Chandra Talpade Mohanty

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Chandra Talpade Mohanty (born 1955) is a Distinguished

Professor of Women's and Gender Studies, Sociology, and the Chandra Talpade Mohanty
Cultural Foundations of Education and Dean's Professor of the
Humanities at Syracuse University. Mohanty, a postcolonial and
transnational feminist theorist, has argued for the inclusion of a
transnational approach in exploring womens experiences across
the world. She is author of Feminism Without Borders:
Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity (Duke University
Press, 2003 and Zubaan Books, India, 2004; translated into
Korean, 2005, Swedish, 2007, and Turkish, 2009, Japanese,
2012 and Italian, 2012), and co-editor of Third World Women
and the Politics of Feminism (Indiana University Press, 1991),
Feminist Genealogies, Colonial Legacies, Democratic Futures Self portrait of Chandra Mohanty
(Routledge, 1997), Feminism and War: Confronting U.S. Born Chandra Talapade Mohanty
Imperialism, (Zed Press, 2008), and The Sage Handbook on
1955
Identities (coedited with Margaret Wetherell, 2010).
Mumbai, India
Her work focuses on transnational feminist theory, anti-capitalist Residence Syracuse, New York
feminist praxis, anti-racist education, and the politics of
knowledge. Central to Mohantys transnational mission is the Academic background
project of building a non-colonizing feminist solidarity across Alma University of Delhi; University of
the borders, through an intersectional analysis of race, nation, mater Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
colonialism, sexuality, class and gender.
Academic work
Institutions Hamilton College; Syracuse
University
Contents
Notable Under Western eyes: Feminist
1 Early life and education works scholarship and colonial discourses
2 Overview of major works
3 Selected publications
4 See also
5 References

Early life and education

Chandra Talpade Mohanty was born in 1955, in Mumbai, India. She has spent time in Nigeria and London. She
became a US citizen and continued her education in the United States.[1]

Mohanty graduated in 1974 with honors and a Bachelor's degree in English from the University of Delhi in India.
She continued her education, earning a Master's degree in English in 1976. She attended the University of Illinois
at Urbana-Champaign, from where she earned a master's degree in Education, specifically in teaching English in
1980. She continued her education in Illinois, earning a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
in 1987. She is additionally the recipient of an Honorary Doctorate, Faculty of Social Sciences, Lund University
Sweden, presented in 2008,[2] and an Honorary Doctorate in humanities from the College of Wooster, Ohio,
awarded in 2012.[3] As of 2013, Mohanty has served as the women's studies department chair at Syracuse
University. Earlier, she served as a professor of women's studies at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York.[2]

She is a member of the advisory boards of Signs, A Journal Of Women in Culture and Society, Transformations,
The Journal of Inclusive Pedagogy and Scholarship, Feminist Africa (South Africa), Asian Women (Korea),
Feminist Economics, and the Caribbean Review of Gender Studies.[4]

Overview of major works

She became known after the publication of her 1984 essay, "Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and
Colonial Discourses",[5] in which she states,

The relationship between 'Woman'a cultural and ideological composite other constructed through
diverse representational discourses (scientific, literary, juridical, linguistic, cinematic, etc.)and
'women'real, material subjects of their collective historiesis one of the central questions the
practice of feminist scholarship seeks to address."[6]

In this essay, Mohanty critiques the political project of Western feminism and its discursive construction of the
category of the "Third World woman" as a generic, homogenous, victimized stereotype that Western feminists
must save. Mohanty states that Western feminisms have tended to gloss over the differences between Southern
women, but that the experience of oppression is incredibly diverse, and contingent upon historical, cultural, and
individual reasons.[6][7] Her paper was a seminal work, highlighting the difficulties faced by feminists from the
Third World in being heard within the broader feminist movement, and it led to a "redefining of power
relationships" between feminists within the First and Third worlds.[5]

In 2003, Mohanty released her book Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity. In
this work, she argues for a bridging of theory and praxis, and the personal and the political. Major themes
addressed include the politics of difference, transnational solidarity building, and anticapitalist struggle against
neoliberal globalization. As well as reprinting "Under Western Eyes", in the final section, "Reorienting Feminism",
Mohanty offers a response to criticism of the essay, and "reiterates her belief in the possibility, indeed necessity, of
building common political projects between Third World and Western feminisms".[8]

Selected publications
Mohanty, Chandra Talpade; Russo, Anne; and Lourdes M. Torres (1991). Third World Women and the
Politics of Feminism, Indiana University Press, 338 pages. ISBN 978-0253206329
Mohanty, Chandra Talpade; and M. Jacqui Alexander (1996). Feminist Genealogies, Colonial Legacies,
Democratic Futures, Routledge Press, 464 pages. ISBN 978-0415912112
Mohanty, Chandra Talpade (2003). Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity,
Duke University Press Books, 300 pages.. ISBN 978-0822330219
Mohanty, Chandra Talpade; Riley, Robin L.; and Minnie Bruce Pratt (2008). Feminism and War:
Confronting U.S. Imperialism, Zed Books, 280 pages. ISBN 978-1848130180
Mohanty, Chandra Talpade; Wetherell, M. (2010). Sage Handbook of Identities, U.K: Sage Publications.
ISBN 978-1412934114

See also
 Postcolonialism
Postcolonial Feminism
Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak

References
1. Formes, Malia. (2005) "Review of Mohanty, Chandra Talpade, Feminism without Borders: Decolonizing Theory,
Practicing Solidarity (http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=10752)". H-Women, H-Net Reviews. Retrieved
April 28, 2013.
2. "Chandra Talpade Mohanty" (http://as-cascade.syr.edu/profiles/pages/mohanty-chandratalpade.html). as-cascade.syr.edu.
Syracuse University. Retrieved 2013-04-27.
3. Finn, John. (May 15, 2012). "College of Wooster's Class of 2012 Receives Final Instructions for the Journey Ahead (htt
p://www.ohio.com/upublish/general-news/college-of-wooster-s-class-of-2012-receives-final-instructions-for-the-journey
-ahead-1.307179)", Akron Beacon Journal. Retrieved April 28, 2013.
4. "Chandra Talpade Mohanty" (http://socialjusticeinitiative.ucdavis.edu/files/2013/10/Chandra-Talpade-Mohanty-Bio.pdf)
(PDF). Social Justice Initiative.
5. Dua, Ena; Trotz, Alissa. (2002). "Transnational Pedagogy: Doing Political Work in Women's Studies (http://journals.msv
u.ca/index.php/atlantis/article/viewFile/1418/1260)". Atlantis 26:2. p66"
6. Mohanty, Chandra Talpade. (1984). "Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses (http://blog.lib.
umn.edu/raim0007/RaeSpot/under%20wstrn%20eyes.pdf)". Boundary 2. 12:3-13:1. pp. 333-358.
7. Felski, Rita. (1997) "The Doxa of Difference". Signs, 23:1. pp. 1-21
8. Thobani, Sunera. (2005). "Feminism without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity (review)", Hypatia: A
Journal of Feminist Philosophy. 20:3. pp 221-224.

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Categories: Feminist studies scholars 1955 births Living people Syracuse University faculty
Multicultural feminism University of Delhi alumni University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign alumni
Postcolonialism

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