Abstract
Based on more orthodox interpretations of ‘exile’ such as those put forward by Edward Said, many similarities can be drawn between the ideas of exile- particularly the notion of internal exile - and the outcaste that we see in the form of the Dalit in India. In this paper, we will firstly analyse the conceptual linkages between ‘exile’, ‘outcast’, and ‘outcaste’, highlighting both points of interchangeableness and departure for these notions as they relate specifically to the late Tokugawa Japanese ‘outcaste’ groups known as eta and hinin who were officially liberated through the Emancipation Edict promulgated in 1871. Second, after a brief background discussion where we problematize the above notions through the lenses of time and space, we will examine the state/condition of being an outcaste in the late Tokugawa period, and consider how close this situation was to a state of exile. Third, we will examine a specific example of the act of re-inclusion of outcastes into their local community created by the 1871 Emancipation Edict that led to the creation of the ‘former outcaste’ or ‘new citizen’, and analyse to what extent this embodies the process of returning from exile. Lastly, the paper will conclude with a brief discussion of the extent to which a crossover between the terms ‘outcaste’ and ‘exile’ may be applicable in the Japanese context, as well as the positive aspects of attempting such a conceptual reconfiguration for historians and activists working on the Buraku problem.
Highlights
Exile is one of the saddest fates
The association between exile and outcast that Edward Said eludes to here evokes powerful images
For Said, exile, in its premodern form of banishment, was tragic. This was the case because it physically dislodged people from cherished landscapes brimming with familiar bodies, but because it tore the subject away from a home, an environment, and a history, transforming the displaced being into both a physical and emotional outcast
Summary
Exile is one of the saddest fates. In pre-modern times banishment was a dreadful punishment since it meant years of aimless wandering away from family and familiar places, and meant being a sort of permanent outcast, someone who never felt at home, and was always at odds with the environment, inconsolable about the past, bitter about the present and the future. For Said, exile, in its premodern form of banishment, was tragic This was the case because it physically dislodged people from cherished landscapes brimming with familiar bodies, but because it tore the subject away from a home, an environment, and a history, transforming the displaced being into both a physical and emotional outcast. The exile in this passage takes on a somewhat orthodox appearance, as Marie-Paule Ha has noted, a notion resting upon the ‘assumption of a convergence of the self and the native place’ (Ha 2001, para.[1]) It is this familiar exilic form that will largely inform the ensuing discussions of the subject below. Portal Journal of Multidisciplinary International Studies Vol 2, No 1 January 2005 ISSN: 1449-2490 http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/portal/splash/
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