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Saussy, Haun, ed. 2006. Comparative literature in an age of globalization. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. $60.00 hc. $24.95 sc. xiii + 261 pp.

Article Excerpt
As one of a series of decennial reports by the American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA), Comparative Literature in an Age of Globalization offers itself as a "report on the state of the discipline" in 2004; but unlike previous ACLA reports it is conceived of by its editor, Haun Saussy, as "a multi-vocal report" in which nineteen authors present their arguments on the development of comparative literature in the contemporary era of globalization (viii). A common thread is provided by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's Wellek Library lectures, published as Death of a Discipline (2003), and the nineteen contributors were invited to impress, alarm, delight, and stimulate their readership by disagreeing with Saussy and each other about the significance of Spivak's text for the discipline. The collection thus offers the reader an opportunity to synthesize perspectives and develop their own points of view on the state, history, and future of comparative literature.

In Death of a Discipline, Spivak contends that the Euro/US-centric discipline of comparative literature must not merely transcend national borders, but also its location within disciplinary boundaries. Stressing the potential hazards of comparative literature practiced as a single discipline, Spivak...

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