New York: Shailaja Paik, an Indian-American professor who researches and writes about Dalit women, has received a prestigious $800,000 “genius” grant from the MacArthur Foundation. This recognition of her extraordinary achievements in the field of social justice and the Foundation’s belief in her potential to bring about change is a source of inspiration for many.
Humble beginnings
Hard work and focus on one’s goal can be learned from Paik’s life. In an interview with National Public Radio (NPR), the US government-subsidised broadcaster, she said that she was a member of the Dalit community who grew up in Pune in a slum area and was inspired by her father’s dedication to education.
After obtaining her master’s degree from the Savitribai Phule University in Pune, Paik went to the University of Warwick in the UK for her PhD.
She did a stint as a visiting assistant professor of South Asian history at Yale University.
Currently, Paik is a distinguished research professor of history at the University of Cincinnati, where she is also an affiliate faculty in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and Asian Studies.
The Fellowship and Paik’s work on Dalits
The Foundation announcing her fellowship stated, “Through her focus on the multifaceted experiences of Dalit women, Paik elucidates the enduring nature of caste discrimination and the forces that perpetuate untouchability.”
“Paik’s work provides a profound understanding of the history of caste domination and the ways in which gender and sexuality are used to deny Dalit women dignity and personhood,” the Foundation said, praising her research as a significant contribution to the understanding of caste discrimination and its impact on the lives of Dalit women.
The Foundation said that her recent project focussed “on the lives of women performers of Tamasha, a popular form of bawdy folk theatre that has been practised predominantly by Dalits in Maharashtra for centuries”.
“Despite the state’s efforts to reframe Tamasha as an honourable and quintessentially Marathi cultural practice, “ashlil” (the mark of vulgarity) sticks to Dalit Tamasha women,” it said.
Based on the project, she published a book titled “The Vulgarity of Caste: Dalits, Sexuality, and Humanity in Modern India.”
It said, “Paik also critiques the narrative of Dr B.R. Ambedkar, the twentieth century’s most influential caste abolitionist” and the architect of India’s Constitution.
What is MacArthur Fellowships
The MacArthur Fellowships, popularly known as “genius” grants, are given to people across a spectrum from academia and science to arts and activism, who, according to the Foundation, are “extraordinarily talented and creative individuals as an investment in their potential”.
The selections are made anonymously based on the recommendations received. The programme does not allow applications or lobbying for the grants, which are unrestricted and spread over five years.
Since the programme began in 1981, fellowships have been granted to 1,153 people.
Indians who received the Fellowship before Paik
Previous MacArthur Fellows include writers Ruth Prawer Jhabvala and Ved Mehta, poet A.K. Ramanujam, economists Raj Chetty and Sendhil Mullainathan, mathematician L Mahadevan, computer scientists Subhash Khot and Shwetak Patel, physical biologist Manu Prakash, musician Vijay Gupta, community organiser Raj Jayadev, and lawyer and activist Sujatha Baliga.
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–IANS
