Delbello - Mohawk Interruptus

Mohawk Interruptus  - 02/20/2017

Audra Simpson’s Mohawk Interruptus deals primarily with settler colonialism from a duality of positions, which regards both her involvement in the community and the community itself, she employs a methodology which attempts to escape classical essentialization and “orientalization” of indigenous narration. How can we discuss native culture without the dangers of reifying them in pre-constructed categories that are complacent with domination?

She focuses on the methodological stakes and possible approaches to use when doing research about a familiar topic that happens to be complicated, such as the politics involved in Mohawks as subjects. So she analyzes it as a case of settler colonialism which for her is “defined by a territorial project- the accumulation of land- whose seemingly singular focus differentiates it from other forms of colonialism. (P.19)” Thus it is not about forced expropriation of labor but rather of land, so “indigenous” people must be eliminated in order for the project to be successful in the settler-colonial model.

I appreciate how Simpson criticizes the commonly used recognition issue as a “gentler form, perhaps, or the least corporeally violent way of managing Indians and their difference, a multicultural solution… (p.20).” I agree with her when she articulates that the “liberal argumentation” passes through a form of toleration that is still within the settler-colonial model and that political recognition is still a form of settler governance. So her way of responding through this is very interesting, it’s through refusal, she argues, or better, refusals. Refusal is a very interesting notion, I believe, and a way to get outside of hegemonic narrative of domination that are usually engendered by the same will to get outside of those. There is often a subtle dialectic in sociological accounts, I argue, that makes it impossible for marginalized people to get outside of a structure of domination. As Simpson argues, political recognition is “in its simplest terms, to be seen by another as one wants to be seen (p.23).”

I think that in a project of liberation the idea of refusal to be seen is very important, it’s a complete refusal of the status quo and not a coming to terms with structures of power, as unfortunately often happens with many sociological and anthropological accounts.

My question would be how do we then move from this active project to a new one? What about the settlers? Can we talk about a new stage that is a completely new and radical rearrangement of the political landscape? And if yes, what could this look like?