Tam 1 Stephanie Tam AFAM 403: Diasporic Theory and Diaspora Tropes Professor Richard Iton 13 March 2012

Dalit Nation: Adopting Diaspora for Dalit Liberation But I ask of you, Is this country yours? You are not considered humans. You are jealous for land and you do not have passable roads. How can such people say that this is our land? (Ambedkar qtd. in Spodek 108). B. R. Ambedkars questioning of nationality embodied the spirit of Untouchable activists in 1930s India. Popularly dubbed the father of the Dalit nation, Ambedkar was himself an Untouchable and a Columbia University doctorate, writing widely on the need to dismantle the caste system. His arguments hinged upon interrogations of nationhood, deploying the concept of diaspora to unify Untouchables and demand political independence. The term Dalit drew together various Untouchable castes, creating commonality among diverse histories, localities, and forms of worship by focusing upon conditions of oppression. This paper examines how Ambedkar and Dalit activists adopted the concept of diaspora in their bid for Dalit liberation. In contrast to contemporary Dalit literature, which draws comparisons between caste, race, and ethnicity, this paper seeks to focus upon the delineation of Dalit community through distinctly diasporic characteristics: loss of homeland, trauma, and alienation. Becoming Dalits The term Dalit first emerged in journalistic writing around 1931, offering Untouchables a secular identity independent of Hinduism (Rinker 6). Although it was a casteless term, it both acknowledged and challenged their history of caste oppression (Contursi 326), and

Tam 2 became popularized by Ambedkar in the 1920s and 1930s (Rinker 6). The Dalit Panther movement took up the term in the 1970s, and in the wake of caste riots in the 1990s, Dalit became a political understanding of caste that bonded together various communities suffering under Hindu domination (Reddy 553). The control over and creation of a distinctive identity was crucial to Dalit activists, and they considered their struggle with Hindus a question of who will energize and determine the nature of the minoritys collective identity (Rajshekar 24). Although Untouchables are considered outcastes and are therefore not technically Hindus, they are nonetheless subject to the social hierarchy of Hinduism. They hover at the edge of Hindu society, rejected from it while being made subservient to it. Becoming Dalits effected a clear break from Hinduism, freeing Untouchables from the religious affiliations that pervaded their previous identities as Sudras and Panchamas. As the lowest category of the Hindu caste system, the term Sudra placed Untouchables firmly within Hinduism and mixed them in with other low castes. Panchama was a term invented by Gandhi, who suggested that a new caste be appended below Sudras to set Untouchables apart from other low castes, while affirming their place within Hinduism. Liberation from Hinduism was not only a way for Dalits to challenge a system that assigned them to a position of inferiority, but a way of challenging an entire epistemology. As a way of knowing the world and understanding hierarchies (Jefferson 53), religion dictated Dalitss conception of social and political possibilities. Ambedkars writings on Buddhism and Marxism point to the correlation between religion and politics in his search for a religious epistemology that would correspond to an egalitarian society. Moreover, by detaching Untouchability from religion, Dalit designated a condition of oppression, categorizing Untouchability as a matter of social injustice, and making it relevant to

Tam 3 humanitarian activists outside of Hinduism and India. Floating free from religious and cultural specificity, Dalits inscribed themselves into international human rights discourse and reconceptualized themselves in light of oppressed communities in other countries. The international appeal of the term Dalit is derived from its very etymology: activist V. T. Rajshekar asserts that the term is rooted in Dal, meaning broken or crushed in Hebrew (Rajshekar 43). The etymological connection between Dalits and Jews implies that they suffer similar diasporic conditions of oppression and homelessness. Dalits locate themselves within a larger network of oppressed peoples, demanding the same international recognition of suffering that Jews receive. Tellingly, Rajshekars Dalit: The Black Untouchables of India is subtitled An International Problem. Like many activists, Rajshekar portrays Untouchability as a crime against humanity in order to incite international interventions. Since Rajshekar tends to identify the Indian nation-state with Hinduism, India itself is considered the Dalitss oppressor, making the national framework complicit in their persecution. Activists therefore sought to transcend the nation-state, looking towards an international community for support. By declaring an etymological kinship to Jews, Dalits asserted an identity that was autonomous from the nation-state: the Jewish diaspora became the model for a collective identity that transcended state boundaries and gained worldwide sympathy. Dalits found common ground with the stigmatized Jew who was portrayed as a social outcast, always an alien in whatever country s/he attempted to settle in. The practice of Untouchability effected a spatial and visual shunning of Dalits from Hindu society, as Dalits were limited to residing in polluted spaces, and their touch, shadow and even voice were deemed to be polluting (Rajshekar 50). Rajshekar not only draws comparisons between the plight of the Dalit and the Jew, he asserts that the Untouchable is worse off than a Jew. The sufferings of the Jew are his own

Tam 4 creation. Not so are the sufferings of the Black Untouchables (48). Proclaiming Dalits as innocent and helpless, he portrays their suffering as more worthy of compassion than Jews. Ignoring the persecution of Jews, he states that [t]he Jew is despised but not denied opportunities to grow. The Untouchable is not merely despised but is denied all opportunities to rise (48). The suffering of Dalits is depicted as not only diasporic alienation, but active discrimination. Rajshekar further describes parallels between the holocaust and Untouchability, connecting Hitler to Hinduism: Adolf Hitler only implemented the Aryan race theory. Herein lies the secret of Brahmin admiration for Hitler, and Hitlers swastika is borrowed from the Brahmins. The RSS [a Nationalist Hindu organization] symbol is also a swastika (62, original italics). Activist Laxmi Berwa likewise claims that [t]he anti-semitism of the Nazis against the Jews is in no way different in ideology and in effect from the Satanism of the Hindus against the Untouchables (87). Donning a diasporic mantle allowed activists to not only unite their cause with that of the Jews, but with that of multiple ethnic identities that are oppressed within India. Like Paul Gilroys formulation of diaspora as a shared experience in the Black Atlantic, Dalits sought to form a diasporic community unified through the experience of oppression. The term brought together Chuhras, Mehtars, Balmikis, Bhangis, and other castes that were forced into servile labour and discriminated against. Historically, the political immobility of Dalits has been attributed to their spatial and ethnic fragmentation. Vijay Prashad explains that Delhis Mehtars remained submissive because they shared neither a shopfloor nor neighbourhoods nor did they come from one ethnic community (UF 20). Rajshekar similarly claims that [a]s the Black Untouchables are scattered in all the villages and segregated, they have no capacity to assert their

Tam 5 rights (46). He argues that Dalits were co-opted into the Hindu system because they were without name, fame, identity and religion of their own (61). Cutting across geographic, ethnic, and occupational lines, the term Dalit proposed a diasporic identity under which the oppressed could form a united front and consolidate political goals. How can such people say that this is our land? If owning bounded land is the essence of political power, as John Locke asserts in his Second Treatise on Government (Brown 44), Dalits were not political subjects. While the history of Dalits and land ownership remains murky, the Buddhist canon documents how Chandalas and Nisadas assumed to be early Dalits were prohibited from being agriculturalists by the dominant caste. Prior to British rule, there was a large landless class drifting about, providing low-cost labour to peasants and landholders (Prashad, UF 26). By the 1890s, the Chuhrass (a Dalit caste) designated occupation was manual labour for landholders (27). During British rule, landholding policies likewise designated Dalits as non-agriculturalists, preventing them from owning land (37). Migration and landlessness affirm Dalitss alienation. In light of Lockes association of political subjectivity with land ownership, Dalits remain foreigners on the land that they tended. They were excluded from the rights of state subjects, and prohibited from public services and facilities. Rajshekar recounts how Dalits are denied use of public wells, and how public schools, the police and the military are inaccessible to them (50). Following John Rawlss delineation of the relationship between individual and state, having access to public goods indicates ones allegiance to the state. In not being allowed to partake in public amenities, Dalits are labeled as non-citizens.

Tam 6 Ambedkar describes similar deprivations of political rights, but goes further to suggest that there is a political difference between Dalits and Hindus that makes unified rule inappropriate. Stating that [e]very Congressman who repeats the dogma of Mill that one country is not fit to rule another country must admit that one class is not fit to rule another class (41), Ambedkar equates class relations to state relations. Rajshekar describes Hinduism as a group of nationalities. Each caste or subcaste is a separate nation. Nay. It is a prison house of warring nationalities (66). Castes/classes are not just different in terms of degree, but in kind. They are each politically distinct, and share no collective interests. Writing in the context of Britains waning powers and the throes of the Indian independence movement, Ambedkar co-opts popular condemnation of colonialism to suggest a similar condemnation of class dominance by implying that Hindus are akin to the British. He saw Dalits and Hindus as separate political subjects belonging to separate states that have become amalgamated through brutality and deceit. Claiming that Untouchables are entitled to separate political rights as against the Hindus of India (Rajshekar 79), he posited that the colonial state is not only biased towards Hindus but is an inadequate political form for addressing Dalitss needs. His articulation of Dalithood as a kind of political subjectivity emerged in a call for a separate state: Dalit Nation. Dalit Nation Dalit activists rationalized their sense of alienation through the idea of a lost homeland. Like other diasporic narratives, Dalits constructed an ideal past that was associated with a specific location. Unlike other diasporic narratives, their estrangement from the homeland was not geographic but political. There was no journey that separated Dalits from their land. Instead, activists believed that they were colonized by Aryans and lost legal ownership of their homeland.

Tam 7 Portraying themselves as the original sons of the soil (Rajshekar 44), they asserted that they had remained true to their ancestral culture. They claimed that they had not been assimilated into Hindu culture, pointing to their separate gods, shrines, food habits and cultural identities, despite the fact that they also worship Hindu Gods (44). This denial of acculturation is part of the diasporic need to maintain an identity separate from ones adopted society, a need to believe that ones identity is fixed and true to the past. Dalitss appropriation of the diasporic narrative becomes murky and contradictory when considering their relationship to the homeland. Dalits have to explain their loss of the homeland and at the same time assert their unchanging tie to it through culture. While loss of the homeland in other diasporic narratives is achieved through geographic removal, Dalitss loss of the homeland takes the form of a sociopolitical defeat that entails a loss of culture and identity. Dalits must simultaneously demonstrate their loyalty to the lost homeland by retaining ancestral customs. The contradiction between cultural loss and cultural preservation is expressed in Rajshekars conflicting claims as he laments Dalitss loss of identity, name, and religion (61), while asserting that Dalits retain a separate identity and religion (44). This contradicting loss and persistence is expressed in the publishers note to Rajshekars text: Dalits work to rediscover and recreate the lost and still-existing elements of their original culture (8). Activists trace Dalitss original culture to the Harappans, one of the earliest civilizations in the Indus Valley. Extolled as a sophisticated society that was wiped out by Aryans, the Harappans remained somewhat of an archaeological mystery, and Dalits wrote themselves into their ambiguous history. In 1921, Sir John Marshall led the Archaeological Survey of India in an excavation of two major Harappan settlements, sparking a number of theories about indigenous rights to land (Prashad, UF 83).

Tam 8 The Adi myth inspired Adi-Hindus, Adi-Dravidas, Adi-Andhras, Adi-Karnatakas and Ad-Dharmis, all movements who claimed that their communities were the original inhabitants of the land. Dalits identified with the Ad-Dharmis and asserted that they were a separate people from the Hindus during the 1931 census, gaining confidence and dignity in their rediscovered identities (85). By claiming Harappan descendance, Dalits asserted aboriginal rights to land and cast Hindus as descendants of the intruding Aryans. Rajshekar describes the Aryans as nomads, barbarians, without a civilization (43), conferring upon them the same invectives that are used against Dalits. This narrative of origins accomplished three things: first, it freed Dalits from the Hindu caste system and its conferral of Untouchability by claiming an independent lineage. Secondly, it depicted Dalits as descendents of an advanced civilization, countering the notion that Untouchability is inherent and permanent. Rajshekar describes the Harappans as innocent but hardworking original inhabitants (43) who were brainwashed by Aryans into believing they were inferior and Untouchable. Thirdly, it depicted Hindus as illegitimate colonizers, and grounded the Dalit nation movement upon primordial legitimacy. This use of the past to create traditions in a colonial setting is a complex process that Indian Marxist D. D. Kosambi calls creative introspection. It produces what Wilson Moses calls Afrotopia, or a vision of the past that draws from the materials at hand to generate texts that vindicate or monumentalize an oppressed people (Prashad Afro-Dalits 191). The Black Power movement and the Dalit liberation movement shared other commonalities, which will be discussed later on. Although Ambedkar did not endorse the Aryan invasion theory, he expressed the Dalit desire for territorial recovery through proposals for secession during the 1940s. Alongside

Tam 9 discussions of Pakistani secession, Dalits demanded a separate territory of their own, which they called Acchutistan (acchuts are Untouchables) or Dalitastan. Territorial secession spoke to the national autonomy and political independence that they sought to establish, which could not be addressed simply through liberation from oppressive practices. Activists rationalized their separatist enterprise in various ways. Rajshekars publisher notes that the creation of Dalitastan is fuelled by despair at the prospects of equality under Hindu Brahminism (8), while Rajshekar claims that the Dalit quest for equality does not lie in their final absorption into Hinduism (70). Whether Hindus would be able to establish egalitarian relations with Dalits or not, Dalits desired a distinct political identity that would have nothing to do with Hinduism. Rajshekar describes the Dalit elite as traitors who aspire to leadership positions as Indians instead of trying to provide the much-needed leadership for their people (53), conflating Indianness with Hinduism and positing Dalits as a separate people. He saw Dalits who sought to work within the Indian nation-state as traitors, replicating the Hindu system of domination rather than countering it. Prashad distinguishes between two kinds of nationalism one, the assertion of the oppressed, and two, what Fanon so cannily called vulgar tribalism, the urge for an imitative bourgeoisie to dominate its own nationality (what Randall Robinson called the Vernon Jordon Disease) (Afro-Dalits 190). Dalit activists were careful to situate their nationalism within Prashads first category, calling for a revolution rather than a [c]hange of heart, liberal education, etc. (Contursi 327). Their nationalism would not just replicate the hierarchy of Hindu India, but liberate India (Rajshekar 34) and establish an egalitarian society inspired by Ambedkars reading of Marx.

Tam 10 Afro-Dalits This revolutionary impetus was led by the Dalit Panthers, a liberation movement that was inspired by the spread of the Black Power movement. It was organized in June 1972 in Siddhartha Nagar, Bombay and rooted in the Little Magazine Movement, which published nonprofit magazines by non-Brahmin writers of Maharashtra. Inspired by the Black Pantherss militant literature and political struggles, it was formed by a generation of literate Dalit youth who were dissatisfied with the mainstream Dalit political movement. They organized demonstrations, an election boycott and attacked Hindu deities in addition to expressing their anger through poetry. Following Ambedkars writings on Buddhism and Marx, the Panthers began as a Buddhist organization with somewhat socialist tendencies (Contursi 325-326). They did not simply draw upon Black Panther strategies, but genealogically identified with them by asserting a common African descent. Rajshekars insistent labeling of Black Untouchables is in keeping with Runoko Rashidis Global African Presence project. Rashidi used archaeological and anthropological records to find Africans around the world, and asserted that the founders of the Harappan civilization were Black (Prashad, Afro-Dalits 192). The Afro-Dalit connection is furthered by studies by Chandler and Winter, who claim that Indias philosophical and linguistic roots lie in Africa (193). Prashad notes that the need to claim Harappans and Dalits as black is to constitute a political solidarity against the Aryans (193), and that blackness was seen as primordial in order to make claims on soil and autonomy (193). The publishers note in Rajshekars book describes the Black Untouchables as originally the African founders of the lush Indus Valley (4) and asserts that both African-Americans and Black Untouchables share a history of slavery and apartheid (4). Both slavery and apartheid

Tam 11 are loaded with international significance, apartheid in particular being characterized as a crime against humanity: apartheid becomes shorthand for the most egregious instances of systemic and overt racism that necessarily and automatically educe (or should educe) severe international condemnation (Reddy 562). Co-opting coded terms that the international community would readily react to was part of Dalit activistss strategy to mobilize support outside of India. The Dalit diaspora situated itself within a larger African diaspora that united Blacks against Aryans, claiming that the oppression of Dalits is the struggle of Diasporic peoples of African descent (Jefferson 51). This nesting of diasporic narratives established solidarity with African-American diasporic communities, whose struggles were perceived as successful. The Dalit liberation movement found its place in a tapestry of global liberation movements that emerged with the momentum of hope (49). It was driven not only by oppression, but by hope and certainty - the belief that the end of oppression is near, that a better world is truly possible (49). Although the Black Power movement was geographically far removed from Dalits, the claim to a common ancestry allowed Dalit activists to claim proximity and make the Black Power movements perceived success seem comparable and reasonably close (49). Beyond the Black Power Movement, Dalit Panthers identified with the Vietnamese, Cambodians and Africans to forge an international identity of the oppressed. Its manifesto defined Dalits as members of Scheduled Castes and Tribes, Neo Buddhists, the working people, the landless and poor peasants, women and all those who are being exploited politically, economically and in the name of religion. By 1973, the Panthers were no longer fighting against casteism, but for revolution (Contursi 326). In rewriting casteism as economic oppression and expanding its constituency to include non-Untouchables, the movement hoped to gain more

Tam 12 support, but also lost the specificity of the original Dalit liberation movement. Ambedkars call for secession had dissolved into a call for rebirth of the Indian nation-state. Dissolution We will not be satisfied easily now. We do not want a little piece in the Brahmin Alley. We want the rule of the whole land. We are not looking at persons but at a system. Change of heart, liberal education, etc., will not end our state of exploitation. When we gather a revolutionary mass, rouse the people, out of the struggle of this giant mass will come the tidal wave of revolution (Dalit Panthers Manifesto qtd. in Contursi 327). The Dalit Pantherss 1973 Manifesto was a far cry from the earlier calls for restitution of a homeland, people, and culture. Activists were no longer situating themselves within a diasporic narrative, having written themselves into an African diasporic narrative that made their original homeland difficult to identify. Moreover, what were previously thought to be Dalit traditions that were retained under Aryan colonization could no longer be considered truly primordial once comparisons were made to their earliest forefathers in Africa. Unlike Jews, Dalits have historically been illiterate so there is no recorded history to confirm their origins and fix their traditions. Instead, Dalits circulate oral myths, all of which involve stories of betrayal by a brother who is usually identified as a Brahmin. Chuhras, for example, narrate a descent into Untouchability where a volunteer preserves the purity of a village by removing an animal carcass having been promised that he will not be permanently defiled by it (Prashad, UF 27-28). By positing a fraternal tie to Brahmins and asserting common ancestry with them, these stories counter the Afro-Dalit narrative of Aryan invasion and racial difference. As ancestry and homeland became questionable, the experience of oppression became the only bond that unified Dalits. While Gilroys Black Atlantic posits the specific unifying

Tam 13 experience of the journey, Dalits had no particular rites of passage, and Untouchability practices vary throughout India. Dalit oppression became a generalized experience and its openness allowed it to absorb many non-Untouchables, changing the liberation movement from one of social justice to one of political revolution. The Panthers began to call for redistribution of land and the elimination of a class system (Contursi 326). Ambedkars prolific writings were difficult to formulate into a coherent political and economic ideology that could be used to structure the Dalit movement. Political economist S. K. Thorat suggests that much of the factionalism that occurred within the movement was due to this inability to produce concurrence (Contursi 326-327). The Dalit Panthers split into factions in 1974 and internal disputes continued to further fracture the movement, making it difficult for political action without coalitions and compromises. The Bharatiya Dalit Panther faction became active in slums along the Bombay-Pune Road, working for all underdogs whether that person is Mahar, Muslim, or caste Hindu (Contursi 328). Political factions in Tamil Nadu became institutionalized, dropped caste terminology from their titles and allocated seats to upper castes to widen their political base (Gorringe 56). Although Dalit political parties began with the intent of offering Dalits autonomous representation, they soon became pawns to mainstream parties who needed Dalit votes to win. Alternative Terms Race was the most universal language of condemnation. Race moved mountains like the UN, the foundations and the corporations. If caste were defined as race in India, one retained local turfs but could use international forums to embarrass the official Indian image (Visvanathan qtd. Reddy 564).

Tam 14

Moving away from a diasporic narrative, a deflated contemporary Dalit liberation movement has turned towards articulations of caste as race. While a racial identification of caste has an undeniable impact upon conversations in international human rights symposia (Reddy 561), the ideological significance of this shift is problematic and warrants examination in comparison to what diaspora offers. Ambedkar himself rejected race as an understanding of caste. Arguing that racial purity exists nowhere and that every caste has an admixture of alien blood, Ambedkar states that the caste system is a social division of people of the same race (49). He was also a skeptic of the Aryan invasion theory, and argued that the Aryans were not a race, drawing upon academic studies of Aryanism as a language rather than a phenotypical group. Finding no evidence of a racial understanding of Aryans in any historic texts, he also rejected interpretations of Dasyus (forefathers of Dalits) as race. Analyzing ancient Sanskrit texts, he concluded that varna (caste) signified a class of a particular religion (Sharma 860). He therefore proposed that caste be understood as a people rather than a race, interpreting Aryans and Dasyus as cultic communities rather than colonizing and colonized races. Although Ambedkar did not believe that Hindus and Dalits were of the same race, he also did not believe that they were the same people nor that Dalit liberation could coexist in the same political space as Hinduism. He proposed a new understanding of nationhood, where nation is understood as a homogeneous (read egalitarian) unit, and argued that India was a union of different nationalities (Franco 37). It is with this understanding of nationhood that he proposed a Dalit Nation.

Tam 15 His philological and scholarly evidence aside, Ambedkars primary objection to race is on the basis of its blanketing of political difference. Skin colour does not in and of itself produce social cohesion or egalitarian relations. Prashad similarly criticizes Afro-Dalits for their epidermal determinism, since many a dark skinned person has been complicit in the subjugation of other dark skinned people (Afro-Dalits 191). The advantage to a diasporic identity is that it takes into account political particularities. Maintaining the memory of an idealized homeland and a separate identity from ones host country is a political project that unifies people from different classes. Had Dalit activists elected to adopt a diasporic identity based upon maintaining their differences from Hindus rather than seeking to build a community based upon oppression in general, they may have arrived at a more politically cogent identity. John Comaroff suggests that the construction of any collective identity is determined through differentiation from the Other, producing a world in terms of We/Them (Reddy 554). The dissolution of the Dalit liberation movement can in some ways be attributed to the growing indistinction between Hindus and Dalits. Whereas diaspora clings to a fixed identity that is alienated from its surroundings, the Dalit identity became increasingly fluid and its collectivity eroded. In the absence of a diasporic vocabulary, Dalit activists oscillated between racial and class-based identities. One can see the confusion in Rajshekars writing: on the one hand, he claims that Indias Untouchables are racially African (39) and that they originally resemble[d] the African in physical features (43), but then he goes on to admit that Brahmins cannot be distinguished from Dalits through skin colour (39). Finding phenotypical differentiation untenable, he switches to a class-based understanding of Dalits who are defined not so much from Black Untouchables color as from their cultural and historical economic, social and

Tam 16 political circumstances (39). Fearing that this frames Dalit liberation as simply social uplift and desegregation, he states that [n]either can [caste] be abolished by inter-caste marriage nor inter-dining. Caste is a state of mind (41, original italics). This appeal to a psychological state closely resembles the trauma of diasporic peoples, focusing on an internal state that neither race nor class adequately describes. Deepa Reddy proposes an ethnic understanding of caste, examining various characteristics that are common to both terms. Arguing that caste was historically in flux and that communities were fuzzy, Reddy suggests that the emergence of the modern nation-state and its mode of governance through types gave them the appearance of fixity. She understands this fluidity as a mark of ethnicity (555). However, Reddy overlooks the fact that for a very long time the British government refused to acknowledge Dalits as separate from Hindus, and that Dalits themselves fought for differentiation. Moreover, it was not the government that turned Dalits into a type": Dalits chose their name themselves in an effort to identify themselves against Hindus. If ethnicity adapts to political conditions, caste creates its own political conditions. The political autonomy of caste resembles that of diaspora, where governing structures have little impact upon the subjects identity, and it is the diasporic subject that establishes the terms of differentiation, not the state. Whereas ethnicity falls under the control of the nation-state, diaspora remains autonomous. Dalit activistss attempt to situate themselves beyond the state structure speaks to diasporic autonomy more so than ethnicity. Reddy notes that ethnicity, like caste, tends to take on the appearance of an unchanging, primordial nature and that it constructs natural social categories despite its actual fluidity (556). While the primordial character of natural social division does hold for both ethnicity and caste, ethnicity does not connote the historical struggle and alienation that are part of Dalit

Tam 17 identity. Moreover, while upper castes see the backwardness of Dalits as a natural characteristic that justifies their inferiority, Dalit activists are adamant that Hindu hierarchy is not based upon natural aptitude. Ambedkar refutes the association of caste and occupational hierarchy by arguing that it creates the very competencies that it claims are natural by not allowing individuals to develop any capacities outside of caste-designated careers (47). While ethnicity can be used to describe caste in general, it is fairly detrimental to the Dalit agenda in its upholding of natural hierarchy. Reddy concludes her argument for an ethnicization of caste by stating that, [] the popular word ethnicity has the advantage of not making India look peculiar, while simultaneously taking into account the tendencies of Dalit discourse to highlight locality, uniqueness, concreteness. It is to collapse the local with the global while recognizing their polarity, to reiterate Appadurais observation that ideas that claim to represent the essences of particular places reflect the temporary localization (and the global is by now also a location in its own right) of ideas from many places (571). While her point that ethnicity removes the exotic stigma of caste is useful in light of activistss past attempts to compare casteism to forms of discrimination in other countries, it is important to note that the collapsing of the local with the global has not seemed to further the Dalit liberation movement, but diluted its aims. In situating Dalit oppression amidst others, activists found themselves not only widening their audience but also widening the number of grievances they addressed. Their effort to stake claims to universal resources entailed a reduction of casteist particularities to general oppression and transformed the movement into a socialist cry for all underdogs.

Tam 18 Moreover, ethnicity is usually deployed within Dalit literature to designate subdivisions within the Dalit community. While the term Dalit united all those who suffered from Untouchable practices, it did not erase the individuality of Untouchable communities that were shaped by specific localities (many at the level of villages) and myths of origins. Not only would confusion arise from calling Dalits ethnic, it would also conceal local differences between Untouchable communities, many of which do not even speak the same language. Indeed, the problem with Reddys conception of the local is that it assumes a scale that far exceeds the size of Untouchable subcastes. The invention of the term Dalit was an effort to construct a mid-scale community that could retain recognition of local subcastes (often called ethnic communities) while gathering together a politically significant constituency. Diaspora offers a better identity for Dalits because it does not misleadingly promise a scalar sensitivity to local communities while cloaking them all under a single name. Diaspora offers an umbrella term for different local communities who all share an experience of trauma and identify with the same homeland, but speak different dialects, worship different gods, and cultivate different cuisines. In the 1970s, indigeneity arose as a way to approach historical change and nationhood. Resulting from an alliance between the World Bank-IMF and oppressed communities, the term allowed Afro-Dalits to appeal to a wider audience. However, Prashad notes that indigeneity designated a primordialism that countered Ambedkars emphasis upon oppression (Afro-Dalits 192). While Afro-Dalits leveraged primordialism to vie for land ownership and dignity, primordialism gestured towards a racial identity that did not address Dalitss historic struggles. Although indigeneity, like diaspora, maintains a political identity that is outside of the nationstate, it does not capture a sense of dispossession. To the contrary, indigeneity signifies a

Tam 19 continuous, uninterrupted ownership of land. Indigenous peoples experience no alienation upon their homeland. The social exile effected by Untouchability is markedly absent from an indigenous identity. In human rights discourse, caste itself has undergone a redefinition, being understood as discrimination based on work and descent, and falling under the category of racial discrimination. It is conceived as a strictly social institution, its disassociation from religion allowing it to take on a universality that is similar to race. As a result, caste has become a global phenomenon, with groups such as the Sri Lankan Rodiya, Japanese Burakumin, Nigerian Osu and Igbo, and Senagalese Wolof identifying themselves as castes (Reddy 565-566). As definitions of caste continue to expand, it remains to be seen if diaspora can offer a useful narrative for Dalit activists. Identity Identity formation is also the process of setting up boundaries, of demarcating who is within the fold and who is outside it. It includes the process of defining who the other is and to what extent that other is also our enemy. At the same time, identity is also a choosing process, the fashioning of a self (Franco 13). Dalit activists have struggled with establishing an identity that is both politically cogent and socially sensitive, hopeful and marked by historical struggle, self-determined and relational. As much as identity formation is a process of taking control and stepping outside of existing traditions, Dalits are very much a reactionary product of the caste system. Ambedkars theorization of Dalithood as a political identity, and his rationalization of subjugation through class are attempts to counter established traditions of Untouchability. Dalitss new identity is in many ways simply a negation of the old.

Tam 20 This same argument can be made for any Hegelian reading of modernity. Claims of breaking with the past are continually debunked by historians who discover strands of continuity between avowedly unrelated ideologies. It is here that diaspora can offer a model that relates historical continuity to the modernist paradigm. Although diaspora is often associated with the modern trauma of estrangement from the homeland, it has clear precedents in antiquity. It is the concept itself - the naming of diaspora and the theorizing around it -, that makes it a modern phenomenon. Similarly, the Dalit liberation movement is not new, and has been preceded by numerous Untouchable uprisings previous to British rule. It is with the emergence of a literate Dalit generation, and the numerous writings they have generated about the Dalit condition, that Dalits have acquired a modern identity. As Dalit activists have shown in their uptake of various terms, concepts matter. They affect both Dalit perceptions of themselves and international perceptions of them, galvanizing political support as well as drawing lines of commonality and difference. Although this paper has argued that diaspora was endemic to the way that activists portrayed themselves, as concepts of identity continue to expand and change, diaspora may outgrow its political use or need to gain new meaning to continue to be relevant to the Dalit liberation movement.

Tam 21 Works Cited Ambedkar, B.R. Annihilation of Caste with a Reply to Mahatma Gandhi: And Castes in India: Their Mechanism, Genesis, and Development. Jullundur City: Bheem Patrika Publications, 1968. Brown, Wendy. Walled States, Waning Sovereignty. New York; Cambridge, Mass.: Zone Books!; Distributed by the MIT Press, 2010. Contursi, Janet A. Political Theology: Text and Practice in a Dalit Panther Community. The Journal of Asian Studies 52.2 (1993): 320339. Franco, Fernando, Jyotsna Macwan, and Suguna Ramanathan. Journeys to Freedom!: Dalit Narratives. Kolkata: Samya, 2004. Gorringe, Hugo. Taming the Dalit Panthers. Journal of South Asian Development 2.1 (2007): 51 73. Jefferson, Antonette. The Rhetoric of Revolution: The Black Consciousness Movement and the Dalit Panther Movement. The Journal of Pan African Studies 2.5 (2008): 4659. Prashad, Vijay. Untouchable Freedom!: a Social History of Dalit Community. New Delhi; New York: Oxford India Paperbacks, 2001. ---. Afro-Dalits of the Earth, Unite! African Studies Review 43.1 (2000): 189201. Rajshekar Shetty, V. T. Dalit!: the Black Untouchables of India. Atlanta; Ottawa: Clarity Press, 1987. Reddy, Deepa S. The Ethnicity of Caste. Anthropological Quarterly 78.3 (2005): 543-584. Rinker, Jeremy. Transnational Advocacy and the Dalit Rights Movement. (2009): n. pag. Sharma, Arvind. Dr. B. R. Ambedkar on the Aryan Invasion and the Emergence of the Caste System in India. Journal of American Academy of Religion 73.3 (2005): 843-870.

Tam 22 Spodek, Howard. Ahmedabad!: Shock City of Twentieth-century India. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2011.