Paper short abstract:

The hegemonization of the Dalit self is reflected through multiple processes and the focus of this paper is on caste hegemony which contains an entire universe, imposing ‘otherness’ through the mechanism of space, symbol, language, institutions, identities, socio-economic, political and cultural practices.

Paper long abstract:

The embodied semiotics of the Thoti symbolizes the manifestation of a caste society. The Thoti belongs to a particular family from the caste of untouchables who through his persona reproduces the everyday sites of caste exclusion. His stick with a rattle at one end makes his caste identity visual and audible. He acts as a bridge between the caste society and the untouchable community. A descendant of the Thoti family, it has been the researcher's constant endeavour to battle entrenched prejudices both apparent and invisible. The analysis is based on actual experiences which are verbalized, visualized and made audible, the embodied framing of a sequence of actual events. The narrative begins from the researcher's birth place to the nation's capital. The endeavour is to put forward the ethnography of ideas that looks into the politics in and of culture as part of a social conspiracy of the caste ridden undemocratic social order. Interestingly, caste based exclusion is an evolutionary process keeping pace with modernity.

Paper short abstract:

The paper examines the production of untouchability through a sensory politics of smell and odours by locating it in Hindi Dalit autobiographical literature.

Paper long abstract:

George Orwell writes in 'The Road to Wigan Pier', "…the real secret of class distinctions can be summed up in four frightful words - the lower classes smell." The politics of the sensory is invested heavily in systems of power and hierarchy. The caste system in India employs this power of the sensory with a great force. The untouchability of leather, tannery and sewage workers is maintained primarily through the unhygienic and smelly conditions that characterize their work. However, discussing the olfactory register of untouchability poses a huge methodological challenge - How does one write, talk or read about odours? Since this is largely an experiential and subjective task, autobiographical accounts could possibly be one arena where odours creep into the narrative, largely unnoticed.

This paper looks at what it then means to be able to 'smell someone's caste', by examining the phenomenological archive of odours made available through Hindi Dalit autobiographical narratives. The paper discusses the role played by the sense of smell in the creation and operation of untouchability. The discussion then moves to the phenomenon of the reproduction of this olfactory sensorium in autobiographical literature and the consumption of these smells by the reader. The odours of blood, raw meat, tanned skins and fecal matter gets translated into words and becomes a part of the reader's ontology thereby invoking repulsion, amazement and disgust. The paper thus examines the relationship between untouchability, sense of smell and odours by locating it in act of writing and consuming autobiographical literature.

Paper short abstract:

Dalit writings inscribe Dalit body with markers of ridicule and degradation on one hand and exultation and assertion on the other. This paper explores to what extent such a representation marks Dalit autobiographical writings in three distinct language domains in India.

Paper long abstract:

In many Dalit writings there is much focus on human body and they inscribe the Dalit body with characteristic markers of ridicule and degradation on one hand and exultation and assertion on the other. These markers are represented differently when a Dalit perceives oneself and does so through the gaze of others. There are changes in these representations overtime through a reflective re-visitation of these markers. This paper is an attempt to see whether such an understanding is common across different language domains and if there are differences, how do they come to be posited.

This question is raised in a twofold context: While the characteristic markers of untouchability vary across different regions and contexts of invocation in India, it has been argued that there is a common core to the relations it embeds. The Lothian Committee (1931-1932) was to underscore this issue. At the same time it has to be noted that Dalit autobiographical writings are profoundly shaped by the distinct ideological and political context of different language domains, closely linked to the Dalit movement in the respective regions, to beget a shared understanding.

Paper short abstract:

Through an ‘immanent’ analytical approach based on vernacular dalit sources, the paper unpacks narrative orders on religion/secularity by contextualizing them within local processes through which dalits articulate their collective self-conceptions and their strife for social recognition and reform.

Paper long abstract:

Religion and secularism, constructed as normative categories beyond situated histories and sociopolitical agencies, have often been applied to structure and represent the lived realities of subaltern peoples as per given frames of caste/community/national belongings. Drawing from ethnography and textual analysis of vernacular dalit materials, the investigation reveals discourses and worldviews too often hidden behind segregation and shame. It sheds light on the 'ideological fields of force' which influence the way dalit peoples both engage and are confronted with the symbolic and material embodiments of religion and secularity and which impact on how they come to articulate collective self-conceptions and political subjectivities. The investigation demonstrates how dalit sociality is marked by a history of violated agency, both in its strife for assimilation and its attempts of subversion, which is linked to century-old systems depriving peoples of the means for collective representation, written codification and authoritative guardianships for their own epistemologies and which has led to what arguably still constitutes the dearth of ammunition in a struggle for normative self-determination.

By devising an 'immanent' analytical approach encountering dalits as they perform from and within their communities of reference, the investigation unpacks narrative orders premised on dichotomous oppositions of secularism versus religion, communalism or primordial nativism. It exposes how societal forces and the state, by structuring the living space, public order and socialization, are implicated in such discursive formations; and how they implicate us in terms of the level of socio-cultural translation we pursue in our epistemic production.

Paper short abstract:

Owing to imposed, non-empirical categorisations, itinerant groups in Bengal labelled 'Bedes' are today often perceived as a single minority group needing social upliftment. In this, self-appointed outside helpers seem to favour strategies contrasting with those preferred by 'Bedes' themselves.

Paper long abstract:

Diverse itinerant groups in Bengal labelled as 'Bedes' have experienced various forms of external ascription in the course of time. Besides categorisations and denominations, which are dominantly rejected by the concerned people, characteristics ascribed to these socially marginalised groups, their occupations and lifestyles by the sedentary mainstream population have led to stereotypical notions oscillating between romanticisation and discrimination. While in fictional Bengali literature and movies 'Bedes' often serve mainly as surfaces for erotic fantasies and a longing for a life far away from the duties of the sedentary lifestyle, they were during British colonial times confronted with the stigma of being criminals. However, regardless of whether the ascriptions to them were positive or negative, these have led over the last two centuries to the strengthening of an ascribed 'Bede' identity outside of the Bengali mainstream society.

Besides an overview on the diverse notions on 'Bedes', this paper will show the different strategies to socially uplift the so-called 'Bedes' today. Whereas outsiders, such as activists from the non-governmental (NGO) sector, take the categorisations of colonial times as their points of departure and thus contribute to the consolidation of the 'Bedes' as a separate minority, some so-called 'Bedes' themselves, especially in Bangladesh, have developed various strategies to counter their marginality with the aim of finding a place in the mainstream society.

Paper short abstract:

The paper provides an ethnographic profile of Dalit Muslim castes. It examines the problem of inequality, humiliation and various forms of discrimination, stigma, structures of domination and untouchability faced by Dalit Muslims. It highlights the issues of recognition for Dalit Muslims.

Paper long abstract:

The paper attempts to provide an ethnographic profile of Dalit Muslim castes/communities. It examines the problem of inequality, humiliation and discrimination faced by the Dalit Muslims in India. It studies the various forms of discrimination, stigma, social distance, structures of domination and untouchability faced by them in order to understand their awareness of their own identity as Dalit Muslims and their relationship with the changing social structure. The paper also studies their customs, rituals, beliefs and other cultural practices.

These marginalized communities, have not been studied due to lack of data, lack of social categorisation, background status or variety of other reasons. While social and economic conditions of Dalits have been extensively studied, intensive ethnographic studies of specific Dalit communities have been rarely undertaken. The available literature has not addressed the problems faced by Dalit Muslim communities.

The paper aims to provide a theoretical framework for justifying the politics of recognition. It explores the Dalit Muslim question and the issues of discriminations, social exclusion/inclusion, and recognition. It also focuses on how caste becomes a source of discrimination and exclusion from the mainstream. It critically engages with the question 'Why did the State not recognize Dalit Muslims?'. It contests Presidential Order of 1950 which excludes them from the purview of Scheduled Castes. As we know that Dalit Muslims have faced discrimination within the Muslim community, paper argues that they have also been discriminated by the Indian State.

Paper short abstract:

The Bengali writer Mahasweta Devi commits herself to the interests of Adivasis in fiction and action. By analysing her most powerful stories the paper gives an account of what the author herself calls the “naked brutality, savagery, and caste and class exploitation” Adivasis have to suffer in India.

Paper long abstract:

Mahasweta Devi, feminist writer and activist, pitilessly exposes in her stories the humiliation, neglect and even harsh violence Adivasi groups in the Eastern regions of the country are forced to suffer. Adivasis are subjected to forms of economic dependence (bonded labour), deprived of land and natural resources and often displaced as a result of so called development projects; especially women and girls are sexually abused or forced to prostitution.

Mahasweta Devi claims that her writings are based on truth; that does not mean that her characters necessarily represent real individuals, but "they could have existed as subalterns in a specific historical moment imagined" (Spivak). Thoroughly researched, Mahasweta Devi work represents history turned into fiction.

Emotions dominate the work of Mahasweta Devi and show in her forceful language - she claims to be "perpetually angry" in view of the exploiting system, and with regard to the Adivasi she believes "in anger, in justified violence", which she understands and represents in her stories.

The paper focuses on translated stories of Mahasweta Devi (English, German). It will explore the multiple forms of oppression of Adivasi and their manifold ways of reacting to it as represented in the fiction (aggression, surrender, hope); it will also confront it with non-literary accounts (e.g. ethnographic work). Finally it will ask about the ultimate message behind Devi's stories, the question whether tribal life is a bygone form of human existence or whether there might be spaces of co-presence and redefinition.