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AnnouncementInterview4 min read
Online Book Launch: TOUCHABLE / UNTOUCHABLE
Aloha kākou.
Please join us Wednesday, September 16th for the online book launch of TOUCHABLE / UNTOUCHABLE: DALIT LITERATURE FROM INDIA IN TRANSLATION. The starting time for our webinar will be at:
6AM HST
8AM PST
12PM EST
9PM IST
6PM CEST
No registration is required; Please click the link below to join the webinar: https://hawaii.zoom.us/j/88968572454?pwd=Nzieb7b4JJNEQr110Mq6dEsC3Aw2iI.1
We are thrilled to be featuring a wonderful and brilliant circle of participants, the names of whom are listed below. We hope you can join us in conversation and community. Ke aloha nui.
Shirisha Amme, Translator of Bojja Tharakam
Amanda Galvan Huynh, Panelist
Joel Lee, Translator of Tulsiram
Maya Pandit, Translator of Baburao Bagul & Pradnya Daya Pawar
Anushiya Ramaswamy, Translator of Sukirtharani
K. Satyanarayana, Co-editor
S. Shankar, Co-editor
DESCRIPTION FOR TOUCHABLE / UNTOUCHABLE:
Touchable/Untouchable showcases extraordinary Dalit writing from India in translation. Dalit is the preferred term for the caste-oppressed communities in India formerly known as “untouchables.” Though untouchability has been outlawed in the Constitution of independent India since the middle of the twentieth century, Dalits continue to experience tremendous violence and social marginalization, including in the literary sphere.
Edited by guest editor K. Satyanarayana and series editor S. Shankar, Touchable/Untouchable presents, for the first time in English, work from five celebrated contemporary Dalit writers—poems by Tamil writer Sukirtharani, translated by Anushiya Ramaswamy; two excerpts from the Telugu novel Panchatantram by Bojja Tharakam, translated by Shirisha Amme; two works in Marathi, a creative/critical essay by iconic writer Baburao Bagul and a long poem by Pradnya Daya Pawar, both translated by Maya Pandit; and an excerpt from Murdahiya, an autobiography in Hindi by Tulsiram, translated by Joel Lee.
In the last twenty-five years, Dalit literature has experienced a boom in publication in India. Only a small portion of this boom has found its way outside India in translation. In publishing the five works, Mānoa joins in amplifying Dalit voices in the global literary scene. The works included reveal the diversity of genres, styles, and political orientations in a literary movement shaking the foundations of Indian writing and reshaping Indian literature in unprecedented ways. Dalit writing is a literature of witnessing as well as aesthetic experimentation. The spectacular works gathered here are presented in English versions through the creative labor of five translators who have deep knowledge about the languages, histories and cultures from which the works emerge. Touchable/Untouchable gathers substantial work from each of five important Dalit writers, providing readers a sustained look at their literary achievement and honoring the distinctiveness of authorial voices drawn from different regions of India.
An introduction by K. Satyanarayana and S. Shankar presents an overview of Dalit literature, and each writer is introduced by a translator’s note.
Hard copies are available for purchase through this link: https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/touchable-untouchable-dalit-literature-from-india-in-translation/.
Access to our digital version is also linked here:
https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/56681
