Page 1 of 7
Journal for Studies in Management and Planning
Available at http://internationaljournalofresearch.org/index.php/JSMaP
e-ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 01 Issue 11
December 2015
Available online: http://internationaljournalofresearch.org/ P a g e | 67
Writing as a Process of Reconstructing and Reforming
Fractured Communities
Pratibha Singh
2/1, Railway Colony Sarojini Nagar, Near Chanakya Puri, New Delhi-110021
Abstract
Though India is mounting towards
development in varied fields but cast system
conversely, till present, situates as an
encumbrance in the overall augmentation of
the nation, overlooking a substantial amount
of inhabitants. The way Dalits are treated in
India is similar to the way African- Americans were pressed to the periphery
and looked down upon in America. This
hierarchy has been apparent not just in the
social order but in literature as well. The
atrocities of both these marginal groups
were not endowed with adequate magnitude
or voice and hence, the subaltern was not a
component of the literary canon for a very
extensive period of time. It is solely through
their ceaseless endeavors that they have
made their way from the edge towards the
core. Progressively the ever hushed and
tangential subaltern groups started putting
across their unfortunate experience by
sharing them with the outside world through
writing. These writers, through minority
groups chose to share their tribulation
through the medium of writing in order to
harmonize and to fortify the sufferers with
positivity as well as to claim parity and
sovereignty. Dalit and African-American
communities have had a comparable
experience of chronological marginalization
which led to their united resentment.
However, Literature has the potential to
connect the past with present and also, at the
same time, assists the country, society and
individual to reconsider their concerns.
Therefore, I will take up the following texts
in my paper and highlight the above
mentioned ideas.
In, Autobiography of An Ex-Colored Man
(1912), James Weldon Johnson, represents
the position of a Mulatto protagonist,
residing in America under conditions of
white dominance. The narrator-protagonist
in the novel illustrates the consequences of
racial discrimination and brutality on the
protagonist’s subjectivity and worldview.
His problematic state further leads to
ambivalence of his identification with his
(legally) black and (visibly) white societies
and his eventual resolution to get ahead as a
white in order to escape the disgust of
racism.
A similar kind of revelation of
discrimination can be noticed in the writings
of Bama Faustina Soosairaj, a Dalit writer
from Tamil Nadu, who bears a sense of
labor and purpose in her writing. She stands
as a challenge for the Indian literary canon
merely for a few reasons; first of all, she is a
woman and second and most importantly
she is a Dalit woman. She stimulated the
tranquil world with her first piece of writing
Page 2 of 7
Journal for Studies in Management and Planning
Available at http://internationaljournalofresearch.org/index.php/JSMaP
e-ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 01 Issue 11
December 2015
Available online: http://internationaljournalofresearch.org/ P a g e | 68
that was published in 1992, Karukku ,
followed by Sangathi. She shared her
experiences with the whole wide world
through writing and has been a notable part
of Literature ever since. In Karukku, Bama
exemplifies her identity dilemma of being a
Dalit and her struggle for survival against
patriarchy. Through her writing, she
describes the importance of empowerment,
education and employment for those who
are exploited for various years. She
reinforces the fact that for a better living,
eradication of untouchability is imperative,
so that the victims of Casteism can take
pride in their true identities.
These examples make the fact very evident
that in order to come out of their trivial
state(s), these writers chose to facilitate
writing as an expression of their uneven
past. Writing was used as a tool by such
marginalized and oppressed writers to
awaken the consciousness of the population
and also to heal themselves through the
written word.
My paper, through the chosen texts/writers,
will try to explore the importance of writing
one’s experiences down and the way it helps
in converting a fragmented identity into a
complete whole.
KEYWORDS: Dalit, African American,
Fractured subaltern communities,
Progression.
Marginalization is an immense
impediment faced by a variety of sections of
the social order. A number of communities
have been pushed to the periphery of the
society from a very extensive period of time.
These sections have had experience of
enormous containment and inequity. The
focus of such communities is greatly upon
declaration of human rights, individuality,
mutiny against inequality and desire for a
new-fangled society; devoid of favoritism.
Literature of the marginalized confers such
two dissimilar Diasporas but one general
idea of humanity in Black Americans and
Dalit Indians.
Dalits and African-American communities
have had an analogous experience of
chronological marginalization, which further
escorted to their cohesive resentment.
However, Literature has tried to incorporate
and support these marginalized sectors, it
has given tone of expression and prospective
to these sections to amalgamate past with
present and also, at the same time, aided the
nation, civilization and individual to reassess
their apprehension. Both these literatures
have a facet of remonstration and to
rummage for identity. They have elevated
plenteous voices to emphasize their
tribulations. This paper shall discuss the
significance laid by the marginalized writers
on the act of writing and recording their
brutal experiences. For such writers, the act
of sharing and unfolding the bruised history
of neglected communities becomes an act
which proves to be a therapeutic process for
both the writers and the readers of Dalit and
Black communities.
The term Dalit, is a Marathi word,
which means devastated. In the current
circumstances the word Dalit does not
symbolize merely untouchables; the term in
fact, is an extensively germane word to all
subsidiary, indigenous, subaltern in addition
to other groups like Muslims, Christians,
Page 3 of 7
Journal for Studies in Management and Planning
Available at http://internationaljournalofresearch.org/index.php/JSMaP
e-ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 01 Issue 11
December 2015
Available online: http://internationaljournalofresearch.org/ P a g e | 69
Neo Buddhists and also to upper caste
women in India, who are distinguished
against physically, economically and
socially (Negotiating Margins: African
American and Dalit writings). Indian Dalit
writers like Mulk Raj Anand, Mahashweta
Devi, Faustina Bama have instituted a
distinctiveness and brought about a colossal
uprising in Dalit literature in India. These
writers believed in the notion that writing is
essential in communities that have been
debarred from didactic prospect; in
communities with lower literacy rates.
Although for those in the boundaries,
admittance to value edification and
encouragement for writing is not easily
accessible. In the midst of poor literacy rates
along with monetary complexity, a lot of
marginalized inhabitants locate writing itself
as opulence. The act of writing becomes
exceedingly crucial for them to demonstrate
their individuality and also to make others
aware and acknowledge their predicament.
Writing for such writers bears out to be a
form of “catharsis” (Jane Schukoske),
through writing, an individual can articulate
her/his self and is able to comprehend
excruciating distress better and also, can
share them with others at the similar
moment in time. Writing, therefore,
legitimates one’s story/reality which can be
used to make one’s affliction accredited.
This can be better understood with
collaboration to Faustina Bama’s Karukku
(1992) along with James Weldon Johnson’s
The Autobiography of An Ex- Colored Man
(1912).
Faustina Bama began to be
distinguished as a writer with the publication
of Karukku (1992). Her novel demonstrates
the appearance of Dalit writings and made
her one of the foremost Dalit woman writers
in India. The narration moves from past to
present, exploring a variety of events, that
she had experienced during her life. Her
work has been called an influential
representation of Dalit suppression by
numerous critics and readers. Karukku
illustrates not just her individual sufferings
but the exploitation and suppression of the
entire Dalit community. Bama, in one of her
interviews stated that “Dalit life is
excruciatingly painful, charred by
experiences; experiences that did not
manage to find room in literary creations”.
Therefore, through her novel, she is sharing
her agony with her community as well as
with inhabitants belonging to further
superior classes.
One of the most significant aspects
presented in the novel is the oppression of
Dalit Christians in the hands of the church.
Karukku gives a picture of how Dalits were
discriminated against of which Bama
provides a variety of accounts; they were not
allowed to sing in the church choir, there
were different schools for the affluent, elitist
upper caste Christians and for poor Dalit
non Christians. In her works, she depicts
how she and her community have been
deceived by the assurance of autonomy and
distinction by the convent, the church and by
humanity as a whole. Bama outlines her
religious growth as a Catholic and her
realization of herself as a Dalit: for instance,
her portrayal of her exclusion from the
rituals of which she was initially a
participant, but later was debarred from the
