September 3 (M), September 5 (W), September 7 (F), September 10 (M)

Besky, The Darjeeling Distinction: Labor and Justice on Fair-Trade Tea Plantations in India

1. What are the origins of the plantation system in Darjeeling? How are those origins significant for plantation workers today?

2. What is the tripartite moral economy?

3. What is Geographical Indication? How, according to Besky, does it recast plantation production as traditional knowledge? With what effects? Is GI a form of contemporary Orientalism?

4. What is fair trade's vision of justice? How, according to Besky, does fair trade enable particular kinds of extractive practices on Darjeeling tea plantations?

5. What is the Gorkhaland movement? How does it envision justice? What does it assume about tea laborers and their practices? What might Benedict Anderson have to say about it?

6. According to Besky, all three visions of social justice mentioned above (Q 3-5) obscure the tripartite moral economy in which laborers work. How? With what effects? What broader lessons should we take from Besky's analysis of workers' experiences and worldviews?

7. Besky writes, "...[T]he inclusion of Darjeeling plantations in the fair-trade market has not only not brought workers any closer to justice, it has actually undermined non-market mechanisms for ensuring workers' well-being" (27). What evidence leads Besky to make this claim? Do you agree with her assessment? What is the significance of her argument?

 

Topic for RESPONSE PAPER #1 (2-3 pages, double-spaced, due on September 10 by email before class to Professor Leshkowich.)

Colonialism, Nationalism, and Tea
Said, Anderson, and Strassler explore how colonial and postcolonial regimes involved forms of representation through which people came to understand themselves, land, and history. How does Besky's book illustrate and develop (either explicitly or implicitly) these ideas through her analysis of Darjeeling tea plantations under contemporary circumstances of global capitalist production and exchange? What is the significance of her analysis?

To answer these questions, first pick a key point or set of ideas from Said, Anderson, or Strassler. Then, explore how Besky's work relates to that point or those ideas through two concrete cases. To give three examples of how you might construct your paper: 1) You might discuss Strassler's ideas about the role of landscape photography in developing a sense of national identity rooted in rural traditions. Then, you could explore how pictures of tea plantations under British colonialism and contemporary marketing of Geographical Indication function to create certain ideas about Darjeeling land and workers. 2) You might consider how colonial mapping techniques shaped the plantation system and ideas about Gorkha identity that are now important to the Gorkhaland movement. 3) You could explain the key dynamics of Orientalism, as developed by Said, and then explore whether claims about or depictions of plantation workers deployed through Fair Trade or Geographical Indication marketing are Orientalist.

Whatever approach you take, be sure to include a clear thesis statement presenting your own argument about the strengths, weaknesses, and importance of Besky's analysis that you will develop in the body of your paper. Ultimately, your paper should offer a concrete interpretation of what we learn from Besky's book, why that is important (or not), and how the ideas of the other author you have picked help us to see that.