Suraj Yengde, Shorenstein Center Post-Doctoral Fellow, Harvard Kennedy School
Can Brahmins participate in the anti-caste struggle? Has there been any history of Brahmins taking upon the Brahmin community to fight bigotry and oppression? History is laden with such examples albeit miniscule.
Brahmins in the caste system enjoy unaccountable privilege and control over the ‘lower’ declared bodies. Due to their absolute command on power distribution and control, Brahmins become default power-brokers who negotiate unequal relations to their advantage. This can be seen with the overwhelming representation of Brahmins in all the positions of power in India. Be it politics, media, bureaucracy, judiciary and religious institutions, Brahmins continue to remain key players.
This definite control on the resources give the minority Brahmin community an added advantage to reproduce oppressions on each level of operation. In the gamut of anti-caste struggle, Dalit discourse is prominently targeted against Brahminical values of the Brahmin community. This remained a remarkable success of the Brahminical project in India. However, there were few notable exceptions among Brahmins who defied the regularity of Brahminness and instead took intellectual arms against fellow orthodox Brahmins who wanted to reproduce caste oppressions. In this talk we will deal with the questions of right to agency among the oppressors to engage with unequal sociological relations of oppression by looking at Brahmins participation in the anti-caste struggle.
Dates:
Thursday, November 14, 2019 – 5:00pm
Foster 103