It is said that ancient languages did not have a word for the color blue. The Himba tribe in Namibia still does not have a word for the color blue. When shown a picture with blue and green squares, they struggled to identify the one that was blue. So, the question is when you do not have the vocabulary to describe an experience or a thing, does the experience even register in our consciousness?
Isabel Wilkerson in her book – ‘Caste The Origins of our Discontent’ argues that America does not have a vocabulary that completely defines the discrimination that African-Americans face routinely. This missing vocabulary, she believes is that of caste. And while the book has seen split opinions across a broad spectrum, this idea itself is not new. In fact, as she herself has cited, there is evidence going back to the 19th century of people who did see discrimination in America to be rooted in caste vs the prevailing notions of racial discrimination.
The most famous example of adopting the vocabulary of caste to describe discrimination in America is that of Martin Luther King famously saying – “Yes, I am an untouchable, and every Negro in the United States of America is an untouchable.”
It is true that irrespective of what a minority of historical scholars, sociologists and anthropologists have seen – caste discrimination is not a part of the language of discrimination in America today. An average American would need a primer on what the word caste even means. And in this context, Wilkerson’s book is an attempt to mainstream the caste vocabulary and add a new lens to the understanding of the systemic discrimination endemic to American society. Wilkerson in her book, in no way claims that caste is a substitute for the discussion on race. In fact, as she says – ‘Caste is the bones, race the skin. Race is what we can see….Caste is the powerful infrastructure that holds each group in its place’.
This invisible hierarchy that permeates all aspects of societal norms and human existence maybe a new perception for Americans. But to the over 240 million Dalits in South-Asia, caste is a lived reality.
Unlike people of color in the United States who have never seen their lived experiences through the lens of caste, south-east Asian Dalits can vouch to the all-permeating, all-consuming nature of caste in their lives. It is impossible to step into a conversation of caste and not talk about India and other south-Asian countries that are still steeped in caste discrimination practices. The conversation on caste-discrimination in India is as ubiquitous as the discussion on race in the United States. And there is good reason for this. An Indian NCRB data report cited over 43000 atrocities against Dalits in 2017 alone.
What Wilkerson has advanced through her book is the argument that oppression – be it in India or Nazi Germany or the United States does have a common language. And it is of an invisible caste hierarchy to which society classifies people – on the basis of the family they’re born into or religion or race. Taken in this light, Dalits in the south-Asian subcontinent and people of color in the United States have more commonalities than differences. For as Wilkerson so put it – ‘Caste is the infrastructure of our divisions’.
Note: Caste and race are both topics that I am ill-equipped to talk about. So this blog post is an attempt to use words of those who have experienced it as their lived reality. Written as a part of research being done for ICDR International.