Who is the trueHalalkhor? Genealogy and ethics in dalit Muslim oral traditions

Bibliographic Data

ID3865618
AuthorsJoel Lee (0000-0003-0855-9856, Williams College, Williamstown, MA, USA, corresponding author)
Year2018
Volume52
Issue1
Pages1-27
Publication date2018-02-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueContributions to Indian Sociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0069-9659 • E-ISSN: 0069-9667
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0069966717742223
OpenAlexW2780571048
LanguageEN
Citations received18
References cited12

The social worlds that dalit Muslims in North India daily negotiate are pervaded by contradictions between caste practices and Islamic ethics. Dalit Muslims engaged in manual scavenging and related forms of sanitation labour experience these contradictions acutely in the distinctive spatial and affective conditions of this labour, which I characterise as 'intimate untouchability'. Grounded in historical and ethnographic research in eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, this article demonstrates how dalit Muslims use narratives mobilising the genealogical and ethical concept of the Halalkhor-a caste label that also denotes 'one who earns an honest living'-to critique their higher status co-religionists and to engender a more egalitarian Islamic community. The category of the Halalkhor is tracked in the historical record and in its deployment in dalit Muslim oral traditions about the origin of the community and its association with sanitation work

Caste · Ethnography · Geography · Hinduism · Islam · Muslim community · Negotiation · Political science · Sanitation · Social science · Socioeconomics · Sociology · Uttar pradesh · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Anthropology · Gender Studies · Islamic Studies and History · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Law · Religious studies