Conclusion: The Landscape

Abstract

Many people in the world are being left out in the globalisation game, or the universalistic language of civility and legality, or the use of English. Yet they are expected to play by these rules. Some of them refuse to do so and speak in their own language. In fact, the subaltern is speaking everywhere, but it is the ideology of the ‘civilised’ that prevents people from listening. Likewise, the villagers who oppose to the construction of the sewer, or those who oppose to the destruction of a small path, seem to stand in the way of progress, but their act and stories speak, telling us that universalistic modernisation and capitalistic development are not so universal as they may seem. Instead of being backward-looking, these people, with their own history, memories and worldviews, are just different. History has not ended. Through their language and actions and making a detour to the past, they are pointing to an alternative future.