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A Bibliographic Essay on Hindu and Christian Dalit Religiosity Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies Volume 17 Article 9 January 2004 A Bibliographic Essay on Hindu and Christian Dalit Religiosity Mathew N. Schmalz Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs Part of the Religion Commons Recommended Citation Schmalz, Mathew N. (2004) "A Bibliographic Essay on Hindu and Christian Dalit Religiosity," Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies: Vol. 17, Article 9. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7825/2164-6279.1318 The Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies is a publication of the Society for Hindu-Christian Studies. The digital version is made available by Digital Commons @ Butler University. For questions about the Journal or the Society, please contact [email protected]. For more information about Digital Commons @ Butler University, please contact [email protected]. Schmalz: A Bibliographic Essay on Hindu and Christian Dalit Religiosity 1'1' ~ I, 1\ Bibliographic Essay on Hindu and Christian Dalit Religiosity Mathew N. Schmalz "College of the Holy Cross IN his now classic novel Untouchable, who' is portrayed often in terms of Mulk Raj Anand portrays the life of a stereotypical images of the Untouchable as sweeper named Bakha. 1 Bakha works dark and physically powerful. Perhaps for cleaning latrines at the Cantonment, imitates Anand as well, Untouchable experience was the British "tommies" in his attire, and a cipher that did not easily lend itself to negotiates the' differing spaces in which his understanding. Untouchability is defined. After an incident Within the academic study of South during which Bakha inadvertently touches a Asia, no issue remains more contested than caste Hindu in the street, Bakha wanders the issue of caste and Untouchability. Most I I through town. During his wanderings, he recently, of course, the Western emphasis ,I first meets a Christian missionary who upon hierarchy in the study of India has speaks almost incomprehensibly about been brought under withering academic fire. Jesus. Bakha then listens to a speech by For example, ina searing review essay in 'I Mahatma Gandhi and while he fmds the the American Ethnologist, Arjun Appadurai Mahatma's vision compelling, his mind takes to task a whole corpus of scholarship turns to reflecting upon how flush toilets that draws its inspiration from Louis might be the real answer "to his plight. As Dumont's homo hierarchicus. 2 Appadurai Anand portrays him, Bakha the sweeper is argues, that instead of representing a new neither Hindu nor can he somehow become approach to the study of South Asia, a Christian, for as an Untouchable he DumonCs work and its derivatives represent remains trapped in a wholly other spatial instead a swan song for Orientalist domain. In his introduction to Untouchable, approaches in which India civilization is E. M. Forrester observes that only a understood to be the ultimate counter-type to Kshatriya like Anand could write about the West. Of course, there is no question Untouchability, since an Untouchable would that much of Western scD.olarship on India , be too overcome with rage, while a foreigner uses caste as an essentialising marker of could not begin to understand the depths of Indianness in ways that are much more Untouchable degradation. But more often ' closely related to Western problematics than than not, Bakha emerges asa distant figure to Indian ones,. Nonetheless, to ignore the Mathew N Schmalz received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in History ofReligions. He is presently an Edward Bennett Williams Fellow in the Department ofReligious Studies at the College of the Holy Cross where he has also served as Director ofAsian Studies. He has published in the areas of Christianity in North India, American Catholicism, and Modern Religious Movements. Journal ofHindu-Christian Studies 17(2004) 55-65 Published by Digital Commons @ Butler University, 2004 1 Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies, Vol. 17 [2004], Art. 9 I I , 56 Mathew N. Schmalz th existence of caste and most particularly the of the 19 century and his etlmographic experience of Untouchables themselves is to observations were later published in both overcompensate for the undeniable French and English. Dubois focuses his fetishization of hierarchy in much Western remarks on the restrictions placed upon the scholarship on South Asia. In this Tamil Parayer (Paraiyer) caste, from whose bibliographic essay, I wish to overview and name he suggests the European word place into dialogue a range of works on "pariah" is derived. Dubois does not delve Untouchability that take the religious vision into any detail with regard to Parayer of Untouchables serioJlsly. As the historian practices and instead puts f01ih a rather John Webster has remarked, caste is aggressive argument that Parayer and other generally independent of religiosity, for both Untouchable castes suffer conditions far Hindu and Christian members of worse than slaves in the Western world. Untouchable castes are often treated as Dubois serially diagrams the various equally inferior. 3 It is within this context that restrictions attendant upon Parayer members the term "Dalit," meaning "oppressed" or and moves to relate these strictures to those "broken," takes its form. What unifies the faced by other Untouchable castes of wide range of work on Dalit experience and cobblers and leatherworkers. Dubois religiosity is an acknowledgement of caste surmises that the "degraded classes" must as a construct that is not bound to a single have originally been composed of "all religious community or institution. disreputable individuals of different classes of society, who, on account of various General Works on Untouchability offenses, had forfeited their right to associate with respectable men.,,7 Once In his study, The Pastor to Dalits, John separated from society, these "disreputable A Webster sympathetically presents individuals" formed a class apart. In interactions between Protestant pastors and Dubois's view; these original character traits Dalit parishioners as a means for fostering continue in the Untouchable castes he renewed pastoral approaches to ministry.4 observed who, since they have no stake in By contrast, James Freeman's account of the society, give themselves over to numerous life of the Indian Untouchable Muli cannot ' "vices. ,,8 resist judging Untouchable life and Dubois observes that Untouchables particularly the machinations ofMuli - from , seem resigned to theIr state, and this is a whom Freeman goes to great lengths to point made in: another early and significant distance himself.5 What both these works treatment of Untouchable life, The Chamars indicate is that underlying many academic by George Briggs. Briggs was also a treatments of Dalit life there is an alternation missionary, and although this perspective between judgment and solidarity: most certainly colors his presentation, his Oscillation between }lleSe two poles of ethnographic observations of the Chamar perspective has also shaped the range of caste of leatherworkers in Uttar Pradesh are historical works on Untouchability as a still unmatched in their breadth. Like whole. Dubois, Briggs emphasizes the restrictions applied to Chamar life such as denial of access to communal water sources and Early Works 9 The first extensive ethnographic treatment confinement to colonies outside of villages. of Untouchables and Untouchable life can But Briggs also describes in great detail be found in Abbe Dubois's, Hindu Manners, elements of what could be called Chamar Customs and Ceremonies.6 Dubois was a religious life. F or example, Briggs talks missionary who lived in the Madras about the significance of the exorcist (ojha) Presidency and the Deccan in the first part who would divine various afflictions and https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs/vol17/iss1/9 DOI: 10.7825/2164-6279.1318 2 Schmalz: A Bibliographic Essay on Hindu and Christian Dalit Religiosity A Bibliographic Essay on Hindu and Christian Dalit Religiosity 57 who would also be one of the principle moved from stances of hierarchical mediators between Chamras and the higher judgment to a scholarly commitment to castes for whom he would often nerform advancing Dalit concerns. services. Briggs also introduces the significant figures in the Chamar religious Dalit Hindu Religiosity imagination, such as the niguni poets Raidas, Shivnarayan and Kabir. But in even The relationship between Untouchables and stronger terms than Dubois, Briggs portrays Hinduism is complex, especially given the Untouchables as gullible, superstitious, and quite obvious fact that Hinduism itself is a intemperate. bitterly contested construct. There are a variety of historical treatments of Hierarchy, Politics and Conversion Untouchable religiosity, most notably More recent works on Untouchability have Saurabh Dube's discussion of Ghasidas and moved away from the judgmental posture the Satnamis in Untouchable Pasts. 15 But assumed by Dubois and Briggs. Bernard . ethnography remains the method that is Cohen conducted a study of a Chamar often most sensitive not only to the community in Eastern Uttar Pradesh in the permutations of Untouchable life but also to 1950s that discussed how Untouchables how scholarship discursively constructs negotiated the hierarchical standards of the Untouchability itself society surrounding them - challenging them and sometimes appropriating them. IO In a Parasuram and the Ramnamis controversial work, Michael Moffat One of the most sensitive and discussed how a South Indian community of ethnographically
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