Summary of talk to the Gender and Law Thematic Group [of the World Bank] by Professor Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak

This document is an email summary of a talk given by Professor Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Avalon Foundation Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University in New York, to the Gender and Law Thematic Group of the World Bank. Professor Spivak spoke of her work in the field of gender, stating that women at the grassroots level are often excluded from discussions of the legal rights and societal role of women. In addition, she stressed that Bank officials and those working in the development field must recognise that sustainable change must come from within, with patient learning from below rather than the impatient imposition from above.