Dalit Camera: Through Untouchable Eyes

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Suresh Kumar
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Social Networking Sites ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Caste System ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Caste Discrimination ◽  
The Social ◽  
Media Institutions

In India, Dalits also known as ‘untouchables’ have been exploited and subjected to various sorts of atrocities due to the social stratification of Indian society. Though Dalit populace is around 23 percentage of total Indian population, they are underprivileged and discriminated in numerous ways. Dalits are socially, economically and politically segregated and oppressed by the caste dominated society. Mass media which claims to be the social institution seldom gives coverage to Dalit related issues. Even if any news items were to appear in the mainstream media, it was only misrepresentation of facts. For centuries, Dalits have been making an effort to emancipate from the clutches of caste system, and many Dalit leaders have even laid down their lives for this cause. Nonetheless, Dalits continue to undergo the caste discrimination in all spheres of their lives. Dalit intellectuals and activists tried to voice their concerns to the mass media, but owing to the caste dominated media and the absence of Dalit journalists, their voices were unheard and silenced. Dalits were even denied the space to work in such media institutions. When Dalits themselves tried to own their media to champion Dalits’ cause, economic factors miserably failed them in perpetuating such efforts. Thus, Dalits were denied their space to voice their views on a public platform. In a situation such as this, the emergence and proliferation of internet and social networking sites have provided a sigh of relief to them to voice their problems to be heard even to the international community. Dalit Camera, a YouTube channel has become a rallying point for the Dalit community in India. This article throws light on how Dalit Camera is a platform for the expression of discrimination and avenue for exposing the atrocities committed on Dalits.

Caste and Christianity in India

2019 ◽  
pp. 408-419
Author(s):  
Anderson Jeremiah
Keyword(s):  
Social Practice ◽  
Caste System ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Religious Rituals ◽  
Religious Worldview ◽  
Caste Discrimination ◽  
The Social ◽  
Cultural Forces ◽  
Caste Groups

The Indian practice of the caste system creates a repressive stratification in the subcontinent. Hinduism refers to a variety of theologies, mythologies, cultic practices and philosophies spread across India. The exclusion of outcastes is ordained, pursued and perpetuated by dominant religio-political and socio-cultural forces, often with violent consequences. While the constitution prohibits any discrimination on grounds of caste, the social practice of caste identity continues to be relevant across the country. Because the caste system is the product of a religious worldview, it is through religious rituals that caste discrimination and prejudices are manifested. Mission organisations agreed to work within specific caste communities in order to avoid conflict. The caste-based segregation masquerading as denominationalism runs so deep within the churches in India that there are congregations who do not share the Eucharist. Only 12 out of 241 bishops are from a Dalit background, whereas Dalits make up more than 65% of the membership of Catholic congregations. Dalit groups have had to mobilise to counter the unfair advantages enjoyed by higher-caste groups. The caste system has become a potent political tool within Indian society and its relevance in shaping socio-cultural moorings have not diminished.

"Getting down with Covid, being crowned, under quarantine, or language transformations during a pandemic "

Lyuboslovie ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 ◽  
pp. 276-292
Author(s):  
Desislava Cheshmedzhieva-Stoycheva ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Search Engines ◽  
Active Part ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Frequency Of Use ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Mass Media

The focus of the paper is on the neologisms that have occurred in Bulgarian as a result of the pandemic. The corpus of analysis comprises linguistic exchanges collected during some personal conversations of the author with a number of informants as well as occurrences of the encountered neologisms in the social and mainstream media. The neologisms were also compared with the linguistic entries in some reference books and their frequency of use was checked through search engines. One of the main conclusions reached is that despite the fact that some of the analysed neologisms are not part of the official lexicon they are widely used in the social and the mass media, which means they are an active part of everyday life of Bulgarians.

scholarly journals DYNAMICS OF MEDIA AND SOCIETY INTERACTION IN COMMUNICATIVE SPACE

2013 ◽  
pp. 234-240
Author(s):  
D. I. Chistyakov
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
Mass Communication ◽  
Structural Integrity ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Communication Model ◽  
Media Impact ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Masses ◽  
Late Modern

The article is dedicated to the analysis of the social issues caused by mass-media impact on individuals and society. The author bases on reflection of sociological theories and discourses of late modern and postmodern and thus shows the transformation of media and their audience on the society’s way to the postmodernity. Postmodern media are viewed as a specific social institution of postmodernity; the author also emphasizes the basic peculiarities of its institutionalization. Structural integrity between mass-media and society is ensured through mass communication in its one-sided direction of the only communicator to the masses, often turning into an influence on recipients. The article stems from the premise that a modernday person is included in qualitatively and quantitavely other communications than in a preceding era of late modernity. Mass-media’s influence on society is thus specific. Messages, images, symbols, signs created by media not only form our perspective, but also serve as keys to the perception of reality. A subject today is involved in endless interconnected streams of information, hence a subject doesn’t consume information in discreet blocks anymore. Rather, we can imagine a subject standing knee-deep in a vast stream grabbing whatever he or she may find interesting. Under the certain conditions the very reality is being substituted by the virtual reality. The author shows and analyses the communication model of the basic information producers and recipients.

3. Colonial India: religious and caste divides

2017 ◽  
pp. 34-47
Author(s):  
Craig Jeffrey
Keyword(s):  
Religious Diversity ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Caste System ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Colonial India ◽  
Natural Feature ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
Imperial Power ◽  
Partition Of India

India is often identified as a Hindu country, but there are many other religions in India including Buddhism, Jainism, Islam, Sikhism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Christianity. ‘Colonial India: religious and caste divides’ explains India’s religious diversity and the inequalities that are associated with the assumed ‘Hindu-ness’ of India. It also describes the Partition of India into three new nations in 1947 and the accompanying violence. A sharply hierarchical caste system is not necessarily a natural feature of Indian society. Caste is rather a social institution that has changed historically in response to economic and political forces. The imperial power introduced or exacerbated social contradictions that continue to mark the lives of low castes in modern India.

scholarly journals A Commentary on Ambedkar's Posthumously Published "Philosophy of Hinduism" - Part II

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 01-16
Author(s):  
Rajesh Sampath
Keyword(s):  
Social System ◽  
Caste System ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Human Consciousness ◽  
World Religion ◽  
Modern Conception ◽  
The Core ◽  
The Social ◽  
Philosophy And Religion ◽  
The Status

This paper continues the commentary on Dr. B. R. Ambedkar’s posthumously published Philosophy of Hinduism. Utilizing resources from various modern continental European philosophers and social theorists, particularly of religion, we elaborate on several key passages within Ambedkar’s overall framework of analysis. The paper continues to explore how Ambedkar conceives relations between philosophy and religion, and how historical shifts in general human consciousness have occurred whereby altering both fields. At the core of his being, Ambedkar is concerned with a methodological justification that will enable him to venture into a penetrating critique of the immoral and amoral nature of Hinduism’s social system of caste. In Part I of the commentary, we followed Ambedkar until he arrived at the criteria of ‘justice’ and ‘utility’ to judge the status of Hinduism. He wanted to test whether this Eastern world religion, which descends from antiquity, meets those criteria, which shape the modern conception of religion. In Part II of this commentary, we expand further on Ambedkar’s thesis as to why Hinduism fails to meet the modern conception when those twin criteria are not met. This thought presupposes various underlying philosophical transformations of the relations of ‘God to man’, ‘Society to man’, and ‘man to man’ within which the Hindu-dominated Indian society forecloses the possibility of individual equality, freedom, and dignity. In making contributions to Ambedkar studies, the philosophy of religion, and political philosophies of justice, this paper sets up Part III of the commentary, which will examine Ambedkar’s actual engagement with the classics of Hinduism’s philosophy and thought in general. Ultimately, Ambedkar is undeterred in his original critique of the social and moral failures of the caste system, thereby intimating ambitious possibilities for its eventual eradication.

scholarly journals Caste and Consequences

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 95-110
Author(s):  
G. C. Pal
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Sense Of Security ◽  
The Social ◽  
Victims Of Violence ◽  
Caste Groups ◽  
Caste Structure

Abstract   Caste, a social institution in India, has significant implications on social legislations, affirmative action and group-specific development policies. In the modern society, the traditional caste structure however continues to nurture the unequal social interaction process among caste groups. This often translates into various forms of human rights violations against the groups at the bottom of caste hierarchy. The key concern is that resistance to such violations often leads to ‘caste violence’ of different forms. Although a body of literature that explains this caste phenomenon in the discourse of human rights and social justice, its larger consequences remains a neglected dimension. This paper, drawing evidence from a series of empirical research on ‘mapping caste-based violence’ in contemporary Indian society, sheds light on diverse consequences of real or perceived violence, emanating from ‘caste’. The analysis reveals that consequences of caste violence are manifested in social, economic, psychological and moral terms. The ‘victims of violence’ speak the language of suffering and deprivation in different spheres of life, having a bearing on the basic human needs of ‘belongingness’ democratic honour and ‘sense of security’. The apathetic attitude and slow response of state machinery towards caste violence often accentuate the social conditions to make the ‘victims of violence’ and their communities fall into the vicious cycle of caste oppressions and increased vulnerability to poor human development.

scholarly journals Declining Social Control and the Rising Deviant Behaviour in India

2020 ◽  
Vol 69 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-33
Author(s):  
Pravin J. Patel
Keyword(s):  
Social Control ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Crime Rates ◽  
Caste System ◽  
Informal Social Control ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Social Control Theory ◽  
Law And Order ◽  
Deviant Behaviour ◽  
The Social

Crime rates are increasing across the Indian society. Normally, such crimes are attributed to two broad categories of factors: (a) psychological factors like individual or mob fury and (b) administrative factors like the failure of law and order machinery. These explanations, however, do not account for the increasing rates of such demeaning instances. This article, attempting to explain the increasing crime rates, focuses on the social control theory. The main argument of the article is that the rapidly declining informal social control causes the phenomenal rise of decadent behaviour in the contemporary Indian society. Due to modernising forces, traditional social institutions and structures such as family, kinship, caste system and village community have become weak. As a result, the traditional informal social control based on shame has gradually diminished. And the sense of guilt, the functional alternative to shame, as an informal mechanism of social control, has not yet been fully institutionalised. This seems to be the major factor giving rise to widespread deviant behaviour in India. Although formal mechanisms of social control like police and judiciary do exist, they cannot be very effective without being reinforced with the informal social control.

scholarly journals A Study of Psycho-Educational Variables in the Light Socio-Economic Status

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jawaid Ahmad Ittoo ◽  
Mukhtar Ahmad Wani
Keyword(s):  
Learning Styles ◽  
Learning Strategies ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Economic Status ◽  
Sampling Technique ◽  
Caste System ◽  
Cluster Sampling ◽  
The Social ◽  
Lower Castes ◽  
Educational Variables

In spite of strict religious prohibition of caste system, yet the social stratification features have deeply crept into some Muslim societies and Kashmiri society is no exception. The proper reason might be due to the fact that Kashmiri people have retained some Pre-Islamic features despite conversion. The Kashmiri society is considered to be composed of 1906 castes which are just like other societies categorised into upper, middle and lower castes. At the upper end are Syeds, Khans and Pathans and at the lower end are watal, teeli, Gurjar, lohar etc. In the light of social psychology, the caste in which an individual is born and reared has a significant effect on the personality of that individual (Linton, 1936). Personality traits are expressed in learning styles, which in turn are reflected in learning strategies which eventually produce a certain learning outcome (Heinstorm, 2000). For the present study a sample of 800 students was drawn from seven castes of Kashmir valley i.e. two from dominant upper caste (Syeds and Khan) and another five from under- privileged lower caste (Hajam, Kumar, Gurjar,Lohar and Teeli,) through cluster sampling technique.

scholarly journals The Journey from Untouchable to Dalit: Pioneering Literary Landmarks and Dissident Dalit Voices of Contemporary India

2018 ◽  
pp. 35
Author(s):  
Ana García-Arroyo
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Literary Works ◽  
Palabras Clave ◽  
Caste Discrimination ◽  
The Social

AbstractThis paper analyses the situation of Untouchable / Dalit people in India through intersecting literature and social realities. It focuses on the most relevant and pioneering literary works of colonial and postcolonial times and how these landmarks of fiction function as a mimetic expression of everyday life. Then, the main objective is 1) to give an overview of the representation of untouchability and its evolution into the Dalit consciousness within the interrelated contexts of literature and real life; and 2) to demonstrate that in much less than a century India has witnessed astonishing changes as far as the social stratification of caste-gender is concerned. Keywords: untouchability, Dalit identity, pioneering Dalit literature, gender-caste discrimination   ResumenEste artículo analiza la situación de los/as intocables o Dalits en India, interrelacionando realidades literarias y sociales. Se examinan las obras literarias pioneras de la etapa colonial y postcolonial y cómo éstos textos de ficción mimetizan la realidad diaria. Así, el objetivo principal es 1) exponer cómo se ha representado la intocabilidad y cuál ha sido su evolución hasta la formación de la consciencia Dalit, en el contexto literario y social; y 2) demostrar que en menos de un siglo se han producido asombrosos cambios en lo que se refiere a la categoría social de casta-género. Palabras clave: intocabilidad, identidad Dalit, literatura pionera Dalit, discriminación de género-casta.

scholarly journals Conversion to Islam Untouchables' Strategy for Protest in India

1990 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 258-260
Author(s):  
Mohammad A. Siddiqi
Keyword(s):  
Caste System ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Psychological Violence ◽  
Indian Politics ◽  
South Indian ◽  
Conversion To Islam ◽  
The Social ◽  
Extreme Measure ◽  
Mass Conversion ◽  
Comprehensive Framework

Many Indians were taken by surprise, anger, and dismay by severalthousand South Indian untouchables when they converted to Islam in 1981-82.Hindu chauvinists violently reacted and formed the Vishva Hindu Prishadwhich later occupied the famous mosque built by the first Mughul ruler ofIndia, Babur. Since then many attempts have been made to analyze the causesof the mass conversion which still continues, although not in large numbers.Abdul Malik's book carefully examines the regional and local causes as wellas the consequences of this mass conversion to Islam. Malik explains theelements of the complex social matrix in which the untouchables usedconversion as a "conscious and articulate protest" against a cruel and unjustcaste system. This unique study provides a thorough sociological perspectivethat deepens our understanding of more than 200 million untouchables of India.Malik explains, in the first chapter, the methodological and theoreticalbasis as well as the framework of his study. He raises relevant questionsthat have been answered in the latter part of the book, questions such as:Why did the untouchables resort to the extreme measure of conversion? Werethe conversions isolated cases or were they part of a long-term strategy? Whywas Islam as a religion chosen? Malik suggests that the main variables inthe process of conversion were the untouchables’ “aggressive and assertivebehavior.” While developing his own thesis, Malik carefully examines similarstudies by political sociologists such as Feierbend, Gum, Grimshaw, Niebuhrand others. He critically evaluates their work and draws meaningful similarities.Yet he establishes a more comprehensive framework by redefining many termssuch as violence and psychological violence in the context of the untouchables’conversion to Islam.The second, third, and fourth chapters provide a detailed understandingof the caste system that is the core of Indian politics, the economic, social,political, and cultural milieu of the untouchables, the pervasiveness ofuntouchability in the Indian society, the nature of violence against theuntouchables, and the helplessness of ’the untouchables in dealing with thepolitical power that is embedded in the caste hierarchy of the social systemin India ...

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