The Struggle for Liberation from Caste and Gender: Representations of Dalit Women in the Neg-Buddhist Movement Carolyn Annette H
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THE STRUGGLE FOR LIBERATION FROM CASTE AND GENDER: REPRESENTATIONS OF DALIT WOMEN IN THE NEG-BUDDHIST MOVEMENT CAROLYN ANNETTE HIBBS A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY GRADUATE PROGRAM IN HUMANITIES YORK UNIVERSITY TORONTO, ONTARIO April 2013 © Carolyn Annette Hibbs, 2013 11 Abstract This dissertation analyzes the representations of Dalit neo-Buddhist women in literature, iconography, and media, and situates these representations in a religious context. It fills a gap in the existing research by bringing together three areas of study, all of which are interdisciplinary in themselves and all of which intersect: religious studies, women's studies, and postcolonial studies. A central feature of the contemporary Dalit movement is its response to B. R. Ambedkar's founding of a new sect of Buddhism in 1956; this sect is popularly known as neo-Buddhism. Ambedkar founded this sect as a means to counter casteism and sexism in India. This dissertation proposes that religious experience is central to the neo-Buddhist movement, to the experiences of women within that movement, and to the production of representations of Dalit women. This dissertation situates neo-Buddhism as a religion which engages with the intersection of gender and caste, and considers the impact of the text The Buddha and His Dhamma as scripture. It also situates neo-Buddhism in the context of historical responses to the caste system in non-Hindu traditions, and the contemporary practice of casteism and sexism in those traditions. It argues that in his founding of neo-Buddhism, Ambedkar drew on both indigenous and foreign models in order to challenge both Hindu and colonial oppression. Non-Dalits, Dalit men, and Dalit women all respond to Ambedkar and neo-Buddhism. This dissertation argues that Dalit men's representations of Dalit women tend to reinforce upper caste Hindu concepts of womanhood through the idealization of self-sacrificing devotion, domesticity, and purity. In contrast, in their self- 111 representations, Dalit women participate in Buddhist feminist theology through engaging with concepts of religion, rationality, and the polluted body. The dissertation concludes that Dalit women's engagement with casteism and sexism both follows Ambedkar's example and provides a stronger means of countering casteism and sexism in their Dalit communities, and in Indian culture more broadly. lV Acknowledgements This dissertation work proceeded with the support of the supervisory committee including Dr. Jamie Scott, Dr. Becky Lee and Dr. Nalini Persram. In addition, Dr. Arun Mukherjee and Dr. Shobna Nijhawan contributed to the project at York University. At the University of Pune, Maharashtra, India, Dr. Pradeep Gokhale and Dr. S.S. Bhelke provided guidance and support. In Pune, Maharashtra, India, Sunila Gondhalekar supported this work through Marathi language studies and cultural analysis. Friends, guides and translators Kranti Bhosle, Viplov Wingkar and Yogesh Jagam all made essential contributions to my understanding of cultural context. I am also grateful for the review, editing and support work of many others who are too numerous to include. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract ................................................................................................................................ ii Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................ .iv Table of Contents ................................................................................................................. v Introduction: The Struggle for Liberation from Caste and Gender: Representations of Dalit Women in the neo-Buddhist Movement. ..................................... 1 Chapter 1 : Theory and Methods ........................................................................................ 3 3 Chapter 2: On the Wheel: Buddhism, Gender and Caste in Historical Context.. .............. 80 Chapter 3: Wheels Within Wheels: Nee-Buddhism in Context.. ..................................... 124 Part I: Off the Wheel: Christian and Muslim Caste Conversions ........................ 126 Part II: Reinventing the Wheel: Ambedkar and Western Thought.. ..................... 150 Chapter 4: Writing Women: Men Writing, Media Writing .............................................. 169 Chapter 5: Picturing Women: Iconography and Artistic Production ............................... 215 Chapter 6: Polluting the God: Women Writing Religion ................................................. 258 Chapter 7: Women's Mission: Education and the nee-Buddhist Movement.. ................. 299 Conclusion: Nirvana and Samsara: Successes and Challenges in the nee-Buddhist Movement. ............................................ 335 Bibliography .................................................................................................................... 3 71 Appendices ................................................................................................................ ~ ...... 412 Appendix A: Nee-Buddhist Iconography ........................................................... .412 Appendix B: Glossary of Terms .......................................................................... .419 1 Introduction The Struggle for Liberation from Caste and Gender: Representations ofDalit Women in the neo-Buddhist Movement The caste system and religious conversion both provoke strong reactions among South Asians in India and diaspora. Because of the explicit prohibition against caste discrimination in the Indian Constitution, and because of international condemnation, government bodies in India are particularly invested in understating the persistence of caste discrimination today. Associated with this rejection is a resistance to conversion from Hinduism, stemming from Hindu nationalism which seeks both to keep Dalits (ex- Untouchables) within the fold of Hinduism and to deny the variety of identities within India, and manifesting in laws against conversion in several Indian states. 1 An association between the Dalit movement and religious conversion drives this antagonism in part. During the nationalist movement in the early twentieth century, Mohandas K. Gandhi famously opposed untouchability, and practised interdining to challenge it. However, Gandhi saw the caste system as an important and valuable aspect of Indian society; he was a Vaishya, among the three upper castes, and his political supporters were upper caste elites. Bhimrao "Babasaheb" Ramji Ambedkar, less famous internationally but arguably more influential, went further and included freedom from caste discrimination in the Indian Constitution; he was a Dalit. 2 However, an analysis of the States with anti-conversion legislation include Gujarat and Tamil Nadu. See Bharat Desai, "US Report Flays Gujarat for Christian Survey," Times ofIndia 20 Dec 2003. 2 Freedom from caste discrimination is included in articles 15-17, 46, 325, 330, 332, 335, 338-342 in Government oflndia, "Constitution of India," (28 August 2007), Ministry of Law and Justice (Legislative Department). 2 confrontation between Gandhi and Ambedkar as representatives of the elitist nationalist movement and the Dalit rights movement risks erasing women's experiences. Within the context of caste conversion, representations of women in the religious neo-Buddhist movement, and particularly self-representations of Dalit women, are under-represented. Hundreds of thousands of Dali ts took the Buddhist vows with Ambedkar; his wife Savi ta Ambedkar converted with him, among many other Dalit women. The assumption that men dictate the life choices of "their women" (mothers, wives, sisters, daughters) often erases women's religious experiences. Androcentric, Eurocentric, and religious nationalist attitudes often portray religious conversions as coerced, resulting from male pressure or lack of education, especially when women convert. I challenge these assumptions to examine Dalit women's writing for their representations of themselves and other women in their religious lives. Dalit women respond to aspects of caste and gender in Hinduism after their conversion to Buddhism. I argue that while men's religious representations of women reinforce existing sexism and casteism, Dalit women's religious self-representations are a legitimate and powerful challenge to oppressive gender and caste inequalities. Studies of women and gender in the neo-Buddhist movement tend to situate the movement in the context of politics rather than religion. This dissertation analyzes the neo-Buddhist movement from a religious studies and feminist theological perspective. In the fifth century BCE, Siddharta Gautama, the historical Buddha, theorized the Four Noble Truths: 3 1) The Noble Truth of Suffering: Clinging to existence is suffering. 2) The Noble Truth of the Cause of suffering: Desire leads to rebirth and thus suffering. 3) The Noble Truth of the Cessation of suffering: The destruction of desire. 4) The Noble Truth of the Path which leads to the cessation of Suffering: The eightfold path leads to the destruction of desire. 3 The tension between struggle and liberation is central to Buddhism, and in neo-Buddhism this tension is also central to social justice movements. Ambedkar connected the concept of struggle for justice and liberation from oppression to a modern vision of Buddhism, and revised the core doctrine of Buddhisll'l:, the Four Noble Truths,