Reflection and Summary

This module asks us to reevaluate how intersectionality is introduced in the Global South, raising both ethical and epistemic questions. At the outset, we explored how intersectionality, developed in the North American academy as a theory and methodology, enters the academic paradigm. This introduces a politics of power when such a theory or methodology is used to train new scholars from the Global South and to study social phenomena there.

The module concluded with the short film “The Discreet Charm of the Savarnas,” which illustrates that awareness of Western theories and knowledge systems does not necessarily create progressive citizens or scholars in the Global South. The film shows how, knowing about civil rights movement and racial justice issues from the USA, the protagonists fail to recognize their own caste-based biases and prejudices.

We are also prompted to consider the hierarchical relationships between researchers and their subjects, especially when the researchers are affiliated with academic powerhouses of the Global North. Researchers analyzing phenomena with their pre-existing Western toolboxes may ignore, neglect, or distort their observations to produce narratives that fit theories from the Global North. For instance, a researcher using gender or intersectionality as their lens might overlook the fact that the studied community does not practice separate categorization of identities. In such contexts, where identities are perceived collectively and multiplicatively (e.g., religious, caste, tribal, ethnic, and linguistic identities), it would be unethical and inefficient to analyze power dynamics through a category-based system like intersectionality.

The module focuses on Nivedita Menon’s (2015) “A Critical View on Intersectionality,” which questions the efficacy of importing categories like race, class, gender, caste, and sexuality from the Global North to create a just and equal society. Menon argues that these categories, introduced and imposed by European colonizers, serve to determine and stabilize power and status in society. Categorizing, like gendering, is a governance tool used to control access to power and resources. When someone is categorized as a woman, a member of a disempowered group, she loses the possibility to fully participate in social, political, cultural, and economic life, and is barred from decision-making bodies in her community. Therefore, it is not liberating or beneficial for marginalized communities in the Global South to accept categorization into groups, as it forces them into systems of binaries and hierarchies.

Menon also points out that intersectionality operates under the premise that categories like race, class, and gender are legitimate, thus contributing to their normalization. In countries like India, the legitimacy of these categories is questionable since they are products of colonialism and continue to be imposed through unequal globalization and neoliberalism.

Responding to Menon’s argument, Mary John (2015) contends that in India, where collective and multiple identities are dominant, it is important to learn from and adapt intersectionality. John believes that intersectionality opens up conversations about power and oppression, especially when one category or axis is insufficient to explain a social phenomenon. This approach can also analyze collective contexts of power and oppression. Intersectionality shows that within the same category, individuals can face different forms of oppression. For example, within the category “women,” Savarna women and Dalit women experience significantly different opportunities and discriminations. Ultimately, John argues that intersectionality, despite its imperfections, is a useful tool for understanding the contexts of the Global South.