African American Womanism Speaks to Dalit Feminism: Special Reference to Telugu Dalit Women’S Literature

Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities, Vol. IX, No. 1, 2017 0975-2935 DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.21659/rupkatha.v9n1.15 Full Text: http://rupkatha.com/V9/n1/v9n115.pdf African American Womanism Speaks to Dalit Feminism: Special Reference to Telugu Dalit Women’s Literature D. Jyothirmai & K. Sree Ramesh Adikavi Nannaya University in Andhra Pradesh, India. Email: [email protected] Received March 1, 2017; Revised April 6, 2017; Accepted April 27, 2017; Published May 7, 2017. Abstract ‘Mainstream feminism’ in India remained substantially elitist in its concerns carrying the legacy of ‘western feminism’. As such it failed to appreciate, accommodate and represent the specific concerns of Dalit women. Consequently Dalit women are forced to lead a separate movement. It is the premise of this paper that the nascent Dalit Feminism, which could not derive any theoretical and representational sustenance from the Indian Feminism, can draw from the African American womanist/feminist experiences as it shares a similar socio-historical environment. Further, it argues in favor of Dalit feminism as a more inclusive kind of feminism that challenges oppression of any form for women in India or elsewhere. As much of Dalit women’s writing is produced in Indian vernaculars a few short stories from Telugu Dalit writing, translated into English are analyzed to reflect different perspectives of Dalit women’s discourse. Keywords: Feminism, Dalit Feminism, African Feminism, Untouchability, Education of Dalits. 1. Introduction Even though it comes under the category of ‘third world’ feminism, ‘Indian mainstream feminism’ remained elitist in its concerns carrying the legacy of ‘western feminism.’ Indian feminism was/is truncated in appreciating the heterogeneity and the specific needs of women belonging to various oppressed castes, tribes, minorities. Its failure to accommodate and represent the specific concerns of Dalit women lead to its rejection. Thus originated, nascent Dalit Feminism could not derive any theoretical and representational sustenance from the mainstream Indian Feminism. However it can derive roots from the African American womanist/feminist experiences as both share a similar socio-historical environment. The paper argues in favor of Dalit feminism to become more inclusive challenging oppression of all women. As much of Dalit women’s writing is produced in Indian vernaculars a few short stories from Telugu Dalit writing are analyzed to show how Dalit Feminism can draw theoretical sustenance from African American Feminism. 2. The Context African American Feminism/Womanism took its birth from the Black liberation movements as much as from the American women’s liberation movements. Discriminative politics in the © AesthetixMS 2016. This Open Access article is published under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For citation use the DOI. For commercial re-use, please contact [email protected]. 141 Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities, V9N1, 2017 American women’s rights movements, dominated by middle and upper class white women, etched out a distinct brand of feminism/ womanism for the African American women. American Feminism was blind to native working class (white) women, immigrant women, and more so to the conspicuous presence of the female slaves. Though, theoretically, the early American women’s rights movement conceived a ‘universal sisterhood,’ it finally remained exclusive. The 19th century American society was highly patriarchal and confined its women to domestic realm. Hence, their struggle was aimed at equal politico legal status with men and differed from the aspirations of black female slaves. Ann Ducille succinctly states the differing perspectives: Whereas white female activists were concerned with the rights of married woman to own property, for example, black women were concerned with the basic human right not to be literally owned as chattel. As white women lobbied to change divorce laws, black women lobbied to change the laws that prohibited slaves from marrying. While white women sought definition outside the roles of wife and mother, black women sought the freedom to live within traditional gender roles, to claim the luxury of loving their own men and mothering their own children. (2006: 30) Similarly, in the Indian context, upper caste women sought liberty from oppressive patriarchy which entangled their lives, while Dalit women sought freedom from the stigma of pollution, untouchability and poverty. While upper caste women confront oppression in domestic realm, Dalit women have to bear it in the social, political and economic realms. Hence, as upper caste feminists lobbied for laws against dowry, domestic/psychological violence, sexual freedom and property rights, the Dalit women have to fight against physical violence (by upper caste wo/men as well as their own men), basic amenities and daily lively hood. Though the upper caste ‘women’s movement’ progressed to the extent of seeking reservations for women in legislatures, the Dalit women have to plead for government ration and human dignity as Swaroopa Rani, a dalit feminist and writer points out: For the feminist movement in India, all women are the same and, therefore, their problems are the same. But this is far from the reality. In our society, which has differences of caste, religion, class and region, the problems of any group are not the same as that of any other group. Although some similarities may exist, many differences are also evident. Because all these groups have their own identities, their problems will also be particular to their situation. Although the slogan ‘All Woman Are One’ appears very liberal, it does not allow the reflections of feminists to move even one step beyond that. (2013: 705) Though dalit women confront gender oppression, caste naturally took precedence being their immediate cause of suffering. Tormented in ‘ways as particular to their gender as determined by the race,’ Ann Ducille (2006: 36) rightly says that ‘nineteenth-century black women writers, activists, and intellectuals were concerned with the rights, roles and responsibilities of women, as well as a double consciousness that cut across (rather than between) their racial and gender identities.’ The priority for the African American women was not one against the other (race and gender) but it was accepted that the emancipation /empowerment of race was inextricably linked with the improvement of the material conditions of women (Ducille, 2006: 36). In a similar vein, Swaroopa Rani (2013: 707) writes dalit women remain confused in choosing between elitist feminism and male centered ‘Dalitism’ that make them scapegoats in their movements. She argues that though Indian feminists and Dalit men include Dalit women in their movements of struggle they remain mute when atrocities on Dalit women take place for 142 African American Womanism Speaks to Dalit Feminism: Special Reference to Telugu Dalit Women’s Literature being Dalits/women. Hence, the priority for Dalit women is to contest upper caste domination while striving for the empowerment of the community. Pioneers like Maria W. Stewart in 183 laid a formidable path to African American feminist thought which has been flourishing on the pillars of: self, community and society to build a ‘multifaceted African American women’s intellectual tradition’ (Collins, 2012). Further, though it grew as a more inclusive ally of Black male, it could not remain blind to the oppression within the family/community/race. Hence, from 1970 as Collins points out, the African American feminist intellectuals “… insisted that the masculinist bias in Black social and political thought, the racist bias in feminist theory, and the heterosexist bias in both be corrected.” (2012: 10). The complex multidimensionality of African American feminine subjectivity is recognized as the product of the intersectionality of social categories like gender, race and class as Kimberle Crenshaw recognized in her seminal critique of U.S. antidiscrimination law that failed to acknowledge Black women’s unique experience of racism and sexism as simultaneous and inseparable. Similar task awaits Dalit feminism which needs a distinct path from main stream Indian feminism that was never a single theoretical point of reference. Developed as a legacy from the Vedic period, religious reformations, Bhakti movements, social reformation movements, anti- colonial freedom struggles and postcolonial discourses of the Indian nation state, Indian Feminism was never inclusive. Even during the freedom struggle, when pioneering male feminists like Raja Ramohan Roy in Bengal (against Sati) or Veerasalingam (in favour of widow re- marriages) in Andhra Pradesh led a movement for the liberation of women it was aimed at the liberation of the upper caste women. Further the nationalist movement has relegated both caste/women’s question to the sphere of the cultural/private to prevent colonial intervention. The nationalist project fulfilled its agenda of liberation but certainly not without ‘the forcible marginalization of many who were supposed to have a share in the fruits of liberation’ (Chaterjee, 2001: 156). Postcolonial India however found a solution to the empirical reality of caste discrimination in the advocacy of modernist

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