An Analysis of Bildungsroman Narrations in The Scar By K.A. Gunasekaran Ms. Elangothai A string of incidents woven together like beads in a rosary, does not leave any trace of the Dalit people. Hence they write their history themselves. Autobiography is the consequence of their yearning to create their society's history. autobiography has turned out to be not only a part of the Dalit history but also an important node of Dalit literature. Not only are they published in various Indian languages, but are also translated into English. Autobiographies of Naxendra Jadhav, Sharankumar Limbale, Vasanth Moone, Omprakash Valmiki, Laxman Mane and others have been translated into English and other European languages. The autobiographies of Aravind Malagatti …show more content…
The themes for Gunasekaran’s modern plays are drawn from everyday life. Thodu {Touch) a play recently directed by Gunasekaran is based on an incident in his life that is narrated in his autobiography. It is about a caste conscious Hindu who suddenly has an epileptic attack and is seen frothing at the mouth. Muniyandi Machan rushed to his aid, but on regaining consciousness the man upbraids him, 'You Paraya, why did you touch me?’ apologize in front of the panchayat. (Dalit, May-July 2002) This reminds us of an incident that Rettaimalai Srinivasan mentions in his autobiography. Describing his meeting with King George at the Roundtable Conference, in England, he says, 'I got an opportunity co speak again with the emperor. He asked me about untouchability. When I said the high caste will not touch the low caste, he asked me, "Wont a high caste help a low caste to his feet even if he falls on the road?'' When I said, he won't, the emperor was shocked and shaken, and he said, "I will never allow this in my …show more content…
It is a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist. Growing up as a boy from the Parayar caste, in the milieu of Christian, Hindu and Muslim communities, K.A. Gunasekaran narrates the familiar tale of caste oppression and prejudice prevalent in the villages of Tamil Nadu. As the narrative unfolds, the reader is shown how the ‘low’ caste negotiates differently with the three religious communities. The deep pain of the Paraya surfaces through the risible anecdotes that ridicule the grievously unjust practices of the ‘upper’ castes. The book emphasizes the fact that Indian villages are doubly caste-conscious and cruel, and that Dalit emancipation rests in better education for the community. Gunasekaran writes in an earthy and colloquial style to capture the innocence, cruelty and drama of a South Indian
A few upper caste youths, hiding behind parapet of the building in an opposite auction place, stoned the pot. “C-r-a-ash” a sound Teeha heard. The youths struck Methi’s pot and her whole body became drenched completely. It is her caste that is her flaw. By the time, Teeha moved towards Methi as soon as the pot shattered. Methi’s companions stood at some distance from them. Mathi was wet from head to feet. She stood rooted to the ground. The upper caste youths’ eyes roved over Methi’s breast and navel visible through her wet clothes, because the woman was an untouchable’s community in that village. So the upper caste youths wanted to humiliate her in public place. Look at this caste that became a weak and means of under-estimation. Teeha, a Dalit and an outsider, has openly hit a Patel youth that is a burning issue. But a low-caste girl was assaulted which is considered as sign of upper caste
Roy asserts that people’s fears of upsetting the power balance based in the caste system often leads to a blind acceptance of the status quo and a continuous sense of self-deprecation by individuals at the bottom of the hierarchy. When Velutha’s father fears that his son’s affair with a Touchable will have potentially disastrous consequences for him, he serves his own self-interest and is willing to endanger is son. He exposes the affair to the grandmother of the woman his son is having an affair with, revealing the extreme degree to which caste and conforming to societal norms drive the behaviors of individuals in Indian society; “So Vellya Paapen had come to tell Mamamachi himself. As a Paravan and a man with mortgaged body parts he considered it his duty…they had made the unthinkable thinkable and the impossible really happen…Offering to kill his son. To tear him limb from limb” (242). His fear of disrupting the status quo (i.e. the Indian social hierarchy) is so great that he is willing to sacrifice his own son’s life to protect his own. Rather than considering the genuine...
In this book, the people are subject to thousands of different ways to condition them to society. Whether this is based off of there standing in the society, or even the jobs that they are performing. Every single person is conditioned, and they are all expected to think exactly like their fellow caste members.
Indian society was patriarchal, centered on villages and extended families dominated by males (Connections, Pg. 4). The villages, in which most people lived, were admini...
Owing to India’s diversity, these identities are determined by caste, ancestry, socioeconomic class, religion, sexual orientation and geographic location, and play an important role in determining the social position of an individual (Anne, Callahan & Kang, 2011). Within this diversity, certain identities are privileged over others, due to social hierarchies and inequalities, whose roots are more than a thousand years old. These inequalities have marginalized groups and communities which is evident from their meagre participation in politics, access to health and education services and
Evidently, the descriptive nature of the two divergent environments mirrors the persistent social inequality and unequal distribution of India’s novel wealth. Boo’s prologue fundamentally gives an insight into the social injustice at hand responsible for Abdul’s elusion of the police. Abdul, his father and sister are accused of burning One Leg, a woman named by the Annawadians appropriate to her disability. Once Abdul’s father is arrested, Abdul aspires to escape the slum during the concealing darkness of nighttime. Much to his own dismay, Abdul falls asleep and is instructed to turn himself into the police to protect his ill father the following morning. The inhabitants of the slum represent a form of urban poverty, visibly hidden amid a facade of economic might and superiority. As one of the marginalized groups in Indian society, Annawadians are faced with economic obstacles on the pathway to social equality. Even in India’s moment economic resurgence, the layer of poverty is even further suppressed by the system; struggling to rise above and into the over-city. Yet, Boo describes the aspirations of the youth of Annawadi who seek to work as waiters in the surrounding hotels, acquire a college education or simply climb the
Recent years have witnessed a large number of Indian English fiction writers who have stunned the literary world with their works. The topics dealt with are contemporary and populist and the English is functional, communicative and unpretentious. Novels have always served as a guide, a beacon in a conflicting, chaotic world and continue to do so. A careful study of Indian English fiction writers show that there are two kinds of writers who contribute to the genre of novels: The first group of writers include those who are global Indians, the diasporic writers, who are Indians by birth but have lived abroad, so they see Indian problems and reality objectively. The second group of writers are those born and brought up in India, exposed to the attitudes, morale and values of the society. Hence their works focus on the various social problems of India like the plight of women, unemployment, poverty, class discrimination, social dogmas, rigid religious norms, inter caste marriages, breakdown of relationships etc.
From beginning to end, the novel, “The God of Small Things”, authored by Arundhati Roy, makes you very aware of a class system (caste) that separates people of India in many ways. This separation among each other is surprisingly so indoctrinated in everyone that many who are even disadvantaged by this way of thinking uphold its traditions, perhaps for fear of losing even more than they already have, or simply because they do not know any other way. What’s worse, people seen as the lowest of the low in a caste system are literally called “untouchable”, as described in Roy’s novel, allowing, according to Human Rights Watch:
Caste represents the most memorable, comprehensive and successful attempt ever made by an order to oppress humanity in its own interest. Its enactments broke up the race into many fragments never to be reunited, separating Aryans from other peoples by impassable barriers, permanently fixing their occupations, interests, associations and aspirations. As men were born so they must remain. Their course of life was prescribed, their places after death predetermined. (Porter, 25)
Mahasweta Devi, always writes for deprived section of people. She is a loving daughter, a clerk, a lecturer, a journalist, an editor, a novelist, a dramatist and above all an ardent social activist. Her stories bring to the surface not only the misery of the completely ignored tribal people, but also articulate the oppression of w...
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy tells the story of the communist state of Kerala and the forbidden love between two castes, which changes the lives of everyone. In the novel an ‘Untouchable’, Velutha is a carpenter and works at Paradise Pickles and Preserves for much less than he deserves because of his status as an Untouchable in the caste system. Velutha falls into a forbidden love with a divorced woman, Ammu who is associated with an upper caste Syrian Christian Ipe family. Marriage was the only way that Ammu could have escaped this life, but she lost the chance when marrying the wrong man, as he was an alcoholic and this resulted in them getting a divorce. Ammu breaks the laws that state ‘who should be loved, and how and how much’, as their affair threatens the ‘caste system’ in India, which is a hierarchal structure and social practice in India in which your position in society is determined and can’t be changed. Arhundati Roy portrays the theme of forbidden love within the caste systems and shows how they are t...
Susan Bayly. (1999). Caste, Society and Politics in India: from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age. Cambridge University Press
Mahesh Dattani writes on the burning issues that beset the post-independence Indian society, whether it is communal discord, politics and crime, growing homosexuality or the gender bias. He uses stage to condemn many of the drawbacks prevailing in society. His plays depict marginalized groups of society, people who are considered misfits in a society where stereotyped attitudes and notions reign supreme. His plays have varied content and varied appeal.
Growing up during a time of violent political upheaval in Sri Lanka, Arjie travels an especially bittersweet journey into maturation in Shyam Selvadurai’s Funny Boy. The adults in Arjie’s extended family mostly belong to an older, more conservative generation that attempts to fit Arjie into society’s norms. The adults that Arjie meets in the community through his family are individuals who prompt him to see past the confines of his childhood, and it is Arjie’s peers who give him the extra push to understanding himself. With guidance from his extended family, his adult friends, and his peers, Arjie is able to discover his identity through understanding the impact of race and gender on his life.
Dalit literature represents an influential, rising trend in the Indian literary scene. Dalit writing is a post-independence literary phenomenon. The emergence of Dalit literature has a great historical significance. It has served the purpose of awakening the consciousness of the downtrodden for forging their identities. The recent surge in Dalit literature in India is an attempt to being to the forefront the experiences of discrimination, violence and poverty of the Dalits. The emergence of low-caste literature has taken place alongside a broader growth of consciousness and activism, particularly in urban India. As an individual a dalit cannot forget his past. The humiliation tries to remember his past.