In Response to Pratt...

I’m a little unclear on what exactly a genre of resistance is. But I do think that Pratt introduces the idea of resistance through communication verbal v. non-verbal, and written v. non-written and how those texts work to form societies “Accepted westernized history.” She explores this idea through the analysis of autoenthnographic texts. These texts are those written by someone within a culture that seeks to analyze their placement in the world as a culture against how someone outside of their culture places them. There are many purposed of this genre to not only combat a westernized view of non westernized cultures but also to show how history falsely represents non-written cultures.

Pratt contextualizes Guaman Poma’s project through the theory of contact zones. She defines each picture as a cultural representation of its infrastructures and social placement of sexes, religions, and how symbolism can be more descriptive then pages and pages of text. Many cultures wrote their histories in books, and historical text but Pratt aimed to represent the idea that non-written history can be just as effective and any other type of written history.

The most important point that Pratt makes in this article is that history can be recorded and written or not-written and any form. A cultures history does not lose its significance because it is not recorded in textual format. Another point that Pratt makes is what contact zones actually are. She begins her piece with an example of contact zones with her son and children and ends her piece with a contact zone within her classroom. She also aims to point out the positive and negative effects of contact zones. Contact zones can provoke meaningful conversation and argumentative ones. But contact zones can also get to the derivative of problems that have been continually overlooked because it’s easier to do so.

I would like to discuss Pratt’s discussion of Guaman Poma’s and its effectiveness. It would also be effective to discuss Pratt’s definition of “safe houses” and if such a space could actually exist.