While semiotics is not usually associated with subaltern studies, Ranajit Guha relied on a semiotic framework to develop the concept in his early works such as the classic essay of subaltern historiography, The Prose of Counter-Insurgency (1984). In analyzing the event of the Santal Hul, Guha argues that both colonial and nationalist historians read the “indexes” of the events of the Hul through semiotic ideologies that tied the events to colonial “progress,” nationalist rebellion, or class struggles, incorporating the Hul into the narratives of the elite. A subaltern historiography, he suggested, would take seriously what philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce, would call the “Firstness” of historical experience which could lead analysts to develop a more democratic, or truly ‘postcolonial’ historiography.
Guha's methodological proposal, which brings together the intricacies of language, performance, ritual and history finds resonances I suggest with theoretical interventions in anthropology, such as the concept of “indexical order” developed by Michael Silverstein (2003) or the application of Peircian “Firstness” and “Secondness” in the the work of Valentine Daniel on Tamil personhood (1984). By comparing semiotic approaches in anthropology and history, I suggest that we move away from equating the 'subaltern' with a ‘marginal’ or ‘silenced’ subject in itself, and argue that the marginality of what we call 'subalternity' in both history and anthropology could potentially be addressed through a more rigorous, interdisciplinary and semiotically-informed methodology.
I illustrate a way that could be done by examining the historical event of the Santal Hul, the subject of Guha’s essay, through an ethnographic investigation of the communicative practice of writing as practiced in contemporary Santali Adivasi communities. Drawing on Guha and semiotic anthropology, I claim that subaltern history is brought forward in living experience through a series of semiotic correspondences that span modalities of graphic language, ritual practice, and oral performance.
