Dalit Autobiography Research Articles

Exploring Self-Reflexivity in Selected Dalit Literatures

Dalit literature, which emerged prominently in the 1970s and 1980s, represents a significant shift in Indian literary and cultural discourse. It is deeply connected to the Dalit Panther Movement in Maharashtra, which sought to confront and challenge entrenched caste hierarchies and social injustices. Historically, Indian literature has been dominated by upper-caste perspectives, which marginalized lower-caste voices and reinforced existing social structures. Dalit literature disrupts this hegemony by foregrounding the experiences of those historically marginalized, challenging traditional literary canons that glorify upper-caste perspectives and advocating for a redefined cultural legitimacy. Self-reflexivity, a process of critical self-examination within social contexts, plays a crucial role in Dalit writings. It involves reflecting on one’s identity and its formation within oppressive socio-cultural frameworks. Dalit literature often explores the interplay between spatial identity and caste discrimination, emphasizing how physical and social spaces are laden with historical and cultural meanings. This reflexivity enables Dalit writers to question and reconfigure their identities in response to systemic inequalities. Historically, Dalit writings can trace their roots back to Vedic traditions that justified caste hierarchies. Figures like Sharankumar Limbale and Eleanor Zelliot highlight how Dalit literature is a counter-narrative to these oppressive traditions. Early Dalit writers, influenced by social reformers like B.R. Ambedkar and movements such as Bhakti, used their works to critique caste-based injustices and advocate for social change. Education has been a transformative force in Dalit autobiographies, serving as a means for personal and societal advancement. Despite historical resistance to the education of untouchables, British colonial reforms and missionary schools played a pivotal role in improving educational access. Figures like Jyotiba Phule further advanced educational opportunities for marginalized communities, challenging entrenched social norms and promoting empowerment through learning.

Construction of Self in Aravind Malagatti’s Government Brahmana

The issues based on caste, gender, and religion have been imprinted upon the medium of art. The canvas of literature has many a time laid focus on the discrimination based on caste. This theme has been etched in different hues. The subject of being dominated, discriminated, and the stigma attached to it has been justified by the individual ideologies of Dalit and Non-Dalit writers. But in this prominent autobiographical work titled Government Brahmana, by Arvind Malagatti there is a different perspective is presented. Dalit autobiographies speak about the rampant practices of intolerance towards Dalits and have significantly impacted society, In a step ahead, Arvind Malagatti Dalitatva is the literature that has the flow of Dalit consciousness throughout. This autobiography Government Brahmana speaks about various sagas the writer witnessed in different stages of life. In the beginning, he justifies the title Government Brahmana by considering the benefits given by the government to Dalits in comparison to the ideology of Brahmanism which was in practice from Sanatana Dharma. Later he draws the attention of readers by revealing how his name was misinterpreted in school and a variety of punishments imposed on him. He also writes about the ways in which the society marginalized the people belonging to his community in the name of untouchables. His writings not only interpret the chaos of marginalization but also reflect the consciousness of constructing his identity in tackling the hurdles. This apparently resulted in oppression and alienation after the country became sovereign. Apart from this, he has been able to contemplate his narrative style using his special dialect to withstand the interest of readers in the original text. It is good to know that the same has been achieved in the translational work by translators.

Book review: Sonya Surabhi Gupta (Editor), Subalternities in India and Latin America: Dalit Autobiographies and the Testimonio

Sonya Surabhi Gupta (Editor), Subalternities in India and Latin America: Dalit Autobiographies and the Testimonio, London, Routledge, 2022, 228 pp., ₹995. ISBN: 978-0-367-36097-9 (Paperback)

When They Know Us: Do Dalit Lives Matter?

This paper explores the concept of knowing in caste-ridden Dalit lives using the analogy of seeing in the context of the Black African-American racial society, where race is identified primarily through skin colour. Thus, the ‘Black body’ is marked by the act of seeing. A Dalit body, however, is usually discovered through knowing caste. Knowing is a complex mediated by caste, class, race, religion, occupation, spatiality, language and other forms of placement. Knowing is imperative in the context of a representative democracy to ensure social justice and the equitable distribution of government services. But does knowing someone’s identity lead to equal treatment and equal respect, which constitute the substantive measures of democracy? I argue that knowing is a mode used to perpetuate caste, based on everyday ways in which Hindus live their lives. Pursuing this question, I problematise the concept of knowing in the trajectory of Dalit lives. I then take Ambedkar’s ‘Waiting for a Visa’, situated in the genre of Dalit autobiographies, to illustrate the concept of knowing. Finally, I ask: given the politics of knowing, how do Dalit lives matter when practising caste?

Utilizing Dalit Autobiographies in History

In the academic field, debates in the discipline of history largely contest whether the people whose narratives are absent in the dominant archives of knowledge, including Dalits, can be considered as devoid of history. Such contestations raise queries about the ways in which these groups form a sense of their past. In this light, can we consider cultural forms of narrative as reliable and ‘valid’ means to form an understanding of past, and to what extent? Can the cultural narrative forms, particularly autobiographical accounts, be utilized to reflect on the past of these communities? What methodologies does such an approach demand, and what challenges does it pose? This paper shall grapple with these intriguing inquiries. It attempts to position Dalit autobiographies and their utility in locating the sense of their past and in the larger knowledge production. This paper fundamentally proposes that Dalit autobiographies can lend crucial insights into the history of Dalit communities and beyond. These autobiographies can provide a perspective ‘from below’ and contribute to understanding how Dalits made sense of their past into narratives. I argue that Dalit articulation of their life experiences in the form of autobiographies not only rupture the assumptions of a singular past but also foregrounds the multiplicities and specificities to their everyday experiences.

A Gujarati Dalit Autobiography by B. Kesharashivam: 'Purna Satya'

Kesharashivam, the author of Gujarati 'Purnsatya' autobiography, was born on 28-9-1940 in Kalol, Mehsana district of North Gujarat. His native place is 'Adewad' village. His real name is Bhikhabhai Shivabhai Jadav. Mother's name is Kesharben. Taking the name of his mother and father together with the nickname 'B. Kesharashivam', he has been active in the field of literature. By creating stories, essays and novels in Gujarati Dalit literature, B. Kesharasivam has gained much fame as a Dalit writer. If we study his stories, essays or novels, we will definitely hear the sound of his personal experiences or empathy. He wrote only Dalit literature. He has also received many awards for his literary works. Looking at the two parts of 'Purna Satya', we find the first part more interesting and creative. The language is simple and easy in style. In the first part of this work, the creator has depicted the condition and direction of his life by covering the events of childhood and curriculum. So, in the second part, the situation in which they perform their duties during their job is depicted. In which the creator seems to give a chart of the social reform works he does after becoming a government official. In the first part, the author appears as a creator, while in the second part, he appears more as a reformer.
 
 Abstract in Gujarati Language:
 ગુજરાતી 'પૂર્ણસત્ય' આત્મકથાના લેખક બી.કેશરશિવમ્ નો જન્મ તા.૨૮-૯-૧૯૪૦ના રોજ ઉત્તર ગુજરાતના મહેસાણા જિલ્લાના કલોલમાં થયો. તેમનું મૂળવતન ‘આડેવાડ’ ગામ છે. તેમનું અસલ નામ ભીખાભાઈ શિવાભાઈ જાદવ છે. માતાનું નામ કેશરબેન છે. તેમના માતા અને પિતાનું નામ સાથે રાખી 'બી.કેશરશિવમ્' ઉપનામ રાખીને તેઓ સાહિત્ય ક્ષેત્રે પ્રવૃત્ત થયા છે. ગુજરાતી દલિત સાહિત્યક્ષેત્રે વાર્તા, નિબંધ અને નવલકથાઓનું સર્જન કરીને બી.કેશરશિવમે દલિત સાહિત્યકાર તરીકે ઘણી પ્રસિદ્ધિ મેળવી છે. એમની વાર્તાઓ, નિબંધો કે નવલકથાઓનો અભ્યાસ કરીએ તો તેમાંથી એમના જાતઅનુભવો કે સ્વાનુભૂતિનો રણકો આપણને અવશ્ય સંભળાય છે. તેમણે માત્ર ને માત્ર દલિત સાહિત્ય લખ્યું છે. એમને એમના સાહિત્ય સર્જન માટે અનેક પારિતોષિકો પણ પ્રાપ્ત થયા છે. ‘પૂર્ણ સત્ય’ના બે ભાગ જોતા તેનો પ્રથમ ભાગ આપણને વધારે રસાત્મક અને સર્જનાત્મક લાગે છે. ભાષાની દૃષ્ટિએ સાદી અને સરળ શૈલીમાં છે. આ કૃતિના પ્રથમ ભાગમાં સર્જકે બાળપણ અને અભ્યાસક્રમના પ્રસંગોને આવરીને પોતાના જીવાતા જીવનની દશા અને દિશાનું આલેખન કર્યુ છે. તો બીજા ભાગમાં તેમની નોકરી દરમ્યાન પોતાની ફરજ બજાવવામાં આવતી સ્થિતિ-પરિસ્થિતિની વાતને આલેખી છે. જેમાં સર્જક સરકારી અધિકારી બની ગયા પછી સમાજ સુધારાના જે કાર્યો કરે છે, તેનો માંડીને આલેખ આપતા જણાય છે. પહેલા ભાગમાં લેખક સર્જક તરીકે ઉપસી આવે છે તો બીજા ભાગમાં સુધારક તરીકે વધારે ઉપસી આવતા લાગે છે.
 Keywords: પૂર્ણસત્ય, બંધાણી, ઘર સંચાવા, છાણાં વીણવા, પોદળા લેવા જવું, ગધેડાની લાદ

Games, Mimesis and the Environmental-Imagination: Childhood in Select Dalit Autobiographies

The theme of childhood remains an integral part of any life-writing narratives and, when it comes to Dalit autobiographies it is no exception. Strikingly, researchers on Dalit autobiographies have focused mostly on the ‘darker-side’ of the childhood by revealing only the socio-economic deprivations (food, clothes and shelter), plight, and the mental trauma and physical abuse, humiliation, and pain of the Dalit children, often overlooking the diversifying aspects of Dalit childhood. Though caste system pushes Dalit children to live in isolated ghettos, they still create their own imaginary world within the confines of their Dalit inhabitations by playing games with things available at hand, by role-playing some characters seen in their environs, by celebrating traditional festivals, and by listening to the elders’ stories! The article, therefore, attempts to examine how the playful activities of Dalit children, as represented in the autobiographies, embody an ecological imagination of interconnectedness. By inscribing their lived experience of subjugation in nature, Dalit children not only share a relationship of common oppression with the environment, but such an entanglement sheds new insights on the human–non-human relationship. I have chosen four Dalit autobiographies to exemplify the fact that through their games and play Dalit-children nurture an ‘intra-active’ communication between humans and the non-human environment which in turn makes ‘multispecies liveability possible’. The article draws insights from eco-criticism to reflect on the embodied experience of Dalit childhood.

Articulating Dalit Autobiographical Narratives in Social Work Education: Ideological Imperatives for Anti-Caste and Ubuntu Practice

Dalit and subaltern literature have gained colossal space in the global academic community. This literature is prominently studied, analyzed and used in literary, cultural or linguistic studies in national and international universities. The use of literary texts such as autobiographical narratives in social work teaching, research and practice is a less researched area. In this article, the author has highlighted the importance of Dalit autobiographies and how they could be used as an indigenous knowledge source in social work teaching and practice to strengthen anti-caste/anti-oppressive perspectives among social work educators, students and practitioners. This emancipatory framework could also help to address the structural as well as micro-macro level issues to ensure the realization of social justice and human rights as a foundation and core principles of the social work profession.

A Corpus-based Study on Selected Dalit Autobiographies

Dalit literature represents consciousness about human rights. Autobiographies written by Dalit authors are based on real-life experiences. Based on the conducted studies regarding Dalit autobiographies, women are the ones who suffer oppression and violence to a great extent (Simon, 2021) since they are the backbone of the family. Therefore, how Dalit autobiographies draw their reader’s attention is essential and makes these autobiographies unique. In recent years, text analysis tools have been introduced to facilitate information extraction from a collection of texts and compare two or more texts. So, this article using text mining tools aims to analyze three selected Dalit autobiographies of women writers. The central hypothesis of this study is that sufferers, their families and society have higher frequency in Dalit autobiographies and semantic relations between these elements at the lexical level are available. Based on the findings of this study, only in Dutt’s work, keyword in contexts (KWICs) such as “Dalit, caste, India” had higher frequencies than two other works. In Halder’s work, the frequency of these KWICs was zero. Accordingly, it can be said that in recent years, authors are explicitly willing to attract their readers’ attention toward Dalits and their problems.

Daya Pawar’s Baluta: a Discourse of Dalit Marginalization

Baluta is a realistic and thrilling discourse about how the Dalit community faces multiple forms of marginalization. Daya Pawar’s Baluta is credited as the first Dalit autobiography in Marathi language. Traditionally, Dalits have been denied representation in Indian history and literature. The upper caste ruling classes have scripted their history by depriving them of the right to get an education. The history of the Dalits is one of brutality, hardship, marginalization, exploitation, and compromise. They are forced into ignorance by social injustice and inequality, and they are forced to live in a hostile atmosphere of estrangement and compromise that is oppressive. An eye-opening portrayal of the social, cultural, and political prejudice against Dalits can be found in Daya Pawar's current autobiography, Baluta, which has been chosen for analysis.

Intersection of caste and gender in Dalit Autobiography: A comparative study of Joothan and The Weave of My Life: A Dalit Woman's Memoirs

In Dalit literature, autobiography has been an influential mode of narrative. It has been a crucial confessional instrument for expressing the plight of the underprivileged and bringing attention to several levels of oppression experienced by the outcaste. Dalit autobiographies discuss the plight of the Dalit in India and provide insight into how they challenge the power of the upper caste. However, there are two methods to approach this resistance. One, where it discusses the Dalit community's battles against the horrors committed by the higher caste. Second, it has been used as a potential tool to address how women are doubly marginalised in the Dalit community. Dalit women are more marginalised than Dalit men due to the economic, social and cultural factors. In the proposed paper, there will be a comparative study of the two chief autobiographies- one by a male author, second by a female author. The paper would study the representation of gender divide and its intersection with caste atrocities in the selected works. It aims to shed more light on the apparent differences and similarities between autobiographies written by a woman and a man respectively and try to analyse the mode with reference to gender inequality and caste.

Dalit Autobiographies as Counter Publics: An Exploratory Essay

Despite Bourdieu’s warning that autobiography is a form of narcissism and a decline into navel gazing, as it were, the genre of autobiography is a well-recognized medium in contemporary scholarship. In particular, there has been recognition of the autobiographies of subaltern populations as representations of their lived experience, which was hitherto unknown to broader audiences. Such autobiographical texts are increasingly popular ways of understanding the lives of marginalized, excluded “others” that are obfuscated by the veils of difference, entitlement and privilege. This paper seeks to examine this trend through the lens of some Dalit autobiographies and to examine how autobiographical narratives bring out, with rich insight, poignancy and great detail, the everyday lives of Dalit men and women. At the same time, such autobiographical writings unwittingly push the Dalit subaltern into a narrative form that emphasizes the experience of wretchedness, isolation and exclusion. By bringing in the struggle, individual and collective acts of agency against caste dominance, the autobiographies simultaneously constitute “subaltern counter publics,” to use Nancy Fraser’s persuasive term. This confirms that autobiographies are a formidable medium for not only the representation of Dalit experience of subalternity but also of the possibilities for transformation as these emerge through the experience of Dalit writers. The conundrum is whether autobiography is an enabling genre for understanding lived experience or more worryingly poses the problem of reproducing subaltern subjectivity. I conclude that Dalit autobiographies indeed mark a movement towards change through the fierce struggle and independence that they also represent.

WE ARE WHAT WE EAT”: READING FOOD AS A METAPHOR OF CULTURAL IDENTITY IN SELECT DALIT NARRATIVES

The identification of multiple layers of subjugation, primarily on the basis of caste, class and gender, has formed the basis of reading Dalit narratives. The complex structure of these powerful forces of domination has evolved over a long period of time in the Indian subcontinent. The intensity and manner of caste-based practices vary from region to region. This diversity has resulted mainly due to differences in geographical as well as ecological variant of spaces. Dalit autobiographies and creative writings have focused on such representation of social stratification which are unique to their situation and identity. An interesting element in these texts is the focus on food as well as elaborate culinary details. Food assumes an important aspect of the identity of the characters and their negotiation with life. Detailed descriptions of food cooked and consumed in day-to-day life is seen to be a part and parcel of these narratives. Also significantly, the association of food with various ritualistic practices bring about the cultural connotation of dietary restrictions in conjunction with a community’s identity. Many contemporary regional writers from across the country have dealt with the shackles of caste discrimination and its powerful impact on social stratification. Well-known authors of Dalit literature – Baby Kamble (b. 1929), Urmila Pawar (b.1945), and Perumal Murugan (b. 1966) – among others, have focused on the multi-layered shades of caste, class, and gender in their books. Their narratives, while portraying the dominant structure of caste and class, take the readers through the metaphor of food and culinary activities which form the basis of the identity of their characters. This paper is an attempt to study select novels by Kamble, Pawar, and Murugan to explore the metaphor of food vis-à-vis the dominant structure of caste, class and gender hierarchies. The paper will be based on the theoretical foundation of Dalit Feminism to explore the silent voices of the oppressed.

Struggling for Freedom from Caste in Colonial India: The Story of Rettaimalai Srinivasan

Rettaimalai Srinivasan (1860–1945), a Dalit leader in colonial India, argued that there were two kinds of freedom struggles being waged in the region–one against the British and the other against caste. His autobiography, published in Tamil in 1938, is likely the first Dalit autobiography, and along with his other papers, pamphlets, and speeches comprises a potent anti-caste archive that is yet to be studied. In these texts, Srinivasan defined untouchability as a complex of social and economic practices and emphasized the role of Dalit leadership in undoing these practices. As his work indicates, the freedom struggle against caste required a re-signification of caste names and untouchability itself and an increased representation of Dalit groups within governance. By seeking to turn the name of the Pariah caste into one that could be used with pride, he continuously grappled with the question of self-representation and an appropriate vocabulary to do so. His definition of untouchability as intimately linked with agrarian labour lies at the heart of his emphasis on the importance of Dalit representatives governing and leading people from these communities towards freedom.

WE are Dalit History

Life writings had time and again been used as source material for historical research both in the West and the various literary cultures of South Asia. Considering the absence and a deliberate, socially conditioned erasure of Dalit history from the mainstream narratives of Indian historiography, some scholars have introduced the notion of viewing Dalit life writings as exercises in history writing. This article explores several Dalit autobiographies as instances of engagement with the process of constructing history of Dalit communities in India. Starting from this premise, it undertakes a preliminary analysis of various narrative strategies employed in Hindi autobiographies by Dalit authors in the hope of revealing the nature of their engagements with India’s past and present. The study presented in this paper is based on four relevant examples of prose in Hindi—by Kausalya Baisantri, Sushila Takbhaure, Omprakash Valmiki, and Sheoraj Singh Bechain.

Reading Dalit Autobiographies in English: A Top Ten List

Dalit autobiography has joined protest poetry as a leading genre of Dalit Literature since the nineteen seventies. Finding their inspiration in the social and political activism of B. R. Ambedkar (1891-1956), leader of the India’s anti-caste movement and a founding father of the Republic, low caste men and women have documented their struggles and victories in the face of ongoing violence and deprivation. Surveying ten life narratives translated into English from Marathi, Hindi, and Kannada, the essay treats works by Ambedkar, Daya Pawar, Sharankumar Limbale, Baby Kamble, Laxman Gaikwad, Siddhalingaiah, Omprakash Valmiki, Urmila Pawar, Vasant Moon and Namdeo Nimgade. Tracing the origins of Dalit autobiography in the writings of Siddharth College and Milind College students in the 1950s, protest writers in the 1960s, and the Dalit Panthers and their followers in the 1970s, the survey identifies recurring themes of social exclusion, poverty, patriarchy, survival and assertion in the realms of politics, employment, education, and religion. These intimate testimonials share a radical vision of social transformation across caste, class, gender, linguistic and geographic boundaries and provide a needed corrective to mainstream portraits of modern Indian social history.

A call for mutual change and progress: An interview with Aravind Malagatti and Dharani Devi Malagatti

This interview with Dr Aravind Malagatti and Dr Dharani Devi Malagatti, conducted in Mysore, India, in April 2019, was one of several interviews I conducted for my doctoral thesis that examines caste system and Dalit struggles in the context of India. Dr Aravind Malagatti has contributed more than sixty books to Kannada literature, out of which his autobiography, Government Brahmana published in 1994 is considered the first Dalit autobiography in Kannada ( Government Brahmana, 2007). It was translated and published in English in 2007, and Dr Dharani Devi Malagatti is one of the three translators who translated the work. In this interview, Government Brahmana is discussed as a springboard to understand the social, economic, religious, political and legal aspects of caste and its practices in modern India. Dr Aravind Malagatti provides anecdotes to explain the significance of Dalit consciousness, what it entails and who can possess it. His responses are powerful statements calling for mutual change and progress for Dalits and non-Dalits. Dr Dharani Devi Malagatti talks about the challenges of translating the radical aesthetics of Dalit personal narratives as well as the scope and possibilities offered through translation. The interview explores the undertones of patriotism in Dalit identity, and the synthesis of individual and collective consciousness.

Tracing Buried Selves: In Search of Punjabi Dalit Woman Autobiography

This article is an attempt to understand the significance of autobiographies with particular reference to Punjabi dalit women. In fact, autobiographies are one of the effective mediums for breaking the silence and create a constructive dialogue among people. These dialogues are prerequisite for the solidarity, democracy, equality and fraternity in the society. Besides, the autobiographies from the marginalized section challenge the exploitative established norms. Therefore, to write autobiographies is a courageous act full of risk and daring. In this context, there are more than hundred dalit autobiographies written in Indian languages, but in Punjabi literary discourses only a few dalit autobiographies have been written. However, according to Census 2011, in Punjab state, population of Scheduled Caste people is highest in India that constitutes 31.94% of the population in comparison to 16.6% in the entire country. Despite the largest population of dalits in Punjab, shockingly, there is not a single autobiography that has been written by a dalit woman until date. In this situation, it is a challenge for educated Punjabi dalit women to write their life narratives or autobiographies. They have to represent not only their pain in front of the world but also write about the consciousness, unconsciousness and subconsciousness of their community women who have not got opportunity to attain education. This article will examine and trace the problematics and complexities of gaps and silences so far as autobiographies of Punjabi dalit women are concerned.

From Worse than Dogs to Heroic Tigers: Situating the Animal in Dalit Autobiographies

Dalit autobiographies narrate the journey of protagonists from the ‘untouchable’ communities of India towards self-realisation and their struggle for human rights. A vigilant reading recognises the representation of animals as tropes in Dalit autobiographies that trace the reconstitution of the non-human limit of the Dalit as narrative subject. This paper reads Dalit autobiographies by Narendra Jadhav, Bama and Namdeo Nimgade to reveal the importance of animals as an analogy in Dalit literature, but then, following the work of Spivak and Derrida, it deconstructs the circulation of the hegemonic logic of the rational humanist subject in the radical gesture of Dalit subject constitution.

Caste Amid Aspiration and Opportunity: Everyday Struggles of Dalits to Gain Access to Education

AbstractIn India, there are a number of Dalit autobiographies and Bollywood movies that narrate the humiliation of Dalits in various spheres of their life. The autobiographies of Dalits and a few prominent Bollywood movies capture the struggles of Dalits to obtain a high level of education. Education has been one of the primary instruments for Dalits to achieve upward mobility. Drawing from two prominent Dalit autobiographies by Tulasi Ram and Omprakash Valmiki, two Bollywood movies—Pariksha and Arakshan, and my own fieldwork experience with Dalit students confirms the experience of Subodh, a Dalit student who is currently pursuing higher education in Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University, Lucknow. The experiences of Subodh exemplify the humiliations a Dalit experiences in educational institutions and the struggles of Dalits to use education to achieve upward mobility.