Domination and the arts of resistance : hidden transcripts /

This imaginative and innovative study should facilitate social scientists' understanding of the impact of domination on public discourse. In this respect, the volume invites comparison with the seminal contributions of B. Moore, especially Injustice: The Social Bases of Obedience and Revolt (CH, Dec'78) a volume Scott utilizes and discusses. One of the blind spots in mainstream political science, the "infrapolitics of subordinate groups," is vividly illuminated by this wide-ranging study of power that draws on insights from folklore studies, George Eliot's novels, and other varied sources. The only serious weakness may be a shallow reading of Gramsci's "hegemony" as a theory of "false consciousness." Nevertheless, Scott makes a brilliant case for more research, comparing "the hidden transcript of subordinate groups with the hidden transcript of the powerful and both hidden transcripts with the public transcript they share." Scott's probing analysis of the roots of "counterhegemonic discourse" is a major contribution to the study of social and political change. Upper-division undergraduates and above. -H. G. Reid, University of Kentucky