Spivak on feminism and the critical tradition

Renowned literary critic and theorist Professor Gayatri Spivak drew a sizeable crowd when she delivered a Vice-Chancellor's Open Lecture at UCT on 27 September.

Spivak, who holds the title of University Professor at Columbia University in the US, spoke on The Tradition of Critique and Feminist Writing.

Critical thinking, she began, requires an "awareness of the subjective structures of production of the thinking".

It's a rule of thumb Spivak would apply, throughout her lecture, to a number of texts, including - cautiously - to South Africa's Women's Charter for Effective Equality of 1994, and the writings of 18th century feminist philosopher Mary Wollstonecraft.