Bama’s Karukku: Dalit Autobiography as Testimonio

Abstract

This essay argues that Dalit autobiographies must be treated as testimonio, atrocity narratives that document trauma and strategies of survival. Using Bama’s Karukku as a case-study, it explores the shift between the generic conventions of individual life-writing and collective biography in this text. It analyses the strategy of witnessing in Bama’s narrative, arguing that she functions as a witness to a community’s suffering, and calls upon readers to undertake “rhetorical listening” as secondary witnesses. This act of recording trauma and witnessing, the essay proposes, is one of subaltern agency.

Testimonioas Praxis for a Reimagined Journalism Model and Pedagogy

“…Chicana feminist scholars have marshaled the process, aesthetics, and purpose of testimonio to legitimate the life experiences of Chicanas and Latinas (Delgado Bernal, Godinez, Villenas, & Elenes, 2006;Latina Feminist Group, 2001), theorize the imprint of multiple oppressions on their minds, bodies, and spirits (Anzaldúa, 1987;Nayar, 2006), detect the faculty needed to surmount marginalization (Delgado Bernal, 2006b;Galván, 2006;Villenas, 2006), and forge a gender-and race-based knowledge production previously disregarded by the academy (Pérez Huber, 2009b). Testimonio has been anchored in Latin America for decades, where it emerged as an anthropological project between a subaltern and interlocutor that gave voice to an experience of gross injustice and those with the tenacity to surmount it to bring about a respite to the suffering (Binford, 2001;Pérez Huber, 2009b;Irizarry, 2005).…”

“…Testimonio has been anchored in Latin America for decades, where it emerged as an anthropological project between a subaltern and interlocutor that gave voice to an experience of gross injustice and those with the tenacity to surmount it to bring about a respite to the suffering (Binford, 2001;Pérez Huber, 2009b;Irizarry, 2005). The testimoniante (person giving the testimonio) is often positioned in a liminal space, while the interlocutor is situated in a different and often, greater sphere of power, but he or she strives to channel the raw, unedited testimonio into a written product (Nayar, 2006). The tale is frequently narrated in the first person, but the singular experience alludes to a broader collective experience (Irizarry, 2005;Nayar, 2006).…”

“…The testimoniante (person giving the testimonio) is often positioned in a liminal space, while the interlocutor is situated in a different and often, greater sphere of power, but he or she strives to channel the raw, unedited testimonio into a written product (Nayar, 2006). The tale is frequently narrated in the first person, but the singular experience alludes to a broader collective experience (Irizarry, 2005;Nayar, 2006). This rhetorical strategy functions to raise awareness to the plight endured by this individual and the members of her or his community in order to engender progressive change in the living conditions, policies, or treatment of those peoples.…”

“…This rhetorical strategy functions to raise awareness to the plight endured by this individual and the members of her or his community in order to engender progressive change in the living conditions, policies, or treatment of those peoples. It is meant to reach those with life experiences far removed from the testimoniante in order to evoke empathy, sympathy, and advocacy (Binford, 2001;Cruz, 2006;Nayar, 2006). These purposeful literary devices make testimonio pragmatic, performative, and overtly political.…”

The Politics of Form in Dalit Fiction

“…These readings seek to explore subaltern narrative forms. I have elsewhere argued that Dalit human-rights politics adopts particular narrative conventions and aesthetic modes to stake political claims in the Indian Journal of Gender Studies, 18, 3 (2011): [365][366][367][368][369][370][371][372][373][374][375][376][377][378][379][380] form of trauma narratives (Nayar, 2006(Nayar, , 2008. My intention in this article draws inspiration from Slaughter's work, and argues that to read Bama and Sivakami as merely offering 'authentic' pictures of Dalit oppression or culture is to negate the significance of their choice of form, which is, I suggest, a political choice.…”