Madara Chennaiah, an 11th-century CE Kannada great vachana poet and saint, belonged to the Chambhar (Chamar) caste. He is widely regarded as the first Vachanakara in India who lived in the reign of Western Chalukyas. [1]
Madara Chennaiah, an 11th-century CE Kannada great vachana poet and saint, belonged to the Chambhar (Chamar) caste. He is widely regarded as the first Vachanakara in India who lived in the reign of Western Chalukyas. [1]
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Tarabai Shinde (1850–1910) was a feminist activist who protested patriarchy and caste in 19th century India. She is known for her published work, Stri Purush Tulana, originally published in Marathi in 1882. The pamphlet is a critique of caste and patriarchy, and is often considered the first modern Indian feminist text. It was very controversial for its time in challenging the Hindu religious scriptures themselves as a source of women's oppression, a view that continues to be controversial and debated today. She was a member of Satyashodhak Samaj.
S. Joseph is an Indian poet writing in Malayalam in the post modern era. He was born in the village of Pattithanam near Ettumanoor. He has published a number of works on contemporary issues that affect the common man and also the ones who toil in the lower rungs of the society. His poetry collection Uppante Kooval Varakkunnu won the 2012 Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award.
The Dalit Panthers is a social organisation that seeks to combat caste discrimination. It was led by a group of Mahar writers and poets, including Raja Dhale, Namdeo Dhasal, and J. V. Pawar in some time between the second and the third semester of 1972. It was founded as a response to the growing discontent among the Dalit youth during the 25th Independence Day celebrations. Inspired by the Black Panther movement in the United States, poet-writers J V Pawar and Namdeo Dhasal founded the Dalit Panthers, urging a boycott of the Independence Day revelry, terming it a 'Black Independence Day'. The movement's heyday lasted from the 1970s through the 1980s, and it was later joined by many Dalit-Buddhist activists.
Dalit literature is a genre of Indian writing that focuses on the lives, experiences, and struggles of the Dalit community over centuries, in relation to caste-based oppression and systemic discrimination. This literary genre encompasses various Indian languages such as Marathi, Bangla, Hindi, Kannada, Punjabi, Sindhi, Odia and Tamil and includes narrative-styles like poems, short stories, and autobiographies. The movement started gaining influence during the mid-twentieth-century in independent India and has since spread across various Indian languages.
Azhagiya Periyavan is the pen name of C.Aravindan, a modern Tamil writer and journalist. He writes about Dalit issues.
Rajam Krishnan, was a feminist Tamil writer from Tamil Nadu, India.
Bama , also known as Bama Faustina Soosairaj, is a Tamil Dalit feminist, teacher and novelist. Her autobiographical novel Karukku (1992) chronicles the joys and sorrows experienced by Dalit Christian women in Tamil Nadu. She subsequently wrote two more novels, Sangati (1994) and Vanmam (2002) along with three collections of short stories: Kusumbukkaran (1996) and Oru Tattvum Erumaiyum (2003), 'Kandattam'(2009). In addition to this, she has written twenty short stories.
Kotiganahalli Ramaiah is a Dalit poet, playwright, philosopher and cultural activist from Karnataka, India. He is one of the founders of Aadima, an institution that experiments with children's theatre, film, education and caste consciousness.
Gogu Shyamala is a Telugu-language writer and women's activist and a prominent Dalit.
Susie Tharu is an Indian writer, publisher, professor, editor and women's activist. Throughout her career and the founding of several women's activist organizations, Tharu has helped to highlight those issues in India.
Kusuma Satyanarayana is an Indian scholar, editor and anti-caste activist. He is a Professor in the Department of Cultural Studies, English and Foreign Languages University (EFL-U), Hyderabad, and concentrates in the burgeoning field of Dalit studies.
Siddalingaiah, was an Indian poet, playwright, and Dalit activist, writing in the Kannada language. He is credited with starting the Dalit-Bandaya movement in Kannada and with starting the genre of Dalit writing. He is one of the founders of the Dalita Sangharsh Samiti along with B. Krishnappa.
Dalit studies is a new field of research in India which looks at the problem of marginalised groups, namely Dalits, tribals, religious minorities, women from excluded groups, denotified tribes, physically challenged and similar groups in economic, social and political spheres. Dalit studies scholars also undertake research on the nature and forms of discrimination and social exclusion faced by marginalised groups.
P. Sivakami is an Indian Dalit-Feminist writer, former IAS officer and activist predominantly writing in Tamil. Her notable works include Pazhayana Kazhidalum, Kurruku Vettu, Nalum Thodarum and Kadaisi Mandhar. Apart from being one of the most prominent Dalit novelists in India, she has also constantly voiced her opinions on contemporary social and political issues. An author of six novels and more than 60 short stories. P. Sivakami has regularly kept in touch with editing and has actively contributed to the monthly magazine Puthiya Kodangi since 1995. She is a significant presence on social media through her Twitter account.
Susairaj Pushparaj, known as Raj Gauthaman, was an Indian Tamil intellectual who pioneered new approaches to Tamil cultural and literary history studies in the late 20th century. He authored 20 research works that analyse the development of Tamil culture from ancient to modern periods with a focus on subaltern Dalit perspectives. He also wrote three novels and translated Sanskrit works into Tamil. Raj Gauthaman was a part of the core group of writers and thinkers, many of whom were Dalits, which shaped the thinking of the influential journal, Nirapirikai in the early 1990s. He worked in academia before retiring in 2011.
D. Ravikumar is an Indian Tamil intellectual, writer, lawyer, politician and an anti-caste activist. He was the editor of the magazine, Nirapirikai. Nirapirikai inspired several new writers in the 1990s in Tamil Nadu. He is an Ambedkarite and Buddhist. Ravikumar is the current Member of Parliament in the Lok Sabha from Viluppuram and member of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam.
Aravind Malagatti is a prominent Indian poet and writer in Kannada-language. He is the author of more than forty books which include poetry collections, short fiction collections, a novel, essay-collections, critical works and folklore studies. He is the recipient of the prestigious Ambedkar Fellowship Award from the Government of Karnataka. His Government Brahamana, the first Dalit autobiography in Kannada, has won the Karnataka Sahitya Academy Award. Apart from these, the Honorary Award of Karnataka Sahitya Academy was conferred on him for his total contribution to Kannada literature. He is appointed as Chairman for Kannada Sahitya Academy.
Prof. Basappa Krishnappa (1938–1997) was one of the pioneers of the Dalit literary movement in Kannada and the founder president of Dalit Sangarsha Samiti, later it is named as the radical Dalit advocacy group. He taught at the Sir M. Vishweshwariah College in Bhadravathi for thirty years before retiring as principal. He is acknowledged as an important literary critic in Kannada.
H. Govindaiah is a prominent Dalit poet writing in Kannada. He was associated with Dalit Sangharsha Samiti (DSS) and was the publisher of Panchama, a fortnightly magazine of DSS for ten years until 1985. He has worked as a lecturer at Mysore University and the Karnataka Open University and was Deputy Registrar of the latter for two years.
Bandaya movement is a progressive [rebel] literary movement in Kannada started by D. R. Nagaraj and Shudra Shrinivas in 1974. It promoted socially-committed literature and sought to make poetry a weapon against social and economic injustice. "Let poetry be a sword! The dear friend who responds to the pain of people!" ["Khadgavaagali kavya! Janara novige midiva pranamitra!"], was the slogan for the movement coined by D.R. Nagaraj.