ly. . . . [Since] consciousness of also contains elements of critique of that consdousness ... we should encourage the growth of politics based on hopeful signs of popular giving up on whiteness (3; my emphasis). In attempt to break the hegemonic silence (Walton 780) that has served either to trivialize or to reify racial identification, this paper places race and at the heart of Freudian theories of subjectivity. We must take seriously that the modern discourse of race is post-1 400s European invention, which differs markedly from other sociocul turai hierarchies such as caste {varna) or occupational group (Jati) in South Asia (Snowden, Bernal, Dumont, Gailey, and Nandy) . As Roger Sanjek suggests in his introduction to Race , race is remarkable condensation of differences among social class, cultural practices, and language into physical appearance specifically, skin color, facial features, and hair texture. Sanjek writes: No other historical or ethnographic order . . . has been as globally inclusive in its assignment of social and cultural differences to 'natural causes' as has post-1400's racism (2). Whiteness is structuring principle of racial meaning; as linguistic construct, it also subjects individuals to fantasmatic identification that the body's surface seems to literalize. In this respect, we must consider per se and in principle as elaborate conceits. The rich ambiguity of is worth reviewing here. According to the OED , the word obtains from the idea of deception. Its meanings derive from understanding of opinion, judgment, or estimation. The more familiar use of as an overweening opinion of oneself; overestimation of one's own qualities, personal vanity or pride; conceitedness dates from the seventeenth century. This word's figurative turn as witticism, a far-fetched turn of thought, figure, etc.; affectation of thought gained popularity in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This alliance of belief, arrogance, and witticism makes thinking of as conceit or linguistic knot quite appropriate.2 To clarify one's subjection to this conceit, we must note the reproduction of in the colonial scene, which offers the most undisguised view of race relations. In the following section, I briefly locate the significance of race as category of analysis by arguing for more relational understanding of sexuality. I suggest that feminist accounts of sexual difference despite their emphasis on the ideological or fantasmatic nature of identification are necessarily incomplete to the extent that they downplay or ignore that racial identification is as crucial element of subject formation. Using George Orwell's essay Shooting Elephant (1935), I shall focus on recurring This content downloaded from 157.55.39.45 on Fri, 02 Sep 2016 05:34:51 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
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