Reaprendiendo a amarnos

This thesis is in two parts: the first dealing with theories of identity, the second with theories of intersubjectivity. The first chapter in each part deals directly with the discursive strategies of colonial domination. The movement through each part is, then, a movement in search of the ‘beyond’ of colonialism. Part I of the thesis consists of four chapters, two each dealing with versions of essentialist and hybrid theorising. I distinguish between primitivist and ‘strategic’ theories of essentialism and ontological and performative theories of hybridity. Part II, in turning to theories of intersubjectivity, brings issues of relationality to the fore. This Part consists of three chapters, beginning with a chapter on Hegel’s master-slave dialectic, followed by one each on the politics of recognition and Lévinasian ethics.

I bring the international literature on identity and intersubjectivity together with ‘talk’ about Maori and Pakeha to interrogate both. In terms of the order in which theories of identity and intersubjectivity are dealt with, the structure of this thesis follows a linear progression. It is however better visualised as a spiralling, rather than a straight, line. Chapters Two and Six each represent the starting point of a new cycle in the spiral. The discussion of Maori and Pakeha that takes place in each chapter is less linear and, at times, themes and issues recur. The working of a kaleidoscope provides a useful metaphor for the way in which theories and ‘cases’ are brought together in this thesis. Each chapter represents a turn of the kaleidoscope, allowing a different (theoretical) view of the coloured pieces which ‘make up’ (Hacking, 1986) Maori and Pakeha. Each turn rearranges these same pieces into new patterns, leading to new insights into their relationship.

In Chapter Two, ‘Essentialism and colonial domination’, I explore the impact of essentialist approaches to identity construction on settler/indigene relations. I identify the discourses of primitivism and race as the major forms of essentialism that have influenced Western representations of indigenous peoples. These discourses of the Other are also shown to produce the Western/White Self as modern and dynamic. I briefly trace the histories of primitivism and race and identify their influence in early

European representations of Maori, before turning to their ongoing presence in contemporary representations of Maori and Pakeha. I argue that the contemporary effect of these discourses is to produce the Pakeha subject in terms of lack and the Maori subject in terms of versions of primitivist and/or racist essence. Pakeha strategies of equalisation and indigenisation are presented as responses to this situation. These are analysed for their impact on Maori. It is argued that their continued reliance on primitivism and racism works against Maori political interests in asserting a dynamic Maori difference. Moreover, binary oppositions work to divide Maori into ‘authentic’ (i.e. essentialist) and ‘inauthentic’ groups and simultaneously fail to secure Pakeha identity.

Chapter Three, ‘Ontological hybridities’, centres on accounts of hybrid identity in which hybridity is conceived in terms of the ‘substance’ of an identity. In these instances, hybridisation refers to the offspring of cross-cultural sexual relations and to cross-cultural ‘mixtures’ that result from migration. Two types of ontological hybridity are identified and the chapter is divided into discussion of each. ‘Doubled’ hybridities are those in which the two components remain distinct. Such hybrid identifications are rare in Aotearoa New Zealand and I argue that resistance to them is linked to the politics of biculturalism and to the perceived continuity between hybridisation and the colonial project of assimilation. However, expressions of this hybridity of ‘mixed descent’ do exist. Their proponents seek to express their sense of a dual identity and also argue that their ‘both/and’ location allows them to act as mediators between the Maori and Pakeha communities. Some also see this doubled hybridity as positive in disrupting the binary opposition between Maori and Pakeha. On the other hand, the dangers of assimilation remain and individuals of ‘mixed descent’ are encouraged to identify as Maori as an act of resistance to assimilation.

‘Syncretic’ hybridities are those in which a new singular identity label results from hybridisation. Here I analyse ‘Maori’ and ‘Pakeha’ as the outcome of such processes. Looking at the internal hybridity of Maori identity highlights the tensions between tradition and dynamism, between an authentic essence defining ‘real’ Maori and the embrace of Maori diversity and processes of ‘becoming’ Maori. While I consider that

these tensions register the ongoing impact of colonisation, I also argue that it is the ongoing presence of this diversity which best secures Maori identity against colonial domination. Although Pakeha is clearly a hybridised identity on the basis of both mixtures of descent and migrant origin, little attention to this substance of Pakeha identity is apparent within the culture. I argue this is because of the lack of a political project other than the continued securing of Pakeha domination. In this project, Pakeha access to any substance of identity is blocked by a desire to avoid attending to the legacy of colonial history. As a result, Pakeha culture is ahistorical and can develop no ‘substance’. In conclusion, I argue that ontological hybridity and essentialism remain linked and that hybridity can no more be guaranteed to further the disruption of colonial relations, than can essentialism. Further, both Maori and Pakeha demonstrate a desire to ignore or ‘forget’ the impact of colonisation on their identities: Maori as a means of resistance to that impact, Pakeha to avoid the inevitable challenge to the morality of their identity. The effect of this desire for avoidance is to reinforce the bifurcation of these identities by denying the point at which they meet, thus keeping them locked in conflictual relations.

In Chapter Four, ‘Performative hybridity and the unhomely’, I explore the politics of Homi Bhabha’s theory of hybridity and its usefulness to the reconstruction of Maori/Pakeha relations. I outline Bhabha’s conception of hybridity primarily through discussion of his analysis of colonial mimicry and his utilisation of the concept of the unhomely. Bhabha argues that hybridity founds a resistant agency, offers a means to disrupt the discursive strategies that support colonial relations and evidences a desire for cross-cultural solidarity. In subsequent sections I discuss analyses of Maori and Pakeha identities that either apply, or are compatible with, Bhabha’s approach. I argue that performative hybridity does offer a powerful critical tool for the deconstruction of colonial discourse and for the analysis of the dynamics of settler and indigenous identities under colonialism, but cannot be mapped directly onto the analysis of these identities. I argue that Pakeha, as colonising subjects, utilise colonial mimicry in the service of domination, in a reversal of Bhabha’s argument that hybridity/mimicry serves resistance. However, when the resistant potentiality of hybridity is turned inward,

with colonial history. For Maori, in contrast, while Bhabha’s hybridity offers the same insights into the workings of colonialism and of Maori identity under colonialism, as a mode of identity to be embraced, it is more problematic. For an indigenous people whose identities have been disrupted by colonialism, adherence to further disruption via performativity is seen as compatible with colonialism, rather than disruptive of it. Some ‘substantialist’ basis to identity is necessary to the pursuit of a politics that can resist the continuance of colonial domination.

While Chapter Two canvassed the workings of essentialism in the service of colonial domination, in Chapter Five, ‘Strategic essentialism and indigenous difference’, I look at arguments that assert the politically strategic importance of essentialism for oppressed peoples, with particular reference to the work of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Like Bhabha, Spivak is more of a deconstructionist than an essentialist, but she concedes the political necessity of essentialism. Her deconstructionist commitments remain to the fore however, in that she does not address the political role that might be played by indigenous knowledges in the assertion of indigenous agency. In contrast, I distinguish between the play of strategic essentialism as ‘reverse discourse’, which continues to operate on the terrain of the dominating discourse, and the assertion of autonomous cultural difference. Rather than slipping back into a primitivist stasis, these latter claims are based on a dynamic account of a continuing pre-colonial ‘substance’, or alternative epistemology. With reference to the work of Maori feminist academics, I argue that, without the assertion of autonomous difference no indigenous politics of recovery is possible. Rather, the indigenous project remains reduced to one of resistance, lacking any ‘positivity’. I briefly discuss issues of biology, arguing that descent works as a ‘minimalist essence’, providing a necessary, if not sufficient, ground for indigenous identity claims. In conclusion, I argue that identity claims continue to rely on the interweaving of essentialism and dynamism. For colonised people in particular, recognition and acceptance of the need for both components is the only guard against the assimilatory and exclusionary dangers of both. Finally, I argue that acceptance of the validity of epistemological plurality is crucial to overcoming the ongoing universalisation/domination of Western epistemologies. This acceptance depends on modes of interaction that can account for the ‘facticity’ of difference.

Part II of the thesis shifts attention from theories of subjectivity to theories of intersubjectivity, bringing relations between self and other, and their constitutive role in the construction of identities, to the fore. In Chapter Six, ‘The master-slave dialectic and relations of domination’, I revisit the identity dynamics of colonisation (introduced in Chapter Two) from an intersubjective perspective. I outline Hegel’s analysis of the master-slave relation, linking its dynamics to colonisation through the work of Frantz Fanon, and to speech interactions through the work of Zali Gurevitch. I use Gurevitch’s categorisations of ‘repressive silence’ and the ‘conversation through things’ to explore a range of interactional dynamics between Maori and Pakeha. I argue that these dominating dynamics account for the constitution of Maori and Pakeha as the slave/colonised and master/colonising subjects of the colonial relation. In conclusion, I consider Fanon’s attempts to find a resolution to the master-slave dialectic through a turn to négritude and the espousal of revolutionary violence. I argue that neither offers a way towards a new form of intersubjective relations, but that Fanon’s strength in highlighting the psycho-social harms of ‘misrecognition’ suggests a shift of attention to the possibilities of recognition theory.

Chapter Seven, ‘Recognition and cultural difference’, explores Charles Taylor’s theory of recognition. Taylor distinguishes between two forms of recognition - the expansion of the category of equal dignity and the recognition of cultural difference through judgments of cultural worth. I argue that Taylor’s expansion of equal dignity offers a powerful justification for the assertion of the self-determining autonomy of cultural minorities and for resourced support for the exercise of that autonomy. In contrast, I consider Taylor’s argument for the recognition of cultural difference to be more problematic. I juxtapose this argument with that made by Tariana Turia in a speech to the New Zealand Psychological Society, in which she seeks both the recognition of colonial harm and the recognition of Maori cultural difference. I critique Taylor’s theory of the recognition of difference in relation to Turia’s argument and the critique of Western epistemological domination established earlier in the thesis. I argue that Taylor’s theory ultimately works to secure the centrality of the Western subject, rather than ‘decentring’ that subject, and is wrong in adhering to an singular, epistemological

response to the ‘facticity’ of cultural difference. Against this, Turia’s argument implicitly points to the modification of epistemological relations through the establishment of an ethical relation between self and other.

Chapter Eight, ‘Ethical proximity and the politics of disappointment’, centres on the ethical relation as outlined in the philosophy of Emmanuel Lévinas. I begin by outlining Bhabha’s turn to Lévinas in search of a non-dominating basis to relations between self and other. I outline Lévinas’ conception of the ethical relation and discuss criticisms of its ‘saintliness’ and lack of relevance to political life. Here I centre in particular on the work of Rosalyn Diprose who, while sympathetic to Lévinas’ project, rejects key aspects of his theorisation in an attempt to bring ethics and politics into a closer relation. I reject Diprose’s revised formulation and argue that Lévinas offers us a better, if indeterminate, guide to political practice in our relationships with others. I exemplify my argument with reference to instances of Maori-Pakeha relations. I conclude that Alison Jones’ espousal of a ‘politics of disappointment’, which involves a ‘disappointed’ orientation towards our utopian political aims, and Lévinas’ ethical orientation to the Other, together provide a basis for reformulating the Pakeha political and epistemological relationship to Maori difference.

In Chapter Nine, ‘Conclusion’, I briefly present my final conclusions and observations. I argue that, while identities are necessary to politics, the key to moving ‘beyond’ colonialism is not to be found in a particular theorisation of identity. In my investigation of theories of intersubjectivity, it has become clear that epistemological relations generally, including political and identity-centred interactions, always involve a degree of violence against others. While such relations are necessary to social life, I have argued that they need to be held in tension with an ethical intersubjective relation as espoused by Lévinas. Straddling this tension requires the maintenance of a ‘disappointed’ orientation to our political and epistemological commitments, including our identity claims.

Part I