Abstract 127. Prof. Sylvia Rego
Voices of Dissent: Two Low-Caste Women in Nineteenth Century Maharashtra
The expression of dissent in art, folk and literary forms occurs in the interstitial spaces of hegemonic discourses symbolising asymmetrical power relationships in a hierarchical and exploitative world order. In mid-nineteenth century Maharashtra, two remarkable low-caste women registered a protest against the dominant Brahminic ideology – Savitribai Phule, often called ‘Krantijyoti’ for her pioneering work in low-caste women’s education along with her husband Jotirao Phule, and of Muktabai, a fourteen-year old Mang girl who studied in their school. Their writings fissure the tenuous ‘harmony’ of caste society and articulate a ‘literature of combat,’ (Fanon 1976, 193) to borrow a term from Fanon, that sought to mould the consciousness of the low castes. The deeply disturbing quality found in the writings of these lower caste women forces one to reckon with ugliness as an inherent part of literature, as Jasbir Jain explains(Jain, 147). Dalit consciousness in writing reflects the wounded psyche of women like Savitribai and Muktabai. The combative spirit and the sense of urgency in their need to provide comfort to their suffering community is what sets their writing apart from most of the narratives of upper caste women of their time. Fanon in referring to the psychological ailments suffered by the blacks in their desire to assimilate white qualities prescribes the need to restore their humanity and to extricate them from the core of the universe that governed their life (Fanon 1967, 8). Likewise, the need to heal the low castes of their debilitating consciousness of themselves and the world they inhabited and wished to imitate is the task that Savitribai and Muktabai try to address in their writings.
Voices of Dissent: Two Low-Caste Women in Nineteenth Century Maharashtra
The expression of dissent in art, folk and literary forms occurs in the interstitial spaces of hegemonic discourses symbolising asymmetrical power relationships in a hierarchical and exploitative world order. In mid-nineteenth century Maharashtra, two remarkable low-caste women registered a protest against the dominant Brahminic ideology – Savitribai Phule, often called ‘Krantijyoti’ for her pioneering work in low-caste women’s education along with her husband Jotirao Phule, and of Muktabai, a fourteen-year old Mang girl who studied in their school. Their writings fissure the tenuous ‘harmony’ of caste society and articulate a ‘literature of combat,’ (Fanon 1976, 193) to borrow a term from Fanon, that sought to mould the consciousness of the low castes. The deeply disturbing quality found in the writings of these lower caste women forces one to reckon with ugliness as an inherent part of literature, as Jasbir Jain explains(Jain, 147). Dalit consciousness in writing reflects the wounded psyche of women like Savitribai and Muktabai. The combative spirit and the sense of urgency in their need to provide comfort to their suffering community is what sets their writing apart from most of the narratives of upper caste women of their time. Fanon in referring to the psychological ailments suffered by the blacks in their desire to assimilate white qualities prescribes the need to restore their humanity and to extricate them from the core of the universe that governed their life (Fanon 1967, 8). Likewise, the need to heal the low castes of their debilitating consciousness of themselves and the world they inhabited and wished to imitate is the task that Savitribai and Muktabai try to address in their writings.
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