LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 21:10 October 2021
ISSN 1930-2940

Editors:
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         T. Deivasigamani, Ph.D.
         Pammi Pavan Kumar, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.

Managing Editor & Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.

Celebrate India!
Unity in Diversity!!

HOME PAGE

Click Here for Back Issues of Language in India - From 2001

BOOKS FOR YOU TO READ AND DOWNLOAD FREE!

REFERENCE MATERIALS

BACK ISSUES

  • E-mail your articles and book-length reports in Microsoft Word to languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.

  • PLEASE READ THE GUIDELINES GIVEN IN HOME PAGE IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE LIST OF CONTENTS.

  • Your articles and book-length reports should be written following the APA, MLA, LSA, or IJDL Stylesheet.

  • The Editorial Board has the right to accept, reject, or suggest modifications to the articles submitted for publication, and to make suitable stylistic adjustments. High quality, academic integrity, ethics and morals are expected from the authors and discussants.

Copyright © 2021
M. S. Thirumalai

Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
11249 Oregon Circle
Bloomington, MN 55438
USA
Custom Search

Akkarmashi: A Saga of Existential Fears of an Outcast

Salia Rex, Ph.D.


Courtesy: www.amazon.com

‘Subaltern’ is a term Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak borrows from the Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci to signify the oppressed class (271). In the essay “Subalternity and the Mirage of Social Inclusion, Rajan Joseph Barret opines that Subalternity in India is a complex of a number of factors such as class, caste, race, religion, gender, age, education location, etc. (229).

This Study attempts to analyze Akkarmashi which artistically portrays the sorrows, tribulations, slavery, degradation, ridicule and poverty endured by Dalits. The cumulative aftermath is reflected in the identity crisis of its protagonist who asks countless number of questions to the society regarding his identity as a fatherless Mahar. The identity crisis of Sharavankumar Limbale stems from his abominable status as a fatherless child of a Mahar woman. The predicament of the protagonist exposes the hypocrisy and double standard attitude of the society and the poignant lives of a section of marginalized people stigmatized by the social laws. The uniqueness of Akkarmashi is: It is a Dalit autobiography of objective truth than mere subjective reality narrated sans emotional clamour. The focus of the study is to analyze the impact of the social scourge on the protagonist as a conscious and enlightened human being who undergoes a series of cataclysmic changes caused by the rigours of life and power structures. The study reviews the impact of the Indian caste system: its implications on Indian society, in a microcosmic level in the family of Sharavankumar Limbale and himself.

In the essay “Reading Sharankumar Limbale’s Towards an Aesthetic of Dalit Literature: From Erasure to Assertion” Alok Mukherjee asserts that “The central concern of Dalit literature is how best to represent the ‘authentic experience’ of Dalits (10). G. N. Devy in his Introduction to Akkarmashi, addresses Dalit autobiographies as “Social epiphanies” for their startling revelation of the stratified Indian society brought through Marathi literature (xxii). Dalit autobiographies reflect the exploitations, mistreatment, exclusion, and disownment and cruelty they suffer at various realms of the society and remind us about the countless numbers of lock up deaths, murders, honour- killing occur in our country. The Dalit writers attempt to reveal to the outside world about the despicable life led by them upon the fringes. The life of woe and want that seems to be their onus since birth has strengthened them to proclaim the hard realities from their rooftops to the humanity.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.


Salia Rex, Ph.D.
Asst. Professor
St. Paul’s College Kalamassery, H.M.T. Colony 683503
Kerala, India
saliarex@stpauls.ac.in
Custom Search
  • Click Here to Go to Creative Writing Section

  • Send your articles
    as an attachment
    to your e-mail to
    languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.
  • Please ensure that your name, academic degrees, institutional affiliation and institutional address, and your e-mail address are all given in the first page of your article. Also include a declaration that your article or work submitted for publication in LANGUAGE IN INDIA is an original work by you and that you have duly acknowledged the work or works of others you used in writing your articles, etc. Remember that by maintaining academic integrity we not only do the right thing but also help the growth, development and recognition of Indian/South Asian scholarship.