ABSTRACT:

This paper is an attempt to suggest ways to recover and put to good use a Gramscian methodology that recognizes the presence of the subaltern in new contexts and at times different from those analyzed by Gramsci himself, especially in the context of India. During the past few years a major change has been taking place: the emphasis seems to have shifted from Dalits’ mere awareness of their “oppression”, towards the mobilization of consciousness as a “transforming agents” of subalternity, and hence toward a new path taking them from “desperate cries” to liberating action. In this paper, we have tried to shed some lights on the questions; 1) Why are Dalits a proto-type of Gramscian Subalterns, 2)Whether with Gramscian methodology, is it  possible to  recover those “traces” present in the fragmented history of these groups so as to detect the vital elements that will assist them in overcoming their subalternity.

 

INTRODUCTION:

In the critical field of post-colonialism, the term subaltern identifies and describes the man, the woman and the social group who is outside of the hegemonic power structure. In describing “history told from below”, the term subaltern from the cultural hegemony work Antonio Gramsci, which identified the social groups who are excluded from a society’s established structure for political representation. In the 1980s, the scope of enquiry of subaltern studies was applied as an “intervention in South Asian historiography”.

 

There is a little doubt that that enquiry into the “Subaltern question“ in India today cannot ignore the “Dalit Question” as “the political unconscious of Indian society”.

 

If we wish to propose for India a proto type of subaltern, who embodies those characteristics expressed by Gramsci, we cannot but think of the Dalit.

 

Dalits are those born into castes whose traditional hereditary work, is classed by religious tradition as ritually unclean. Making up one-sixth of the population of India, they are routinely segregated and humiliated and commonly, subject to violence. The depth of this oppression has kept Dalits from joining the industrial working class in proportion to their numbers. In cities most Dalits do casual work, and in the countryside, where they are concentrated, they are overwhelmingly small and landless peasants.

 

There is also a oroportionally small but significant layer of urban petite bourgeoisie that has developed over the last sixty five years as a result of affirmative action program.

 

They constitute a major example, almost an archetype, of the Gramscian subaltern. Religion a significant component in the Dalit’s life-experience, occupies a prominent place also in their struggle to achieve recognition with in civil and political society. The religion of subalterns-defined also as common sense and philosophy of the masses- is a prominent Gramscian theme.

 

Untouchability has deep roots in the history of south Asian countries, as the emergence of some alternative religions to Hinduism demonstrates or eruption of various anti-caste movements with in Hinduism itself approves it.

 

The chequered history of transformation from being an untouchable to becoming a “Dalit” has been paved with many significant moments, often considered sometimes as trivial, which nevertheless constitute the kernel of history in the making. If we discard these traces in search of humanity, we will not make proper sense of Dalit consciousness.(1)

 

In Gramsci writings (pre-prison, prison letters and the Quaderni-Q), we find that  he makes extensive use of the term subaltern/s, subalternity and subaltern groups, following both their conventional but also metaphorical meaning. He gives us a concise presentation of his theory in one of the special Notebook, Q 25, entitled’on the margin of history’. (2) This is a development of some notes already persist in Q1,3 and 9.  Gramsci avoids giving any clear definition of these ‘subaltern groups’ because they cannot be lumped together under one single, homogeneous entity. This is made clearer when we take into account that while Gramsci initially talks of ‘subaltern classes’, in the later notes he prefers to use the expression ’subaltern groups’ denoting the disgregation and disunity of these social groups, something Gramsci had already noted, when reflecting upon the themes of subaltern question. Besides not concluding his project, Gramsci found himself in a position of “subalternity” which needs to interpret this concept as “interwoven with his political, social, intellectual, literary, cultural, philosophical, religious and economic analyses”. (3) We might say that Gramsci was interested in developing a multidisciplinary approach to the study of subalterns.

 

Gramsci’s pre-occupation was to offer a solution to the ‘fragmented and episodic’ history of subaltern groups. In order to have a share of power, having established the weaknesses of the ‘subaltern’ lack of cohesion and despite, a tendency to unification, Gramsci invites us not to dismiss this spontaneity but to direct it towards full consciousness. As Buttigieg told us, this unity of ‘spontaneity and conscious leadership’ for Gramsci is the real political action of the subaltern classes, in so far as it is mass politics and not mere adventure by groups that appeal to the masses.(4)

 

It is at this juncture in which the spontaneity of the subalterns is taken into account and given a new consciousness and political direction, where Gramsci brings together different ideas, theories and actors, playing collectively in the arena of historical commitment. These ideas and theories come together in a dialectical relationship, always renewing through the evidence offered by philosophical reflection and praxis.

 

Apart from his methodology to interpret history, Gramsci also invites the interpreter of history to excavate deeply into the present, to consider reality as expressed in its ethical-political and economic-juridical dimensions, so that the integral historians is able to get hold of the dynamic significance of reality.(5) This is possible, because this historian directs his observation towards relations of power, becoming himself a point of force within this web of power. Moreover, he places himself and his point of view with that of masses.

 

Gramsci laments the failure of both positivists and idealist, for being unable to establish the connection with the masses and subalterns, thus failing to recover their spontaneity, their philosophy and their common sense. Only when this connection is established, the limitations of common sense can be surmounted in order to transform it in good/critical common sense. As we will observe, also in the case of Dalits,we need to establish a connection between religion, common sense and philosophy, as Gramsci  reminds us so as to explain the resilence of the Dalit movements throughout history, its failure and success, and the opposition it has received from dominant groups.

 

We find a very expanded view of Gramsci broad methodology for studying subaltern groups in Q25. Here Gramsci introduces the historical unity of the leading classes, which is not purely juridical and political but rests on the organic relationship between state and civil society. For this very reason, he adds “the subaltern classes by definition are not unified and cannot unify until they become a ‘state’; their history is therefore interwoven with civil society, it is a ‘disaggregated’ and discontinuous function of of the history of civil society and, by way of this, of the history of states and of group of states.(6) Furthermore, he offers his solution ‘six phases’ as a path to be followed by the integral historians, specifying that that these phases of study are not exhaustive but need to be integrated with intermediate phases and combination of phases, to conclude that ’the historian must record, and discover the cause of, the line of development towards integral autonomy, starting from the most primitive phases..”(7)

 

The history of different untouchable groups in south Asia, comprising their journey from untouchability to becoming Dalits, offers an astonishing example of the line of development towards integral autonomy taking into account also the starting point ‘the most primitive phase’. These primitive phase can be interpreted here as both the incipient untouchable-Dalit self-awareness, but also the lowest stage at which dominant groups, both with in state and civil society, have placed these subaltern groups. In the case of untouchables there is a little doubt that their status in society has ranked them even beyond subalternity, to the point of being considered non-human. Amra manus nai (we are not human being), with a condition, which, reflecting social, political, economical, judicial and religious ostracism, reaches the point of ontological negation and humiliation; ‘the ontological hurt endured by untouchables.(8)

 

The reason why the Gramscian theory of the subaltern is preferred to Marxian proletarian discourse in the context of Dalit’s subalternity is the fact that the Marxist concept of the proletarian excludes the socially and culturally underprivileged. According to Marx, only the working class can advance the cause of revolution. In other words, Marx idealizes the proletarian-working class. Opposing this view of the classical Marxists, Gramsci in the Prison Notebook emphasizes the resistant nature of subaltern consciousness. He holds that despite their being subjected to the hegemonic influence of the ruling classes; the peasants and other subaltern classes have retained their dynamic and revolutionary consciousness.(9) Though he is aware of the limitations of the subaltern consciousness, as being inconsistent, fragmented and lacking in historic sense, he is nevertheless conscious of its insurgent spirit. Dalits in India while sharing in the social and economic backwardness of the subaltern classes have also been subjected to caste discrimination, which deepened their experience of oppression. The disintegrated and subservient Dalit consciousness is also akin to the dynamic revolutionary resillence.

 

Edward Said argues, that the Marxist theories of socio- economic revolution are flawed from the perspective of the colonized world. This is because of the fact that the Marxian version of progress is based primarily on the 19^th century assumption of fundamental inequality between the west and the east, that pre-supposes the superiority of the former over the later. It is because of this Eurocentric orientation of Marxism that it fails to address the problem of culturally different subaltern groups and other unorganized people in general.(10)

 

Gayatri Spivak too prefers the model of the Gramscian subalterns to the Marxian proletarian as it provides more appropriate and flexible tools of analysis for the study of domination and subordination in power relations;-

I like the word ‘subaltern’ for one reason. It is truly situational. Subaltern began as a description of a certain rank in the military. The word was used under censorship by Gramsci: he called Marxism ‘monism’, and was obliged to call the proletarian ‘subaltern’. That word used under duress, has been transformed into the description of everything that does not fall under strict class analysis. I like that, because it has no theoretical rigor.(11)

 

Ranjit Guha also finds the Gramscian concept of subaltern suitable in the context of South Asian history for studying the ‘the entire people that is subordinate in terms of class, caste, gender and office or in any other way.(12) This wide acceptance makes it inevitable to explore Gramscian arguments pertaining to subalternity, hegemony and the role of the intellectual further to highlight their aptness in the inquiry about Dalits social and cultural subalternity.

 

Although Gramsci in the Prison Notebook, uses the term ‘subaltern’ as synonym for ‘proletarian’, he expands its scope by using it as a referent for any social group, outside the established structures of political representation. As per Gramsci, in every class divided society, the hegemonic and the subaltern classes are always in a state of conflict. Thus in a wider perspective, he uses the term subaltern to refer to the marginalized and oppressed groups anywhere in the world.

 

 

The bourgeoisie, Gramsci beliefs, enhances its power and control over the subaltern through the hegemony of culture, rather than through the exercise of repressive mechanism. In his view, hegemony stands for a condition in which persuasion outweigh coercion. The cultural hegemony legitimizes itself on self certified notion of cultural refinement.

 

The Gramscian cultural hegemony gets a religious ratification in the ideology of the caste system in India. The ancient Hindu texts like Manusmriti and Dharam-shastra played a vital role in legitimizing the cultural hegemony of Brahmanism. The subaltern castes have been made to internalize this ideology of caste system through the innumerable tales of classical Indian literature and mythology. The social, religious and political domination of the Brahmin in India extends further the Gramscian view that the hegemony of a social class manifests itself in two different ways; through domination and through intellectual and moral leadership.

 

Kancha Ilaiah elaborates how the theoreticians of caste have worked out strategies to subject the subaltern consciousness to the consciousness of the Brahmins.  They did this by teaching the subalterns a divine morality through the Hindu mythology. According to him, the creation and perpetuation of Hindu mythology of Gods and Godesses is a major achievement of Brahminism.(13)

 

The cultural indoctrination of subaltern to the ideology of the ruling class was counter- productive to some extent. The structural resemblance of the subaltern’s cultural and religious practices to that of the elite is often deceptive of their subliminal voices of protest. Their apparent cultural integration has never led to a total assimilation and this in turn results in the production of the counter cultural formations. It is from these formations, Gramsci argues that the subaltern resistance finally took its root.

 

The Dalit religious experience fundamentally differs from that of the Brahmins. The cultural, economic and political ethos of Dalit Gods and Goddesses, are, according to Kancha Ilaiah, different from Hindu hegemonic deities.(14) The Dalit Bahujan tradition of  Gods and Goddeses is diagonally opposite to the brahminical tradition. In opposition to the dominant patriarchal god, subordinated caste’s deities are predominantly female. Their traditional deities are are localized and community centric; as against the hindu deities who are nationalized through epics. The cultural history of India is dotted with innumerable incidents of subordinated caste’s revolt against upper caste. Kancha argues that the Brahmin could succeed only to an extent in this attempt as multiple accounts of these stories are in vogue especially in oral and folklore narratives. Ambedkar translated these differing voices into a political movement, which came to be known in history as the Dalit Movement, where one finds a powerful and collective awakening of the consciousness of the subordinated caste against oppression and injustice.

 

Taking the cue from Gramsci, the subaltern historians attempt to deconstruct the accepted trajectories of South Asian history from a subaltern perspective. These historians argue that in the discussion of nationalism the role played by the subaltern has been down played. They are of the opinion that the historiography of Indian nationalism has for long time been dominated by elitism-colonial elitism and bourgeoisie nationalist elitism.

 

One important problem of recognizing the political voice and agency of the subaltern groups is the elite’s representation of the peasant movements as spontaneous acts of violence, with no political content or organization. Whenever references were made to subaltern revolts, they have been reported as law and order problems, as aberrations from the national ideals. A typical example is the Chauri- Chaura incident, which impelled Gandhi to promptly call off the civil-disobedience movement. Shahid Amin, has reconsidered the Chauri-Chaura events and shown that it was not an instance of anti- social subaltern insurgency; on the other hand, it was a natural repercussion of the charismatic exhortation of Gandhi that led to the gruesome incident of burning alive of the policemen inside the police- stations (15) In the absence of any reliable historical materials, these historians need to recuperate the political agency any resistance through a critique of colonial and elite historical representations. The critique of the dominant historical representation has a clear and distinct political agenda. If the political voice and agency cannot be retrieved from the documentary evidences, it can be re-inscribed through a critique of the dominant historical representation.

 

It was the tremendous success of the rural peasant revolt against the Indian National Government in west Bengal in 1967, which prompted the subaltern historians to rethink and reconstruct freedom struggle narratives from subaltern perspective. It motivated them to reconstruct the various histories of the subaltern insurgency, which are autonomous and independent from the mainstream movement. In doing so, the subaltern studies historians fill the historic void left by Orientalism.

 

In Conclusion it can be said, that Gramsci remains relevant because he tried to explain the nature of political power (much before the meaning of power was investigated, somewhat tangentially by Michael Foucault and Derrida), from the perspective of what he called the subaltern perspective. The usage of this word itself is interesting- it establishes a historical relationship between various, otherwise disparate classes. The subaltern school of historians took off from Gramscian subaltern, employing it almost interchangeably and therefore restrictively with the ‘peasant’. Gramsci’s idea gives fresh emphasis to the central importance and dialectical nature of elite-subaltern relations in rural India. His stress upon the negative and derivative aspects of peasant culture and ideology needs, however, to be qualified by an awareness of the strengths and relative autonomy of subaltern politics with in the overall structure of the elite domination.

 

During the past few years a major change has been taking place: the emphasis seems to have shifted from Dalits’ mere awareness of their “oppression”, towards the mobilization of consciousness as a “transforming agents” of subalternity, and hence toward a new path taking them from “desperate cries” to liberating action. This new line of thought, in addition to regaining the historic figures of the “Dalit question” – such as Jotirao Phule, Valangkar, Periyar and Ambedkar – addresses the formation of methodological concepts which, by revealing the many spheres in which subalternity is present, offer feasible solutions to overcome it.

 

REFERENCES:

1.     Cosimo Zene- Gramsci and the religion of the subalterns (untouchables) in south asia-eprints.soas.uk, p-3

2.     Guido Liguori- Conception of Subalternity in Gramsci in Marck McNally (edited)- Antonio Gramsci.(e-book) Springer, pp.118-133

3.     Marcus Green- Gramsci cannot speak: Presentations and Interpretations of Gramsci’s concept of the subaltern, Rethinking Marxism, vol-14, No-3 (Fall 2002), pp. 1-24

4.     Cosimo Zene op.cit, p-4

5.     Ibid

6.     Marcus Green op.cit

7.     Ibid

8.     V.Gheeta- Bereft of Being. The Humiliation of Untouchability, in G, Guru (edited) Humiliation: claims and context, OUP, New Delhi, 2009, p-107

9.     Guido Liguori op.cit

10.  Shodhganga.inflibinet.ac.in, p-9

11.  Stephen Morton- Gayatri Spivak: Ethics, Subalternity and the critique of postcolonial reason, Wiley.com,2006,p-46

12.  Ranjit Guha - Preface and Some aspects of the historiography on colonial India, in Ranjit Guha (edited) Subaltern Studies, No-1, Writings on South Asian History and Society, Preface and Some aspects of the historiography on colonial India, OUP, New Delhi, 1982, pp.vii and 1-8

13.  Kancha Ilaiah-  Why I am not a Hindu, Bhatkal and Sen, 2005, p-72

14.  Ibid, p-91

15.  Shahid Amin- Remembering Chaura- Chauri: notes from historical fieldwork in Ranjit Guha (edited)- Subaltern Studies Reader No-IX, (1986-95)Writings on South Asian History and Society, University of Minneapolis Press, Minneapolis, 1997, pp 179-239