How Caste Shapes Gender: Femininities Brahminical And Dalit Masculinities In The Modern India

Manasvi Ramnani & Krishika
DOI:

Abstract

Caste in India is a social taxonomy of power, purity and belonging and a tool of regulation that makes gendered lives in very differentiated forms. This paper will show that caste does not simply create gender; on the contrary, it constitutes gender differences by insulating Savarna femininity in terms of purity and modesty, exposing Dalit femininity to labour and vulnerability and making Dalit masculinity undeserving of dignity and equal citizenship. Based on Ambedkar, Chakravarti, Rege, Guru, Ilaiah, and others, and global theoretical approaches of Crenshaw, Bourdieu, Butler, Sen, and Spivak, the study places caste as experienced and embodied in a continuum between sexual security and labour visibility, social presence, narrative legitimacy and economic possibilities. It also looks at how caste-gender is mediated by law, media, religion, marriage patterns, labour structures as well as cultural perception. Throughout the paper, the theoretical insights are correlated with judicial changes and statistical findings to support the argument that caste abolition entails a reconstruction of gender imagination despite gender lines of dignity and equality. The real constitutional morality should then understand that the structural generation of gender by caste is one of the most profound stumbling blocks to social justice in India.

Keywords

Savarna, Dalit Feminism, Castes, Oppression, Freedom