Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2001 16:28:24 +1000
Subject: for mirza athar baig: on la perruque


Michel de Certeau's concept la perruque, in French, literally means "the 
wig" but it also means, metaphorically, "making do" and is developed in his 
book _the practice of everyday life_. He theorises the instances of doing 
your own work in the workplace, such as copying your domestic electricity 
bill on the office photocopier, as examples of "la perruque." According to 
him, these ruses and legerdemains of the disempowered are strategies that 
carve out a space where the order of the state cannot inscribe itself. He 
also gives the examples of Native Americans's use of colonial legal edicts 
in a cunning way. They make something else out of the system that is 
imposed on them from without. As a concept, one can compare al perruque 
with Ashis Nandy's theorisation of South Asian duplicity in his book _the 
intimate enemy_ where bravery is seen as an ideological apparatus because 
it brings the colonised in direct combat with the coloniser and then the 
coloniser can kill the brave because of their superior weapons. Duplicity 
and deceit do not create a direct conflict but produce microphysical 
heresies within the sacred order of the (colonial) state. One can describe 
"la perruque" as a strategy of survival by cunning and duplicity and 
recognising the ideological baggage in the demands that one become a 
"transparent subject," hence Foucault's statement "Do not ask me who I am, 
and do not ask me to remain the same."

regards,
saeed



     --- from list postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---