Paper short abstract:

In this paper, I interrogate the problems that arise for researcher-mediated narratives of subaltern agency. I want to point to the ambivalences and limits of agency as a recurring concept in the study of gender and subaltern politics.

Paper long abstract:

In attempting to bring out subaltern narratives or subaltern voices, scholars often highlight the presence or the lack of agency. Agency has become one of the key theoretical tools to analyse subaltern consciousness and resistance. Likewise, much of the work on subaltern women in social movements, rebel organizations and in campaigns for social transformation often tries to look for the presence or absence of agency in women's narratives of 'emancipation' and 'victimisation' . In this paper, I interrogate the problems that arise for researcher-mediated narratives of subaltern agency. I want to point to the ambivalences and limits of agency as a recurring concept in the study of gender and subaltern politics. To make my argument, I draw on my field experiences among women in rural West Bengal who shape their lives and politics in the presence of left parliamentary parties, NGOs, Maoists and other organizations that claim to work for women's emancipation.