Religion, development and the rights of subordinated people: Christianity and Dalit social action in India.

印度的种姓制度通常被理解为基于印度教的宗教思想(纯洁和污染)。虽然最近的学术研究(将权力、政治和殖民影响重新结合在一起)对种姓的这种观点进行了重大修改，但宗教仍然是抗议战略和平等主张的核心。从历史上看，反对种姓从属的宗教行动采取的形式是皈依非印度教宗教，特别是基督教。今天，印度2500万基督徒中有很大一部分是前贱民或达利特人，其中许多人生活在印度南部的几个邦。这项研究提出的问题是：今天南印度达利特人的宗教认同有何意义，基督教(其思想家、社会活动家、运动领袖和国际网络)在阐明达利特人的另类身份和新的社会政治动员形式方面扮演着什么角色？这个问题需要审查三个相互关联的过程：(1)基督教教会的“戴利化”，(2)印度教民族主义的兴起，以及(3)国际人权话语的传播。在调查这些意识形态(神学)、机构和社会运动的同时，实地研究了普通人参与其中的村级进程，以及达利特人牧师和宗教人士中种姓歧视、宗教职业和社会活动主义的主观经历：(1)基督教教会(达利特人占多数)的人口结构花了几十年才从神学和制度上得到表达；但从1980年代末开始，基督教成为宣扬达利特人权利的背景，一种新的宗教政治和达利特人神学，尊崇“被排斥的种姓文化”。这项合作研究考察了教会如何产生达利特人的抗议活动，并为社会变革--神学、艺术、政治意识形态或社会运动--产生了文化资源，这些文化资源对更广泛的达利特人政治产生了重要影响。它的重点是天主教会和耶稣会，他们400年来一直是泰米尔社会创新和反应的源泉。(2)基督教达利特激进主义发生在一个以印度教为主的社会，并在印度教民族主义的兴起中发生，这种民族主义诋毁基督教少数群体为殖民地、外国和反民族，将来自边缘的抵抗(来自达利特人或部落)解释为来自国际计划的改宗所产生的“基督教侵略”。教会对其从属团体的社会基础(和政治支持)的肯定是对这种威胁的回应吗？教会与世俗达利特政治之间的关系(有不同的解释)是什么？(3)使教会达利特也国际化了达利特问题，将种姓歧视与联合国关于种族主义和人权的讨论联系起来。这就提出了关于达利特人人权(以及以权利为基础的处理不利因素的办法)的新论述在重新将宗教与发展联系起来方面的影响的问题。随着达利特基督徒将解放神学转变为达利特神学，欧洲捐助非政府组织开始重新制定达利特人权利方面的发展目标。这项研究考察了非政府组织将种姓和宗教的身份政治引入发展的后果达利特政治、印度教民族主义和非政府组织关于人权的讨论相互关联的过程在泰米尔村庄的日常经历中结合在一起。利用对1982-2004年进行实地研究的多种姓宗教多元化地区的再次访问，研究了25年来宗教和种姓身份的变化(及其相互作用)；询问基于种姓和宗教的人的暴力两极分化的可能性如何在社会和宗教分裂的社区中在当地扩散。

The Indian caste system is commonly understood as based upon Hindu religious ideas (purity and pollution). While this view of caste has been significantly revised by recent scholarship (reincorporating power, politics and colonial influences), religion is still central to strategies of protest and claims to equality. Historically, religious action against caste subordination took the form of conversion to non-Hindu religions, especially Christianity. Today, a large proportion of India's 25 million Christians are ex-untouchables or Dalits, many living in India's southern states. The question this research asks is: what today is the significance of religious identity among south Indian Dalits, and what is the role of Christianity (its thinkers, social activists, movement leaders, and international networks) in the articulation of alternative Dalit identities and in new forms of socio-political mobilisation?This question requires the examination of three interrelated processes: (1) the 'dalitization' of the Christian churches, (2) the rise of Hindu nationalism, and (3) the spread of international human rights discourse. Investigation into these ideologies (theologies), institutions and social movements is matched by field research into the village-level processes through which ordinary people engage with them, and on the subjective experience of caste discrimination, religious vocation and social activism among Dalit priests and the religious(1) It took decades for the demographics of the Christian churches (a large Dalit majority) to be expressed theologically and institutionally; but from the late-1980s, Christianity was a context for articulating Dalit rights, a new religious politics and Dalit theology, which honoured an 'outcaste culture'. This collaborative research examines how the churches generated Dalit protest and produced cultural resources for social change -- theologies, arts, political ideologies, or social movements -- which have had an important influence on wider Dalit politics. It focuses on the Catholic Church and Jesuits who have been a source of innovation and reaction in Tamil society for 400 years. (2) Christian Dalit activism takes place in a largely Hindu society and amidst the rise of Hindu nationalism which vilifies the Christian minority as colonial, foreign and anti-national, interpreting resistance from the margins (from Dalits or tribals) as 'Christian aggression' arising from internationally planned proselytism. Is the Church's affirmation of its social base (and political support) in subordinated groups a response to this threat? What (in different interpretations) is the relationship between the church and secular Dalit politics?(3) Making the church Dalit also internationalised Dalit issues, linking caste discrimination to a UN discourse on racism and human rights. This raises questions about the effect of a new discourse of Dalit human rights (and rights-based approaches to disadvantage) in re-connecting religion and development. As Dalit Christians turned Liberation Theology into Dalit Theology, European donor NGOs began to re-frame development objectives in terms of Dalit rights. This research examines the consequence of NGOs drawing the identity politics of caste and religion into developmentThe linked processes of Dalit politics, Hindu nationalism, and NGO discourse on human rights come together in the everyday experience of Tamil villages. Taking advantage of a re-visit to the multi-caste religiously plural locality that was the site of field research in 1982-4, changes in religious and caste identities (and their interaction) are examined over 25 years; asking how the potential for violent polarization of people on the basis of caste and religion is locally diffused in socially and religiously divided communities.