Breaking the Silence: A Critical Analysis of Dalit Women's Worldview in Urmila Pawar's Motherwit

Authors

  • Kamna Singh Ph.D Research Scholar Department of English University of Delhi

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.56062/gtrs.2023.2.09.463

Keywords:

Dalit, Urmila Pawar, Motherwit, Mahar community, caste and gender.

Abstract

The Dalit group is among the most oppressed under the contentious but widely accepted social structure known as caste, but some Dalit women have experienced even worse subjugation. The perspective of oppressed Dalit women is examined in this essay. Not Dalit women in isolation, but rather Dalit women collectively. In doing so, Motherwit, a collection of short stories by Urmila Pawar, is the main subject of this essay. It aims to initiate a conversation about the worldview of Dalit women, which is situated at the nexus of gender, caste, and class. It also aims to address the worldview that has largely gone unchallenged in both the well-known Dalit and feminist discourses in India. The article has been divided into three sections. The first section provides a brief biography of Urmila Pawar and then discusses the rise of Dalit women writers, focusing on her collection of short stories Motherwit. The second section discusses the text's themes, offers a commentary on how it uses language, and ends with a statement on Dalit feminism. Women from various castes and social classes may identify with Pawar's feminism since it is not exclusive to any one lady.

References

Deo Veena, Introduction. Motherwit by Urmila Pawar, translated by Veena Deo. Zubaan Books, 2013, pp. xiii-xliii.

Ilaiah, Kancha. Why I am Not a Hindu: A Sudra Critique of Hindutva Philosophy, Culture and Political Economy. Popular Prakashan, 2002.

Interviews with Pawar 1998, Amihi Itihas Gadhawala: Urmila Pawar and The Making of History. Mumbai: SPARROW.

Kumar, Raj. “Beyond the Margin: Dalit Women's Autobiographies.” Dalit Personal Narratives: Reading Caste, Nation and Identity, by Raj Kumar, Orient BlackSwan, 2011, pp. 210–260.

Mahurkar, Vaishnavi. “Locating Urmila Pawar's Work in the Dalit Feminist Canon.” Sahapedia, 26 Apr. 2018, www.sahapedia.org/locating-urmila-pawars-work-the-dalit-feminist-canon.

Pawar, Urmila. Motherwit. Translated by Veena Deo, Zubaan Books, 2013.

---. The Weave of My Life: A Dalit Woman's Memoirs. Translated by Maya Pandit, Columbia University Press, 2015.

Pawar, Urmila, and Meenakshi Moon. We Also Made History: Women in the Ambedkarite Movement. Translated by Wandana Sonalkar, Zubaan, 2014.

Satyanarayana, K., and Susie Tharu. “Dalit Writing: An Introduction.” The Exercise of Freedom: an Introduction to Dalit Writing, edited by K. Satyanarayana and Susie J. Tharu, Navayana Publishing, 2013, pp. 8–21

Zelliot, Ellinor. Foreword. Motherwit by Urmila Pawar, translated by Veena Deo. Zubaan Books, 2013, pp. ix- xii.

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Published

2023-12-26

How to Cite

Kamna Singh , translator. “Breaking the Silence: A Critical Analysis of Dalit Women’s Worldview in Urmila Pawar’s Motherwit”. Creative Saplings, vol. 2, no. 12, Dec. 2023, pp. 46-54, https://doi.org/10.56062/gtrs.2023.2.09.463.

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