Can We Be Sisters? Caste, Race, and Histories of Solidarity among Dalit and Black People

Despite many differences, the timing of Dalit (“Untouchable”) and Black people’s solidarity is most significant because the U.S. Congress (like its British and European counterparts) has seriously begun to recognize the issue of caste and race in the India diaspora in 2023. Delving into personal experiences of Dalit and Black women’s everyday living, in this paper I concentrate on the specific hurdles of two marginalized groups—Dalit women in India and Black women in the US—in order to investigate the interlocking questions of power, identity, and oppression among them. I construct a “margin-to-margin” framework to investigate the possibilities of solidarity between the two groups of women, given the shared history of patriarchy as well as the ways they have been silenced by women from the dominant caste/race. Centering the particular historical experiences, specific contexts, contradictions, and connections between the marginalized “Dalit of the Dalits”—Dalit and Black women—allows for the most inclusive and productive politics, developing of new feminist frameworks, and critical decoding of systemic power structures. Significantly, working margin to margin privileges a vantage point from which to analyze the deep and common continuities of structures of caste, race, law, education, feminism, capital, and labor affecting Dalit and Black women. An intergroup exchange and feminist engagement facilitate the envisioning of broader and joint struggles between subordinated populations across the globe as well as generating news modes of international relations.