Abstract
The paper aims to take the scholarship on corporeal feminism and Dalit Studies forward by focusing on the Dalit woman’s body. The body is not treated as an inert surface in this paper but is considered as a transformative medium that can alter its embedded codifications and significations through transgressive performances in the face of systemic and systematized caste violence. In doing so the gendered body not only challenges to rewrite the Dalit epistemology from the vantage of resistance but also initiates a rethinking of Indian feminism. The paper begins with a discursive discussion on the importance of the gender criterion in this study, and embarks on a textual reading of the writings of Bama and Mahasweta Devi in the following two sections where it attempts to take the Dalit women’s corporeal agency into cognizance. With its return to the infamous Hathras gang-rape case in the final section, the paper concludes in what ways the absent-presence of the gendered Dalit body keeps on being a continuous threat to the penetrative drive of Hindutva violence.
Recommended Citation
Mukherjee, Suddhadeep
(2021)
"Women of the Dalit Unrest: Rewriting Bodies, Reinforcing Resistance,"
Tête à Tête: Journal of Francophone Studies: Vol. 1, Article 11.
Available at:
https://repository.lsu.edu/tete_a_tete/vol1/iss1/11
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