When beauty is rendered as a tool to assert and/or negotiate spaces

by Minakshee Rode

 

In a place like Pune University, whenever I look around, particularly, at the post graduate students studying English Literature, Caste and gender studies, one question always bothers me: what do we expect our mind-sets to be?

Students are learning just rhetoric and politically correct language specifically in terms of caste. Despite many attempts our educational system is still unable to make them sensitive enough to try to relate the personal with the theory, as students are not ready to unlearn their prejudices and assumptions about the non-Brahmin population.

First generation dalit female students, who have migrated to metropolitan universities from across various  classes;  have  no  touch  of  and  knowledge  about  the casteism disguised in the elitist culture of these universities. This is not very easily visible, but practiced so vehemently in almost each and every classroom of the campus. In this post, I will highlight the negotiations and assertions which dalit girls intentionally and unintentionally have to make in these spaces. These processes sometimes results in higher level of confidence and sometimes it can come across as arrogance of dalit girls. Well, the reception to this change is not pleasant, confidence is treated as arrogance and stigmatized as another instance of negative caste stereotype.

At first if we look at the classroom structure at the Post Graduate level; we can clearly see class based groups are formed irrespective of castes. But slowly caste comes to the fore when the fees have to be paid or the scholarship dates are displayed on the notice board. This period is toughest for dalit girls who don’t have any visible caste identity, most don’t want to disclose their caste identities. Because of  the politically correct atmosphere on the campus, the so-called upper caste female students cannot express the unease and plain disgust for fellow dalit students openly, so they slowly start excluding dalit girls from the group (if there are any at all) and activities. Many of us hear this common phrasing of a sentence addressed to us: “you don’t look like your caste or you are different, you don’t represent your caste as such”, from those who make attempts to speak to dalit girls.

So, some very basic questions: what must a dalit girl look like? More importantly what is the image of a dalit girl in their mind? What makes dalit girls so different from other students? After making several efforts at interacting with the upper caste, elite girl students, from all my years on the campus, here are a few responses that I have gathered:

Dalit girls may not be  getting married so their parents have sent them here.

These girls don’t have a sense of clothing,  have no sense of wearing the right make up, and manners are useless.

They are caught up in the wrong place; and they can never match up to our standards.

They don’t speak politely, and are very direct (rude).

They can speak neither good English nor pure Marathi.

Their eating habits/tastes are gross.

They are not feminine enough.

They don’t belong to our culture.

They are different and so on…

What do these responses reveal then? This is gendered casteism clothed in mainstream, elitist materialistic notions of female beauty. Moreover, this beauty is not just the beauty we usually think about, but beauty which is intricately linked to upper class lifestyles. Dalit girls have to compete or adjust and live with this constant comparison and evaluation. Branded clothes, heavy accessories, where you are expected to know all the non-Indian (international) foods and have regular manicure and pedicure, bleaching for fair and clear skin and you should be in proper shape. How  can  dalit  girls  ever  match  these  metropolitan  elite standards – especially when there is no such financial, cultural and socially privileged opportunities available for most dalit girls. Therefore, when implanted in foreign and elitist settings it requires not just adopting a novel culture but also results in attempts of getting rid of our original dalit identity which is largely viewed as a stigma to carry.

The Fab Indianised culture of the academic intellectual elites of the university campuses is very alien to these girls. I have seen girls who buy fashionable clothes and accessories by doing part-time jobs (when the economic conditions are not sound), or by telling lies to their parents and spending from their pocket-money meant for other uses.  Most of the time, money is spent on the beauty products and parlors. Dalit girls try their level best to match these elitist metropolitan concepts of beauty in the campus. All these are attempts to get a sense of belonging-ness in that space; rather we can say creating their space among elites. But it is certainly futile; it only helps to give you the confidence to be ‘assimilated’ in that space but you still remain with the feeling of failure to achieve a ‘legitimate place’ in that space. Always on edge, you become intolerable in this circle, and all these attempts only seeks to throw you out from the place.

However, dalit girls do resist these attempts and as they aspire to find their own space, it poses a question whether we can call such moves as assertion? Or can we see it as negotiating with the changing situation and demands/requirements of the new spaces?

So beauty is not the very straight forward thing that dalit girls have previously known it to be; it has many layers to it, which are very complex to deal with at various levels.  This brings us to responses of male students who already have prejudices about dalit girls as being ‘loose’. Most importantly even if you surpass visibility of your caste identity; forget about others who never notice your existence, but men from your own community also never acknowledge you. Many try to convince you that it doesn’t suit you, your ‘agency’ is totally denied by labelling the change as a result of stupid strategies to become westernized, all the time by calling you an example of ‘fractured modernity’.

The big question before dalit girls then is: how to do well academically in such circumstances as most of their time is spent in trying to get some space of their own in the classroom and in friend circles (if they have any). Dalit girl students who were toppers at the college level become almost zero at the university level because of these complex structures, continuous demoralization and so much energy diverted away from academic activity simply to gain acceptance of peers. However, one cannot deny the possibilities of some democratic spaces being created as a result of the conscious efforts on university campuses where such mainstream ideas of beauty can be contested but there are very few.

30 Comments

  1. Superb article, and thoughts that MUST gain more visibility. For example, I am a product of the Brahmin culture, but not really a subscriber of such thought. At the same time, these perceptions are inbred into our very view of the world, and it is important to address them repeatedly so that alternative views are formed.

    I would also appreciate any Dalit writers here who may want to contribute occasional posts to my blog, so that these thoughts become an accepted norm outside dalit centric spaces.

    Really appreciate this site and post. We have much to learn.

    1. @Vidyut: What a turn around! Particularly from someone who compares the plight of dalits to that of kashmiri pandits!!! looks like lot of learning has happened!!
      http://aamjanata.com/kashmiri-pandits-everybodys-concern-nobodys-responsibility/

  2. I fail to understand the hidden-ness of this disgusting systemic ill. This is not thinly veiled casteism, or veiled at all. this is yhe garden variety casteism, which you also see expressing as people getting beaten up, killed and denied rights.

    Political correctness is more revealing most other forms of communication if its not genuine.

    Not to take away anything from the struggles of Dalit girls, I have found depending on institution, feild and age, descrimination based in color, religion, intelligence, looks, and other things is as prevalent and damaging.

    As someone who spent most of his school days avoiding getting beaten up because i was a puny bespectacled mouse of a guy who like reading books and was a christian.

    I think this speaks about human nature which is inherently xenophobic, not just dalit phobic.

    uberschizo

  3. Good articulation. But in my opinion, system is not going to change so soon. You better learn to cope with the challenges thrown at you. There may be a lot of well wishers but ultimate reality is you will have to rise by yourself and i think you already knew it.

  4. Vivek says:

    Excellent writeup .. good one.

  5. Amigo says:

    I dont get the Dalit connect here…it’s more of a rural vs urban background or rich vs poor conflict…it exists in every society. most of the observations you made could be true for anyone who is from small town or economically poor background irrespective of their caste.

    1. P S M Rao says:

      Amigo, you may be right. But Dalit’s are generally poor whereby the class/caste demarcation gets wiped out. So, this is mostly felt by Dalit girls. True, the upper caste poor too are isolated by the peer group but the cultural influence of the families, even of the poor Brahmin or other upper castes helps them keep their confidence levels high with the end result of winning the battle more advantageously than their Dalit counterparts. Another dimension the write up focused is on the Dalit males’ treatment of their female counterparts. So, the scenario described is the offshoot of the unequal society which is class divided, caste ridden and male dominant – one reinforcing the other. Minakshi Rode’s kind of discussion and analysis is therefore apt and should continue.

    2. Vijaykumar says:

      It is “rural vs urban background or rich vs poor” issue, compounded manifold and almost rendered insurmountable, by caste/dalit issue. The “rural vs urban” or “rich vs poor” is easy to bridge. For example, it takes only a few days of “getting used to” for a poor brahmin from a village to integrate with the groups in question. The same cannot be said about the dalit issue described in the article.

      1. Here, we again witness an instance of someone attempting to derail the caste argument using the class argument. This is really unfortunate. Why cant people step out of their caste privilege and acknowledge that there is a caste problem out there? what is so difficult about it?

  6. Raju says:

    Dear Madam,

    The article is an excellent mirror to the existing educational/intellectual(?)situations under which Dalit students have to survive and study. I agree on the issue that most of the times even Dalit men fail as much as rest do in this context.

    There is greater need to create spaces of our own, I guess your article is a step towards it.

    Looking forward to read and see more of alternative realities/perceptions that are made invisible.

  7. Sanjiv says:

    This article is mis-titled and misguiding. The observations are not related to the dalit/non-Dalit status, they are clearly cultural and geographical. I know of a Brahman kid from a small village who got into IIT and faced exactly the same reaction this young lady did. But he adapted; and so can she, if she chooses to. Instead of creating fake demons to fight with, either adapt – which will be easy to do – or celebrate your differences. But wallowing in your grief won’t solve anything.

  8. Vijaykumar says:

    Very insightful article.
    But the question is, why should the dalit look for that approval/acceptance? Given that the high castes in the university must be mostly richer, dominating, influential, from educated families etc, it is understandable that one wants to seek approval/acceptance. But according to me, this seeking of approval is the root of the problem, to begin with. Dalits should ignore the pursuit of being accepted, and instead focus on developing, excelling in various fields, helping/motivating/empowering/educating fellow travelers, and in removing genuine obstacles using all possible legitimate means.

  9. Shamshad Elahee Shams says:

    thought provoking article…

  10. arpit chaudhary says:

    gud one .. u touched a aspect of life which really need focus …
    the system however will not gain progress so soon …
    according to me the girls who are in low class ,she is sc/st ,, mostly are from villages.. this deprives them to learn as well as adopt new lifestyle which is being lived by modern high class girl …
    well written and a thing to given importance

  11. Dr.Nagesh says:

    Excellent article sister..yes its bitter reality..n our girls r fighting, struggling..

    @amigo There is hatred against the sc-st students in the mind of so called elitist upper cast intellectuals because they are studying with them, raising their voices..competing with them..so its difficult for them to digest it..because deep rooted cast system is ruling their minds,its its not just rural urban issue..its a issue of cast.

  12. Arvind says:

    It was the time of placements when few so called cool dudes came to know that the most beautiful gird in our batch was an SC, they were so amused that I cant express in words. As far as acknowledgement is concerned, I will say its hard but our girls will also have to be hard for such circumstances, may be they should try to be befriended with our boys(they should choose them with carefulness though). The problem is we are moving so fast that we barely see our people as the victim of the system and even criticize them for the same until we ourself fall as the victim. Parents and colleagues have a lot role to play here.

  13. Harshavardhan says:

    excellent!!!!!!!! Keep writing.

  14. Satvasheela says:

    Very good article. I think the Dalit girls should respond to this as it speaks about the pathos of the Dalit girls.

  15. wonderful writeup. According to me, these subtle transformations in the caste system today is directly linked to the understanding of purity which has changed to over time and acts as the causal link to the way the dalit girls are treated in college nowadays.

  16. Wonderful piece. I know that this is also the case in Delhi, but less so in government institutions than in non-government ones. But I do agree with the rich/poor, city/village polarization points of view, because I have seen that work. Creamy layer Dalit kids, particularly from cities, rarely face the problems you describe, because they already have access to many of the ‘desirable’ objects and behaviors that you are pointing to. While i do agree with the substance of your argument, I think you may want to think out the nature of (cross generation ?) privilege in a little more depth.

  17. vatsala says:

    i think the circumstances r inevitable (with the present mindset in the population)… bt the need of the hour is to discuss how to overcome this problem, only den the purpose of this article is served….. asking dem not to bother abt others n to mind their own businness (as in concentrate only on studies) cannot b possibly a solution…

  18. gouri patwardhan says:

    Its a very well articulated article. thanks Minakshee for describing in detail the process through which this discrimination is expressed.I dont agree with some of the responses here that claim that it is just a urban-rural issue. This prejudice will show itself even if a dalit girl student came from a middle class urban background. At some point her caste will be used against her. As long as caste prejudices remain in place it will continue to happen under different economical and geographical circumstances too.

  19. neha says:

    what a well written article. don’t bother about the comments from people rendering your experiences ‘false’-its upper caste privilege and patriarchy speaking. Thanks so much Minakshee. Can you publish this in a space which gets wider university coverage? We need more students to read articles like this, real life attestations as to how struggles differ and where they are rooted. I admire your strength and continued courage.

  20. Krishanu Pradhan says:

    A well written article. The beginning of any discrimination started with striking inequality in resource and income available to people. There is no difference between a elite Bramhin with a elite dalit. Culturally they are same. The difference and hence discrimination between them will never get revealed if the caste of the concerned person is not mentioned. However, in India, where ever you go, you have to mention of your caste. When caste identity of concerned girls are revealed through the fellowship, instead of its financial needs or deservingness, necessarily, the person with same status but from so called upper caste would get angry as he/she is denied from the same opportunity. Thus please don’t divide society based on caste line, rather it should be based on economic status.Try to understand the pathetic condition of millions of poor but upper caste people who get denied every opportunity in our country. Unless income and resource inequality are reduced, caste concept will never disappear from India.

  21. Jagdish says:

    excellent article you are expressing truth from heart and others should learn from you..hats off to you.

  22. Ravinder Kaur says:

    I agree with each n every word you have said dear. keep it up. very well written n thought provoking article it is

    1. Thank you !

  23. Reshma says:

    This article reminds me some of popular responses i received… you dont look like dalit. Its not about rich and poor. its about our perceptions about particular communities. Very well written.

  24. Swati bhardwaj says:

    Excellent article…. Agree

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