The Unfinished Legacy of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar

Savi Sawarkar
Savi Sawarkar. Titled 'Pune-Peshwa', 2002. Courtesy Gary Michael Tartakov, Amherst.

 

May 4-6, 2018 at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA

Venue: Integrated Learning Center (ILC)

 

The current historical moment is marked by a deep contradiction – the incredible success of wealth generating and power concentrating processes that depend on the unimaginable immiserating and marginalization of large swathes of humanity. Consequently, assertions of wealth, power, and oppressions, are met with incessant demands for equity, justice, and end to all forms of oppression the world over. If the arc of our moral universe is to “bend towards justice,” then it demands a constant relearning and reimagination of our connections, divergences, and convergence. Here, comparative possibilities of ‘caste’ in India and ‘race’ in the USA have generated much by way of historical imaginations, political solidarities, comparative strategies, and critical scholarship that have furthered our notions of justice, persistent inequities, and possibilities of liberation.

The comparative framework of race and caste has also pointed to the complexity of navigating between the two. The current historical moment marked by deep contradictions demands a constant relearning and re-imagination of our connections, divergences, and convergences. While acknowledging the distinct legacies of anti-caste and racial justice struggles, this conference seeks to nurture the possibilities for active solidarities.

Plenaries focus on the following areas: The Psycho-social dimension of Casteism and Racism; Lynching, Incarceration and Dispossession; Racialized and Casteized Capitalism. 

Panel sessions on Higher Education, Student Movements, Dalit Cultures of Resistance, Afro-Dalit Pedagogies, Historical and Comparative Analysis and more! Click on Featured Speakers and Conference Program for more details.

The Fourth International Conference on the Unfinished Legacy of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar at the University of Massachusetts Amherst is made possible with generous support of the Chancellor's office.

 

Co-sponsors

W.E.B. Dubois Department of Afro-American Studies

College of Education, UMASS Amherst

Center for Global Development and Sustainability, ​Brandeis University

India-China Institute, New School for Social Research

Boston Study Group