Arias - Rigoberta Menchu

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Modern Language Association

Authoring Ethnicized Subjects: Rigoberta Menchu and the Performative Production of theSubaltern SelfAuthor(s): Arturo AriasSource: PMLA, Vol. 116, No. 1, Special Topic: Globalizing Literary Studies (Jan., 2001), pp. 75-88Published by: Modern Language AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/463643

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Authoring Ethnicized S u b j e c t s : RigobertaM e n c h u a n d t h e Performative Produc t ion

o f t h e Subaltern S e l f

ARTURO ARIAS

ARTURORIASs directorof LatinAmer-ican studies at the Universityof Red-lands. Cowriter of the screenplay forthe film ElNorte (1984),he is author offivenovels in Spanish-Afterthe Bombs(1979;Eng. rans.,Curbstone,1990),It-zam Na (1981), aguaren llamas (1989),Loscaminos de Paxil (1991), and Cas-cabel (1998)-and winner of the Casade las Americas Awardand the AnnaSeghersScholarshipor two of them. In1998 he published wo books of literarycriticism, a dentidadde lapalabra TheIdentityof the Word"),on twentieth-centuryGuatemalan iction,and Gestosceremoniales("CeremonialGestures"),on contemporaryCentralAmerican ic-tion. He has finished a new novel inSpanish,Sopade caracol,and is editingthecritical dition of MiguelAngelAstu-rias'sMulata de tal and a collection ti-tledTheRigobertaMenchuControversy.

THE QUESTIONSCERTAINLYOT MINE:CANTHESUB-alternspeak?"However, the case of RigobertaMenchu and therecent attacks on the factuality of her mediateddiscourse in thetestimonialI, RigobertaMenchuforce us to reconsiderit. GayatriSpi-vak'sseminalquestionpresupposes hat a subaltern ubjectwhose voicehas been recordedin printis no longer a subalternsubjectbecause the"speaking ubject"must enunciate helanguageof reasonto be heardbyWestern nterlocutors.Thatis, "authentic"discourseis a suppressedorhidden"truth" ecause of the Westerner's nabilityto comprehend t inits own terms; hus, subaltern ubjectsareforced to use the discourseofthe colonizerto expresstheirsubjectivity.This essay attempts o extractfrom thedebatesurroundingMenchu'stext a meaningfulcontributionocurrentthinkingabout these issues regardingthe statusthatthe ethni-cized subject and testimonio as subalterntextuality have in academiccircles in the UnitedStates.By "ethnicized ubjects" meanindividualswho identify themselves with a groupor communitythatconsiders it-self, and is regardedby others, as culturallydistinct from other,morepowerfulgroups nhabiting he samenationalspace.The contradictions thatderive from the subaltern'spositionalityhave created the conundrum n which Menchui s trapped.In a recentbook,RigobertaMenchuand theStoryofAll Poor Guatemalans 1998),David Stoll finds her, on the one hand, not Westernenough when itcomes to the rigorof herlogic andher use of facts. He thus accusesherof invention,of fibbing.On the otherhand,he finds hertoo Western nherpolitics,andhe thereforeclaimsthat herideas arenotrepresentativeof what hejudges to be authentic"native"Mayanthought.Central o this contradictions the natureof discourse.Authenticityand truth-if they exist at all-resist comprehension, expression, and

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76 RigobertaMenchi and the PerformativeProductionof the SubalternSelf

definition.Whatis more,eventhe most strategi-cally plannedelocutionmay elude the speaker'sintentionsbecauseof thepolysemyof language.When someone tries to reduce the multiplemeanings of a discourse and ignores the slip-pages inherent n translation in this case, fromK'iche to Spanish to English), the polemicsgeneratedseem inevitable.The testimonyof RigobertaMenchui, Ma-yan woman fromGuatemala,lwas an importantinstrument n a discursive wartied to cold warpolitics.2 The debate has centered on whetherMenchu told the truth in her book. This issueopensup theproblematicsof truth, he natureoftestimonioas a genre, andthe relationbetweenpolitical solidarityand subalternnarrative.Wecan only expect an absolute truth f we believein perfectlyverifiable truthsor if we still see orinsist on seeing "authentic"ndigenoussubjectsas noble savages whose alleged primitivenessputsthemcloser to some imaginednatural ruth.Accordingto these criteria, ndigenouspersonswho use discourse strategicallyeither lose au-thenticityor arebeing manipulatedby externalforces.Therefore,they mustbe seen de facto aspawns andmimics of Westerncolonizers or ofthecolonizers'revolutionary pponents.This is the argumenthatDavid Stollmakesin his book, which sparked he controversysur-roundingthe 1992 Nobel Peace Prizerecipient.In constructingan argumentaboutMenchu's n-authenticity,Stoll finds discrepanciesbetweenher account and interviews he conducts withotherMayas. He claims thatMenchu's inaccu-raciessuggestthatshe is a spokespersonnot fortheMayapeople butrather ortheradical,revo-lutionary eft in the formof the GuerrillaArmyof the Poor (EGP),for whose ends she distortedMayantruth.Thus,althoughStoll begins with aseemingly neutral and objective concern-"Arecurringquestion is, Whom to believe? Howdo we weigh the reliability of Rigoberta's ac-countagainstthe versions I collected anddocu-mentary ources?"-he quicklydemonstrates nideological bias: "I hope to convince readers

thatthe EGP neverdevelopedthe strongsocialbase in UspantanthatRigobertawouldhave usbelieve" (xii-iii). This sentence rhetoricallylinksMenchu to theEGP, mplyingthatshe wasa propagandist or the organization.Ironically,thismaneuveralso reveals the strategicmanipu-lation of information n Stoll's own account. Itmay even cause us to questionwhetherwe candefine fact in the Guatemalancontext, wheredisseminating nformationoften leads to tortureanddeath. This also raises a questionabouttherole of truth n testimonio.

The Function of TestimonioTheoreticalattentionto testimoniogrew at theend of the 1980s. Georg Gugelbergerrefers tothe genreas a"desirecalled ThirdWorld itera-ture" 1), addingthattestimoniobecame thecen-ter of polemics in canondebates. JohnBeverleyclaims thatwhat is of interest n a testimonial sits "truth ffect."Testimonydoes notproduceorreflectexact historicaldata,he explains;rather,it questionstheprivilegingof literature s an in-stitution,at the same timethat t becomesa newliterarygenreof the subalternsector of society.Thus,testimoniodoes notproduceorreproducereality, but-like that which, in the Lacaniansense, resists absolute symbolization-it pro-duces a sensationof experiencingreality(82).Testimoniowas nevermeantto be autobiog-raphyor a sworn estimony n the uridicalsense;rather, t is a collective, communalaccount of aperson's ife. This is whatMenchu mplieswhenshe says, "This s my testimony.I didn'tlearnitfrom a bookandI didn'tlearn t alone. [...] Mypersonalexperience s therealityof a wholepeo-ple" (Burgos-Debray 1).The testimonio of the1980salso impliedthe logic of collectivepoliti-cal action.A testimoniowas assumed o exercisea formative nfluence andthusplay a pedagogi-cal role analogousto that of slave narratives nthe United States before and during the CivilWar.Thisrole was necessarilycontingent,sinceit exceededthesymbolicdimensions romwhich

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it originated,markedby violence andconflict.Inasmuchas thegenrewas developedas ameansof empowering subalternsubjects andhearingtheirvoices, one can hardlybe surprised hatitwasa tool forpolitical agency.Therecentdebatesurroundinghe truthful-ness of Menchu'stestimony,Elzbieta Sklodow-skaexplains, is oddly out of place in an erathathas redirected its critical energy from investi-gatingthe truth o the study"ofinventing,mak-ing,creating,or [. . .] constructing." fterall, sheclaims,recentstudiesacrossa broadrangeof dis-ciplinesin the humanitiesand social sciences fo-cus onthe constructedor inventednatureof suchnotions as ethnicity, sexuality, nationality,andgender.If these concepts fit thecategoryof cre-atedobjects, t is logicalto assumethatMenchu'stestimonialnarrative, oo, should be approachedwith "aself-conscious acknowledgmentof [its]artifactual ature""Poetics").Thoughno one hasdenied hatMenchu's ext is anappeal or interna-tionalsupport o stopthegenocideof herpeople,few criticshavepaidattention o thewayinwhichtestimonio is understoodby its readingpublics.Thereal ssue in thepresentdebaterevolvesmorearound heseproblematicshanaroundhe notionof testimonio as agenreorthepotential nabilityof Westerners o graspa subalternestimonio.Byvirtueof its hybridity, estimoniohas inviteddif-ferentandconflictingreadings romliterarycrit-ics, anthropologists,ralhistorians,philosophers,andpolitical scientists. This interdisciplinaritymakes tclearthat heinterpretationf testimoniois contingentonthereader's deological purposeanddisciplinaryocus. As Sklodowska ndicates,thelessontobedrawn romthe currentwhirlwindof declarations boutMenchi's bookmaybe thatit is anopentextthatcan bereadaccording o dif-ferentparameters.

Rigoberta Menchu's Testimonio asPolitical Discourse on EthnicityA significantpercentageof indigenousMayas-which included the Menchu family and their

community-fought in the late 1970s againstthe oppressive rightist military dictatorshipinGuatemalaas allies of the left, albeit with theirown agendafor ethnic empowermentandcul-turalsignification.It is estimated thatapproxi-mately 150,000 Mayas out of a population offive million were massacred or were "disap-peared"duringthe peak of the conflict (1978-84), and the Guatemalanarmyadmitsrazingatleast 450 villages (Proyecto InterdiocesanodeRecuperaci6n de la Memoria). The interna-tional invisibility of this massacre before thepublicationof Menchu's testimonio preventedthe opposition to the governmentfrom garner-ing public supportabroad. ArturoTaracena,anoted Guatemalan scholar and the represen-tative of the GuatemalanOpposition in Exilein Franceduringthe early 1980s, helped orga-nize the visit that firstbroughtMenchu to thatcountry in an effort to raise awareness of theoppression n Guatemala.After Menchii arrivedin Paris,Taracena onceivedthe idea of record-ing her life storyas a way of furthering olidar-ity work on the Europeancontinent. It was hewho introduced Menchu to Elisabeth Burgos-Debray andarranged or a week of interviews.These interviews resulted in the book I, Rigo-bertaMenchu.

In her testimonio, Menchu speaks of herpeople's pain andtheir modes of resistance toLadino oppression. She mixes this with theirstruggle for land;Mayanrituals of birth,mar-riage,anddeath; he exploitativenatureof plan-tation work; the death of two of her siblingsfrommalnutritionandpesticides;hermigrationto the city; her experience of racismwhile sheworked as a maid; the radicalization of manyMayasas aresult of experiencessimilarto hers;the creation of self-defense organizations; heirdestructionby the army;the subsequentdeathby tortureof most of theirmembers,includingMenchu'sparentsandbrothers;and hersurvivalthrough lightfrom thecountry.InI, RigobertaMenchut,ne mustacknowl-edge the force of the writing,its metaphoricity,

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andits rhetoricaldevices as a "productivema-trix"(Bhabha 23) that circumscribes the socialengagementof theMayansubjectandmakesthisstruggleavailable o othersas anobjectiveof andforaction. Menchi's visibilityat the endof 1981didnot extendbeyondcircles close to the Guate-malanoppositionand to its solidarity groupsinMexico.Theysawheras thedaughter f theMa-yan grassrootsactivistwho was a martyrof theburningof theSpanishembassyandwhosenamehad become emblematic of thatmisadventure.3She was a memberof the Committee or PeasantUnity and worked on its behalfin Mexico City.4However,the natureof exile impliedthatpoliti-cal work done outside thecountryhad to focuson internationalsolidarity or diplomacy. Thiswas particularly rue of disempoweredpeopleswho continued to be framedby a cold warmen-tality according to which any "leftism"repre-senteda potential hreat o theUnited States.Menchu'sbackground s MayanandCath-olic, and her text is therefore interstitial. Sheoften talks about traditionalMayanreligion tounderlineher ethnicroots,while also paintingasocial scene of communalist unity among theMayas along Catholic lines, as Duncan Earlepoints out. She does not nuance thecomplexityof Mayansociety in her text, limitingherselftousing the Mayas' traditions andexperiences ofracism andoppression to justify their claim tohuman-rightsprotection.Even in this singulardisplacement,we can see the absence of a sim-plistic binarism n herenunciations.Let us lookatanexample:

I rememberhat,whenwegrewupourparentstalked o us abouthavingchildren.That's hetimeparentsdedicate hemselves o thechild.In my case, becauseI was a girl,my parentstoldme:"You're youngwomananda womanhasto be amother." heysaidI wasbeginningmy life as a womanandI would wantmanythings hat couldn't ave.They ried otell methat,whatevermy ambitions,I'd no way ofachieving hem.That'show life is. Theyex-plainedwhat ife is likeamongourpeople ora

youngperson,and thenthey said I shouldn'twait toolongbeforegettingmarried. had tothink ormyself,learn o be independent, otrely on my parents,and learnmany thingswhich wouldbe useful to me inmylife.Theygaveme the freedom o do whatI wantedwithmylife aslongas,firstand oremost, obeyedthe aws ofourancestors.(Burgos-Debray9)

In this paragraphwe canimmediatelydiscernatleast fourcontradictoryattitudes: 1) Menchu'sseeming obligation as a young woman to havechildren; 2) herparents' atalismabouta youngMayanwoman'sinabilityto fulfill her dreams;(3) Menchu's personal need, the two previousattitudesnotwithstanding,o be independent ndlearn to exercise her freedom; and (4) a para-doxical subordination of all the above to thelaws of Mayanancestors.These concernsrepre-sent the symbolic arrayof concepts by whichthis group attemptsto define itself throughitscultureandto differentiate tself fromother,pri-marily Westerngroups. We have here, not therepresentationof a revolutionary dogma, butwhat Alberto Moreiras has defined as largelyunconscious "work on a culture"to create eth-nic borders hroughdifference(225).The style andcontentof the entire narrativereinforcethe hybridityof Menchu's discourse.The interpellationof competingdiscourses un-dermines the rigidity of Western ideologies,weavinga newrhetoricof theself, buildinga sitefor theperformance f sly transgressive racticesthatpushawayfromtutelarypowers(suchas theGuatemalan on-Mayan evolutionaryeft).WhatMarxist evolutionarywouldsaythefollowing?

It was abouthat ime hat mymother]aidshewasgoingtolearn romachimdn.That'swhatwecall a manwhotells theIndians' ortunes.He's like a doctor for the Indians,or like apriest.Mymother aid:"I'mgoingto be a chi-mdnandI'll learnwithone of thesemen."Andshewent o the chimdn ndhetaughthermanythings utof hisimaginationonnectedwithan-imals,withplants,withwater,with he sun.Mymama earned greatdeal,butwhoknows,per-

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haps hatwasn't o beherrole n life.Neverthe-less,ithelpedhera lot tolearn nddedicate er-self to otherhings.Mymotheroved henaturalworld erymuch. (Burgos-Debray13)The focus here on Menchu'smother n a Mayanreligious context and worldview starkly con-trasts with the residual racism andmasculinismof theWestern-looking evolutionary, hoseanti-capitalistic and anti-imperialistic stance oftendisregardedethnicized subalterns andmiscon-ceivedtheirpremodern ast.Evenso, one cannotread Menchu's text as feminist in the Westernsense, even when it seems to be so, as in the fol-lowing quotation:

My motherused to say thatthroughherlife,throughherliving testimony, he triedto tellwomen hat heytoohad o participate,o thatwhentherepressionomes andwith t a lot ofsuffering, t's not only the men who suffer.Womenmust ointhestrugglentheirownway.Mymother'swords oldthemthatanyevolu-tion,anychange,n whichwomenhadnotpar-ticipated,would not be a change,and therewouldbenovictory. he was as clearabout hisasif shewereawomanwithallsortsof theoriesanda lot of practice.Mymother pokealmostno Spanish,but she spoke two languages-Quiche, and a bitof Kekchi. Shetook all thatcourageand all thatknowledgeshe had,andwent oorganise erpeople. (196)

Menchi's motherdoes not constructa feministtheoreticaldiscourse; rather,her life itself is a"livingtestimony" n Quiche(orK'iche, as cur-rently spelled) and Kekchi (K'ekchi). What ismore,the activismshe proposescanonly be un-derstood in the contextof Mayanculturalprac-tices, since women "join the struggle in theirown way."Menchu may display an ingenuouscertitudeabout hermother'squalities,but thereis no simplisticleftistor feministrhetoric.One can also discern in Menchi's text adebt to liberationtheology, a branchof the Ro-manCatholicChurch hatdefendedthepoorandpushed for fundamental social change. Men-

chi's discourse borrows a great deal from theScriptures,as is explainedby GeorgeLovell andChristopherLutz andby VictorMontejo.Men-chucomments:

The Bibletaughtme [tostruggleorjustice].Itriedto explainthis to a Marxistcompanera,who askedme howcouldI pretendo fight orrevolutionbeing a Christian. told her thewholetruth s notfound n theBible,but nei-ther s thewhole ruth nMarxism,nd hat hehadto accept hat[...] asChristians,we mustalso defend our faith withinthe revolution-ary process. (246)

The relation between Catholicism and Mayanculture is a complicatedone. It is well known,for example, that the conqueredMayanpeople,despite theirapparentconversionto Christian-ity, continued to worshiptheir gods in the fig-ures of Christ and Catholicsaints. A visit to thechurchof Chichicastenango asily confirms hatthe Mayas' practice of Catholicism became aform of mimicrythatonly masked theirculturalautonomy in a new, hybrid religious context.From a purely anthropologicalperspective, itshould be more interesting to speculate aboutthe forms of mimicry in Menchu's text thantoworryabouthersupposedMarxism,whichitselfwould be no more thana mimicry of the simu-lacrum of the Soviet ghost that many UnitedStatespolicy makerssaw in the CentralAmeri-canguerrillamovements.Menchuunderstoodherself to be a Mayansubject. She did not regardherself as just an-other member of the Guatemalanopposition,and she was perceivedas arepresentative f theMayanpeoples by non-Mayanmembersof theopposition as well.5Howeverunsystematicherapproachwas, she visualized a double task: toexplain Mayan culture and subjectivity to theoutsideworld andto arguefor its rightfulplacein the Guatemalanopposition.These undertak-ings forced her into an inevitable duality. Shehad to embraceelements of Westerndiscourseto make herself heardby her targetaudiences,

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but she also had to guaranteethe preservationandcontinuityof herMayan dentity,whichwasthe validatingelement of her discourse.This iswhy she performsher identityas she does, me-diating Mayan"secrets"andWesternparame-ters of understanding,and it is why she says atthe end, "Nevertheless, 'm still keepingmy In-dian identity a secret. I'm still keeping secretwhat I think no one shouldknow. Not even an-thropologists or intellectuals, no matter howmany books they have, can find out all ourse-crets"(247). Doris Sommerhas speculatedonthe meaningof thetrope"secrets"here:

[Wemaywellask]whetherweshouldnotknowthemfor ethicalreasons,becauseourknowl-edgewould eadtopoweroverhercommunity.[. .. But]evenif herownexplicitrationalesthe nonempirical, thicalrationale . .] shesuggestsanothereason. t is thedegreeof ourforeignness, urcultural ifferencehatwouldmakeher secrets ncomprehensibleo theout-sider.Wecouldneverknowthemas shedoes,becausewe would nevitablyorcehersecretsintoour ramework. (34)Menchumightbe an organicintellectual nthe Gramsciansense andmighthavemoreedu-cation than she admitted publicly, but she isno intellectual in the Westernacademic sense.

Therefore,for her,Mayanidentityis a fluidno-tion. Ithas to do with a certainoraltradition n-herited romhergrandparentsndparents,whichcorresponds more to the region in which shegrewupand to thesingulareconomicpositionofherfamilythan o a trulypan-Mayandentity.

The conceptof identitymoreoftenthannotsignifies a binaryoppositionbetweena self andan other as partof a rhetoricalcontinuum.AsMoreiraspointsout, thisperception endsto un-derline difference (205). In GuatemalaMayaswere considered different from non-Mayas-that is, Ladinos. This view presupposed a ho-mogeneity of Mayanidentitythatdid not exist.All Mayas, heterogeneous among themselves,had in common theirdifferencevis-a-vis Ladi-

nos, themselvesnothomogeneouseither.Mayanidentitycannot,as aresult,be morethan a sym-bolic expression to determineagency.Catholi-cism, Protestantism,andMayanreligion mightdivide Mayan communities, but Mayas keptsilent abouttheirdisagreementsfor the sake ofempowermentas an ethnic group andbecausethey saw a common denominator n the 1980smassacres,whichrecalledcrimesfromtheSpan-ish Conquest.EvenforordinaryMayas,this linkwas no abstraction.The relation between theevents of the sixteenthcenturyandthose of the1980s is clear: heyareall stillanopen, suppurat-ingwound.

Given the symbolicnatureof identity,how-ever,andthe fact thatMayasarestill searchingforcommunitarianriginsanda sense of collec-tive identity-a traitamonggroupswhose sur-vival is threatened-combined with the absenceof an established protocol to frame what itmeansto be Mayan,we have to readtestimoniossuch as Menchu's as open-ended texts whosefunction is exploratoryandtentative:they areoften a firstattempt o frame a rhetoricof beingand to name agency for a particularsubalterngroup. As a result, they are allegorical by na-ture, or, as Moreirassays, a testimoniois an al-legory of an allegory (204). Their argument sframedin an ethical insistence on the right ofsubalterns o be themselves andthus implicitlydefendsculturalpluralityorhybridity.Ethnicityis a language-andpower-drivenelf-awareness.The constructionof ethnicity is an activitywhose effects areneverfirmlyfixed;it is neverpresent.Always re-presented,it is producedina slippage. It is constantlyand simultaneouslyundererasureandreiterated,anirreducible di-lemma of representationcharged with ironicovertones,hyperbole,brokensyntax.Ethnicity sconstructedperformativelyandfunctionsmeto-nymically.Ethnicperformativitys afunctionofthe reiterativepracticeof regulatorydiscursiveregimes thatcontrol the formationof personalandcollectiveidentity.Thereare ines of flight nethnicity,becauseit is anassemblageof a multi-

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plicity of perceptionswithout a center orverifi-able data other than its own reiterationas a trutheffect. Itsrepetition-a sortof never-ending ressrehearsal-produces and sustains the powerofthe trutheffect and of the discursiveregimethatconstructed he effect andthatoperatesn thepro-ductionof racializedandethnicizedbodies.

Testimonioas a written means to begin ex-ploringthe contoursof a collective identity is aconcrete historical genre that evolved in LatinAmericaduring he"guerrillerista"eriod 1960-90),justas ithad, n similar ashion, notherpartsof the worldduring pecifichistorical vents,suchas theSpanishcivil war,theAlgerianwar,orthePalestinianstrugglefor a homeland. Homi Bha-bha, amongothers, findsrelatedexpressions inSoutheastAsia, and,of course,similar exts haveappearednAfricaduring hatcontinent'snumer-ous struggles orliberationromWesternpowers.Theseimperfect, eaccenteddiscoursescarryin them abuddingquestioningof Western eftistthinkingby virtue of theirbilingual, ethnicizednature,whichchallengesmythsof interpretativetransparencyandmastery.Inthiscontext,Men-chi's writing s notonly theproductof temporalconditions in particular locations but also atransgressiveway of replacing, if not relacing,revolutionarydiscoursefrom a crypto-feminist,subaltern erspective. tundermines aivebeliefsin the alleged simplicity of subalternsubjects,yet at the same time it impairs the doctrinesexpressed by traditionalMarxistrevolutionaryrhetoric. For these reasons, although a privi-leged place from which to subvertGuatemalanLadinodominantdiscourse,Menchu's text con-tains slippages thatmark ssues the official lefthas never caredto confront.

However, t is inevitable hat hesediscursiveelements in herzigzaggingnarrativeogic wouldcreate a certain degree of cultural misunder-standing.Because theGuatemalaneft chooses toemphasize and identify with the passages thatsupport ts ideological tenets, it does notrealizethatit is criticized in the text. In contrast,non-Guatemalanobservers are drawnto otherpas-

sagesbecause theirreadingsareframedby theirsingularwaysof perceivingpolitical ssues.The misunderstandingsignaled above hasledsome to wonderhowMenchu'svoice was me-diatedby ElisabethBurgos-Debray's ompilationof hertestimony.n aninterviewwithDavidStoll,Burgos-Debray claims that she considerablyedited hetranscriptionf Menchu'soralaccount:

HerSpanishwasverybasic.Shetranslatedromherown anguageinherhead];his s what ostme a lot.Yes,I corrected erb ensesandnoungenders,as otherwise t would not havemadesense,butalways ryingo retainherownpow-erful ormof expression.Rigoberta'sarrativewasanything utchronological.t had o beputin order. .. .] I hadto reorder lot togivethetext a thread, o give it the sense of a life, tomake t astory, o that tcouldreach hegeneralpublic,whichI did via a card ile,thencuttingandpasting.t washardogive t a senseofcon-tinuitynRigoberta'swnwords.

(Stoll, RigobertaMenchut 85)Stoll uses this quotation o arguethat the wordsattributedto Menchu could not possibly havebeen hers. What is implicit in his observation,however inadvertently, s that to make the textintelligible to "the general public," Burgos-Debrayattemptedo subordinate he"subaltern"Mayancomponent as Spivakdefinesit), turningthe text into a hybridWestern-Mayan ocumentwith clear Westernlegibility. It is as such thatMenchu's story is now coming under attack.6However, Stoll contradicts his own argumentwhen he states in subsequent nterviewsthathehas now heardthe bulk of the tapes in Burgos-Debray'spossession and thatthey prettymuchflow in the same format as the book ("DavidStoll"; "Stoll: I Don't Seek"). Therefore, wemustask,did Burgos-Debraychangethe manu-scriptanddisguiseMenchi's Mayanvoice, or isthe book a relatively faithful translation of therecording? n the absence of a full disclosure ofthe originaltapes by Burgos-Debray,hereis noevidence,andthereforeno reasonto believe,that

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the transcripts diverge from the taped inter-views. Why, then, does David Stoll contradicthimself.What s at stakehere?

The Anthropologist, the SubalternSubject, and TruthDemanding representational accuracy in thepositivist sense, modern (as opposed to post-modern) normative conditions have framed,formed, commodified, reified, and reiteratedthatwhich has come to be called ethnicity.Thedominantpower's regime of truth has alwaysrecognized the intellectual who interpretsthesubalternsubjectin the nameof Westernaccu-racy.It has been less interestedin deconstruct-ing particularstrategiesdeployed by subalternsubjects in metropolitanor foreign spaces oreven in theirattempts o framehistoricaldata nnon-Westernparameters.It is for this reasonthatMenchu'sdiscoursebecamestereotyped: tturned nto thatotherness which is the objectatonce of desire and of derision and which Bha-bha discusses. Menchu opened up the indige-nous or Native Americanfantasy thatoperatesas the stereotypeof phobiaandof fetishforneo-conservativecultural nclinations.

David Stoll's book evidences the problem-atics of a positivist assessment of testimonio inits shiftsbetweena supposedscientificobjectiv-ity and a tendency to take sides in the compli-cated matterof veracityin Menchi's discourse.In his text, there is no treatment of textual ab-sences, just a preoccupationwith closed mon-ads, elements irredeemablyseparatedfrom thetrace of the signifierthatnamesthem. His onlyconcernseems to be a verifiabletruth: he "tan-gential relationship [of her testimonyl to herlife, family andvillage"(189). For this reason,Stoll ridicules the notion of "collective mem-ory" (190) andcriticizes testimonio in generalfor not being conducive to finding a certifiedtruth.He sees in the genre"asignificantamountof reinvention"192) anda lack of linearclarity.Indeed, as I explained above, testimonio is not

the equivalent of a sworn testimony in whicheveryfact hasbeenverifiedand canbe classifiedas evidence of a crime.7

Stollclaims to maintainapureviewof Men-chi's narrativewhile recognizingthemythsthatmayleadthescientistandthepublic n general omisinterprett. Forexample,he views the sym-pathyforMenchuoutsideGuatemala s sympto-maticof "romancingherevolution"277):

I, Rigoberta Menchui s one of many works towina massaudienceby appealingo Westernexpectationsboutnativepeople. ...] Since n-dfgenas ndpeasantsend o beviewedasrusticinnocents, hey mayhaveto charm heiraudi-ence usttogetahearing....] Anthropologistsarenotcompletelynnocentn thisregard: l-thoughwerefute hecrudest xpectations,urstudies f culture nd raditionaveencouragednewformsofpaternalism...]. (232)

Thoseromanticswho idealizetheclaimsof "na-tive"peoples seem to be Stoll's othershere, al-though he suggests that anthropologists haveoperatedunder he samemyths.Westernanthro-pologists, he also admits,granttheirsubjectsaspecialtruthclaimevenwhile interpellatinghattruthaccording to Westernsymbolic systems.Stoll says he is innocent, however, uninflu-enced by mythologiesregarding he indigenousspeaker.Yethis absolutedeclarations n phraseslike "Thatalone"(83) andhis use of wordslike"innocent,""hearing," nd"win"revealthathistext has more in common with the protocol ofthe United States judicial system than with aself-aware anthropologicalproject thatvaluesdifferentdiscursiveandcultural ystems.In fact, Stoll's book reveals a disdain ofcultural difference-particularly in relationto Mayanconcepts of time, history, and com-munity-that is surprising in the work of ananthropologist. It also reflects a poor under-standing of the social and culturalrealities ofthe Ladino Westernelite in Guatemala,wherethe government,the newspapers,and thejudi-cial systemworkmorelike an obscure(andob-

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scuring)kafkaesque abyrinth han ike the idealenlightened image projected by their UnitedStatescounterparts.

Stoll's principalrhetoricaldevice is to sug-gest a connection between Menchu andMarx-ism repeatedlywithout everofferingconclusiveproofof it. Forexample,he states that

Cubanpromotionf RigobertandElisabeth'sbooksuggestedthat t mightbe speaking ortheguerrillasmorethan orpeasants.Thein-ternecinedisputesdividingRigoberta's eigh-borsdroppedoutof the story,makingarmedstruggleound ike an nevitableeaction oop-pression, ta timewhenMayasweredesperateto escapethe violence.I, RigobertaMenchubecamea wayto mobilizeoreign upportor awounded,etreatingnsurgency.8 (xiii)

The mention of Cuba cannotbe accidental: forUnited States readers,Cuba is an emotionallycharged trope of Soviet intervention in LatinAmerica. By rhetorically associating Menchuiwith Cubahere,Stoll insinuates thatshe was anarms-wieldingnsurgent ombatant, venthoughhe is seemingly focusing on the uses of hertextafterits publication.One could claim that whatStoll's text does best is to expose the doublebind of thecolonizer'sdiscourseregardingruth,ethnicity,culture, deology,andpolitics.Indeed,I believe that the book has generatedso muchdebatebecause it pointsto unresolvedcontradic-tions in the cultural ogic of theWest.This is soespeciallyin regard o thepredominanceof left-right polemics over other types of politicalspeech andrhetoricavailable to subalternsub-jects in a non-Western ramework.The contro-versy surroundingStoll's book in the press andamongthe intellectualelite in theUnitedStatessuggeststhattheCentralAmericandebate s stillmore aboutUnited Statespolitics andparanoiathanabout aMayantruth.This obsession with an imaginarycold warperspective denies Menchuiany agency out-side thatdynamic because it ignores political,economic, and social issues in Guatemala. It

negates the possibility thatMenchu's text wasa strategic discourse in defense, not of leftistguerrillasper se, but of a certain sector of theMayanpeople,perceived by Menchuas victimsof a genocidalpolicy of theGuatemalan overn-ment. Menchu is certainly not making up herstory,nordoes Stoll eversay she is. If Menchucrafted a strategicdiscourse to prevent he con-tinued genocide of her people, how can wequestionthe authenticity f thatact?Stoll uses the testimonyof other"authenticnatives" to contradict Menchu's authenticity.This textual strategy treats the subalternsub-jects' truthclaim as intact,even while silencingthe most prominentsubalternvoice. Moreover,by decidinghimself which of these testimoniesis the authenticvoice of theMayanpeople,Stollimplies thatthe subaltern'sdiscourse can onlybe validatedby a whiteanthropologist.Thus,al-though he uses new tactics, he reverts to theclassical attitude of his field, maintainingthehegemonyof the white anthropologistwhile ap-parentlygiving credence to the subaltern'sdis-course.Stoll is rightin arguing hatGuatemalanhistoryneeds to be reconstructedwith multiplevoices, but he undercuts that project with hisown text. After all, Western anthropologistshave imposed their views on indigenous peo-ples, not respecting their truth in their ownterms. Guatemalans, Mayan and non-Mayanalike, do need to reconstructtheirhistory withmultiple voices and not with a single voice ortruth,but they do not need a self-chosen NorthAmericanarbitratoro do so.

Assuming that indigenous peoples are in-capable of realizing their goals strategicallyoutside Western paradigms, Stoll gives thefollowing explanation of why peasantsjoin aguerrilla organization or support insurgents:"Perhapspeasantsareinspiredby revolutionaryideology,that s, theidea of transformingociety.Orperhaps . . .] theythinktheyhavesomethingmore immediate to gain. Or perhaps they arepressuredinto cooperatingwith the guerrillas,afterbeing sweptup in a processof provocation,

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84 RigobertaMenchuand the Performativeroductionf theSubalternelf

retaliation,andpolarizationthat forces themtochoose sides"(63). While ethnicityis centraltoMenchu, nowhere does Stoll suggest an ethnicreactionagainstracism as a possiblereasonthatMayas joined the EGP.He also does not quoteGuatemalansources that document how evenwell-off Mayas gave this explanationfor theirjoining the guerrillamovement(Arias,"Chang-ing";Arias andArriaza;Porras;Payeras;Colom;amongothers).In this sense,the situation s anal-ogous to that of the African NationalCongress(ANC): even thoughsome of the rhetoricof theANC had a clear Marxistcontent,themovementattracted venupper-middle-classouthAfricansbecause its primarygoal was to end racism. Oneof the issues not yet studied in depthto this dayis the abyss between an organization'sofficialrevolutionary hetoricand the motivationsof in-dividuals who join the organizationandprojectonto it their own phantasmsor desires, whichoftencontradict hegroup'srhetoric.

Why does Stoll avoid the issue of racism?In Menchu'sbook, it is clear. She tells us, "Mygrandfatherused to curse the Spaniards.TheSpaniardswere at the root of ourplight. Theybegan taking so many things out of our lands,they began stealing from us. Our ancestors'finest sons were those who were dishonoured.They evenraped hequeenselectedby ourcom-munity.That'show the ladinos cameintobeing"(Burgos-Debray189).To ignore such an asser-tion implies that ethnicity is only a trope formuddled thinking ratherthan a political issuebased on perceived differences among groups.Stoll's narrative eems in this sense to resist un-derstanding,accepting, and valuing modes ofbeingthatdiffer fromthose in theWest.

Cognizant of the imprecision of languageand the limits on culturalunderstanding,mostWesternacademicsrecognizethatthey exerciseless authorityhan n thepast,thoughtheyexpe-rience greaterdialogism when engaging other-ness. Writing in general is unable to captureotherness because signifiers float, perpetually

deferringmeaning andresisting rational inter-pretation in a sea of contradictions that trapany semblance of truth n semanticambiguitiesor silent regions that hide the other's secrets.Those darkvoids of reason becomeindefensiblepositionswhere one meaningcannotbe made tocoincide with another.

Stoll acknowledges the impossibility ofknowing the truth when he says that "still an-otherreason these incidents are difficultto re-cover is that bystanders were confused aboutexactlywho was doingwhat to whom"(33). Heis also aware of the contradictions hathis owndiscoursegenerates.As a result,he defends hisversion of eventsby arguingthat the left wantsto cover it up:

Inthe case of the bookyouhave nyourhands,a white male anthropologists accusinganindigenouswomanof makingup partof herstory.Theimportantssue is notwhether hedid or not.Instead, t is Westerndomination,whichI amobviouslyperpetrating. easoninglike this enablesRigoberta's toryto be re-moved rom he field of testablepropositions,to insteaduse as a proof-text hatforeignerscanuse to validatehemselves. (277)

The subtlerhetorical hift in the lastsentence tothe xenophobic term "foreigners"cancels outhis acknowledgment of his otherness (that is,his foreignness in Guatemala).The foreignershere arenot anthropologists ike him. They areGuatemala's eftist intellectuals who repudiatescientificmethodsby removingthe story"fromthe field of testable propositions" and "use"Menchi's text for their own ends. The slippageof the term"foreigners" ives awayhis ideolog-ical bias and undermines his allegations thatwhat he intends s a constructive ritique.Stoll divides Mayas into two groupsin hiswork-Menchui andreliablewitnesses. He com-plainsthatMenchuconfuses thedatespertainingto when the armyfirstsent troopsto Uspantan(277), even thoughhe knows that when she re-

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86 RigobertaMench6 and the PerformativeProduction of the SubalternSelf

since he claims to make his gesturein thenameof an alleged andundefinedtruth,whose repre-sentativenesshe either confiscatesorcraves?We know from Edward Said that a certaintype of culturalproductionby Westernacadem-ics-who were productsof a liberal humanisttradition hatpresentedthem as naturallysupe-rior to subaltern subjects-was decisive not

only in framingthe historical context of colo-nialismbut morespecificallyin constructing hestrategiesfor the marginalizationof ethnic sub-jects. The subjectificationof those individualswas in turn made possible and plausible-asBhabhaargues-through the stereotypicaldis-coursethehumanistscreated.What some scholars still do not realize isthat when we identify with a certain politicaldiscourse, we relate to a fantasy that stages ascenario hiddenbehind the shifting meaningsofthe words. Encoded in this fantasy is a re-sistance to meanings that arises from the im-possibility of translating and transculturatingsubaltern languages into anything other thanmetaphorizations.The shifting meanings pre-vent any categoricalassertionaboutestablishedtruths,creatingan indeterminacythatprovidesthegroundsfor the legitimizationof listeningtosubalternsubjects-that is, of recognizing thevalidity of discourses thatoperateas symbolicexpressions of agency, as tropes for the con-structionof identities,even if the discourses donot fit entirelyin the Westernconceptionof ra-tionality, which we now recognize as ambigu-ous andindeterminate s well.

Tentative ConclusionsThe controversyaroundMenchugives us a bet-ter understandingof the issues with which heruncannycentrality n UnitedStatesculturalde-bates confrontsus. These include the natureoftestimonial literature, the need to rethink theconceptof identity,and thedesiresandfantasiesof subjective transformationbut also the iden-tity politics that are a phantasmof hegemonic

subjects' fears of disempowerment.The con-troversy also brings us back to the questionof whether a testimonioshouldbe readonly asa narration"of urgency"or additionally as an"unhomely iction"-as "afictionwhich wouldfocus on those freak social and cultural dis-placements, as a fiction which relates the trau-matic ambivalences of a personal psychichistoryto the widerdisjunctionof politicalexis-tence"(Bhabha11).

Perhaps he two salientissues of the debatearetheperformativenatureof ethnicityas acre-ative assemblageof the self andthe problemat-ics of readingtestimonios.If we acceptthe firstnotion as valid, then we must recognize thatonly bricoleursassemblingtheirown particularsenses of ethnicitycanclaim anytrutheffect, inthe Foucauldian ense, for theirsingularperfor-mativity.9No one else can read or decode thesets of rulesby whichsubaltern ubjectsoperatewhile exercising agency by reinventing theirselves as a way of restructuringheirrelationsofpowerwithhegemonicsubjects.As for the sec-ondissue, we canaskourselveswhetherreadinga testimonio nvolves the reader n a continuousact of faithunlikethatinvolved in literaryread-ing. This is a broadissue that needs to be ex-plored further,since it leads to the question ofhow the reader'ssolidarityor political identifi-cation with victims, dissidents, and oppositionmovements works when a testimonio is read.Answeringthisquestion mplies a new theoryofreading, given that, althoughStoll argues thathumanrights call solely for a legal discourse(277), they in fact demand a kind of affective,empatheticreading, in which individuals whoenjoy guaranteed reedomsor hegemonicposi-tions discover and sympathize with subalternsubjects.It is a reading,however,thatmay leadto concretepoliticalaction.Thus,readinga tes-timonio is radically different not only fromreading literaturebut also from reading legaldocuments,reportsof scientificdata,and othersuch texts. Forthis reason,the questionof how

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the reader of a testimonio authenticates itsmeaning s complex,and it remainsunexplored.In the Menchu-Stolldebate,the indigenoussubject is held up to a standardof truth thatthose who flauntotherdiscourseshave neverhadto meet. Menchi's efforts were aimed atendingthe massacre of her people at a time when in-digenous peoples did not enjoy any kind of in-ternationalsympathy,much less privilege. Hertext, andhersubsequentpoliticalefforts,forgeda recognitionof Mayan subjectivity,as well asan acceptance of the growing social, cultural,and political importanceof the Mayanpeople.Menchuiperformeda role to achievethese aims,andfortunatelyshe has been largelysuccessful.If her text, which did not make any historicaltruthclaims, achieved the goals of ending mas-sacre and creating respect for Mayan culture,does it matter f it did notconform to howWest-ernsciencecontextualizesdocumentaryacts?

NOTES1Born in the tiny village of Chimel in the westernGua-temalanhighlands,Menchd s partof the K'iche people,oneof twenty-threeMayangroups living in this CentralAmeri-can country,which is the size of Tennessee but has beencrucial to the United States for strategicreasons since the

beginningof thecold war.Born in extremepoverty,Menchdtells us that she startedworkingat eight. In Guatemala, n-digenouspeoples have been discriminatedagainstsince theSpanish Conquest, in the sixteenth century, in much thesameway thatblackshave in South Africa.Menchui'sather,Vicente, fought as a progressiveCatholicleaderagainstthegovernment hathelped"Ladinos"non-Mayanmestizos ofWesternheritage) akeawaytheMayas' landby force.2Now, aftertherelease of CIAdocumentsabout he rolethe United States played in replacing democraticgovern-ments with repressivemilitarydictatorshipsandsupportinggenocidalcampaigns n CentralAmerica andafterPresidentClinton's apology to the CentralAmerican people for thatrole,we mayrightlyfeel confused aboutthe rhetoricused tojustify that intervention:reedom ighters, contras,Marxistguerrillas, government forces. These expressions variedthroughout he 1980s accordingto the ideological orienta-tion of theCentralAmericangovernment n question-thus,even though the "freedomfighters"used guerrilla tactics,they were not called guerrillas,because they were tryingto

topple the Sandinistagovernment. Guerrillaswere alwaysMarxist,so much so thatguerrilla was almost always pre-ceded by Marxist. Even the word guerrilla, pronounced"gorilla"by most newscasters andpoliticians, conjured upimages of darkprimitives launchinga bestialbattleagainstenlightenedWesternersn thejungles"down here"--"southof the border," tropesynonymouswithbarbarism.3On 31 January1980, a group of peasants (includingMenchd'sfather,Vicente)anduniversitystudentsoccupiedthe Spanishembassyin GuatemalaCity.They demandedaninternational press conference to denounce the govern-ment's atrocitiesagainst Mayan villages in the Quich6re-gion. The Spanish government mmediatelyacquiesced,butthe Guatemalangovernmentrefused to grantthe presscon-ference andorderedthe armyto storm the embassy.In theensuing attack,all occupiers, including Vicente Menchu,were burned to death,alongside visitors andembassy per-sonnel. The only survivorswere the ambassadorand a Ma-yanpeasant,who hadthird-degree urs. He was kidnappedfrom the hospital by securityforces andmurdered he samenight.Spainbrokediplomaticrelationswith Guatemalaas aresultof this incident.

41 learned of this activity from Menchd Tum, MeganThomas,andElizabethAlvarez, in Mexico in 1983, in thecontext of politicalduties we all sharedatthe time.

5 As a non-Mayanopposition militant,I witnessed thisperceptionof Menchi anddiscussedit withfellow militantsin theearly 1980s.6Thus, when Stoll complains,"Still, the chronologyofhow Chimelbecomes a militantvillage is perplexing.[. ..]This is not the firstpoint where 1, Rigoberta Menchu be-comes confusing" 92), we maywell ask,is this a critiqueofMenchu'sMayanstyle of narration, f herpoor Spanish,ofheralleged EGPpuppeteers or not being clearerabout thechronology they imposed on her, or of Burgos-Debray'sediting talents?Orcould he simply be arguingthat a gen-uineMayan subjectcould not think n the fashionillustratedin the book?

7The hurriedcompositionand oral natureof Menchi'stext andher statusas anexile createeven moreambiguities,silences, andabsences. These factorsprecluded he verifica-tion of any of the facts she narrated, o that the interplayoffiction and history in memory becomes a central issue inMenchi's text. For a more theoreticalclarificationof thisissue, see Sklodowska,"Laformatestimonial"379.

8 TheElisabeth o whom Stoll refers s ElisabethBurgos-Debray,who appearsas author n the firsteditions n Englishand Spanish. Subsequently,underpressurefrom Menchu,she voluntarilywithdrewhername as author,but she has re-tained the copyrightandthe title "officialcompiler"of thetext. The latterrole has alsobeenquestionedby Menchi andArturo Taracena. Stoll interviews Burgos-Debray in hisbook, using this "testimony" by Menchd's interviewer tobolster his argument hatMenchi was complicitouswiththe

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88 Rigoberta Mench6 and the Performative Production of the Subaltern Self

guerrillamovement. Menchu andTaracenahave contestedthis claim in recent nterviews.9Truthas understoodby Foucault s a systemof ordered

procedures or the production,regulation,distribution,cir-culation,andoperationof statements i.e., discourse),whichhe understands, ollowing Nietzsche, as lies performedac-cordingto a fixed convention. The trutheffect derivesfromthe way in which power produces a discursive regime,which permeatesan entire social body.Each society has itsown discursiveregime,and each discursiveregimeproducesits own truth,which exists in a circular relation with thepowerthatproducesand sustains t.

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