Occupation, Dignity, and Space: The Rise of Dalit Studies
Dalit Studies has emerged as a new field of study in South Asia since the 1990s, helping to reorient scholarship's interest away from the study of untouchability as a phenomenon toward a recognition and recovery of Dalit actors. This review essay identifies three broad themes-occupation, dignit...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2013
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| In: |
History compass
Year: 2013, Volume: 11, Issue: 12, Pages: 1059-1067 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Dalit Studies has emerged as a new field of study in South Asia since the 1990s, helping to reorient scholarship's interest away from the study of untouchability as a phenomenon toward a recognition and recovery of Dalit actors. This review essay identifies three broad themes-occupation, dignity, and space, and uses them to survey the literature on Dalit society over the last hundred years. It suggests that occupation was a prominent organizing category in colonial and early post-colonial ethnographic writing that was used to catalogue and define Dalit religious traditions and socio-economic practices. Struggles for dignity and efforts to eradicate caste inequality have become central concerns in more recent writings. This essay also draws attention to a less recognized theme by focusing on the role of space, particularly the role of jati mohallas, in mediating the experience of caste and shaping Dalit political consciousness. |
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| ISSN: | 1478-0542 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: History compass
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1111/hic3.12109 |
