Books for change

EYE CULTURE

- CHINTAN GIRISH MODI

Conversations about caste are difficult to have as they bring up guilt, shame, anger, and defensiveness in people from communities that have profited from or been complicit in structural violence that has persisted for centuries. These uncomfortable feelings need to have a place to be aired and confronted. The work of unlearning cannot happen if people are left without tools to chip away at their conditioning and resources to sit with their inner debris.

Children and teenagers now have access to books that unpack how the caste system dehumanises people on the lower rungs of the hierarchy and how they reclaim their dignity.

In 2005, Anveshi Research Centre for Women’s Studies and DC Books published a series of storybooks called “Different Tales” portraying the lived experiences of Dalit, Adivasi, Muslim children in a wholesome way. These depictions were not patronising or tokenistic.

Kancha Ilaiah’s book Turning the Pot, Tilling the Land: Dignity of Labour in Our Times (2009), illustrated by Durgabai Vyam and published by Navayana, challenges the constructs of lowliness and backwardness thrust upon leatherworkers, farmers, weavers, potters, barbers, and cattle-rearers. It talks about the science, art and skill involved in their labour.