Comparative Studies in Society and History

Comparative Studies in Society and History is the publication venue for a 1992 debate cited by Edward Said in his discussion of postcolonial scholarship. The exchange between Rosalind O'Hanlon and David Washbrook and Ranajit Guha Prakash’s reply gives a concrete form to a larger argument about how to analyze colonial power, historical evidence, and the agency of subordinated people.

The 1992 Exchange

Said’s reference identifies two contributions: O'Hanlon and Washbrook’s “After Orientalism: Culture, Criticism, and Politics in the Third World,” and Prakash’s “Can the Subaltern Ride? A Reply to O'Hanlon and Washbrook.” He cites them together as appearing in the journal in January 1992, in volume 9, issue 4, on pages 141–184. The paired publication makes the journal a record of an argument rather than merely a source for one isolated claim: Prakash’s piece is explicitly presented as a reply to the earlier essay.

Place in Said’s Discussion

Said invokes the exchange while considering disagreements over postcolonial criticism and the study of Orientalism. He favors what he calls Prakash’s more mobile post-structuralism, while maintaining that the debate deserves to be considered on its merits. For Said, such argument is part of a wider intellectual field in which colonial systems shape subjective relations and historical interpretation, but do not make individual thought or action entirely predictable.

The journal citation therefore anchors a specific scholarly disagreement within Said’s broader account of postcolonial work. It points readers to a discussion of how criticism should address culture and politics in the Third World, and how analyses of colonial power might engage the position and historical agency of subordinated groups.

Scholarly Context and Significance

Said places the exchange alongside his account of postcolonial scholarship’s varied methods and contributions. He argues that this work can be criticized for its limits without reducing it to complicity with neo-colonialism; its achievements should be acknowledged while remaining alert to later pitfalls. In this context, the journal’s publication of both the initial essay and its reply represents a visible site of critical contest, one that Said considers important to understanding the field’s theoretical movement.