Created by Kku
Last edited September 22, 2021


Ants Among Elephants: An Untouchable Family and the Making of Modern India
File:Ants Among Elephants.jpg
AuthorSujatha Gidla
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
PublisherFarrar, Straus and Giroux
Pages320
ISBN978-0-86547-811-4

Ants Among Elephants: An Untouchable Family and the Making of Modern India is a book by Sujatha Gidla on how India's untouchables (Dalits) struggle to overcome poverty and social ostracism due to the rigid caste system. The book deals with the humiliation and caste-based discrimination which Dalits face in India.[1][2][3][4][5] The book also looks at the various levels of oppression faced due to caste, gender, and familial norms. Writing in The New York Review of Books, Pankaj Mishra says that the book "significantly enriches the new Dalit literature in English" and that the book is a "devastating critique" of India's independence leaders and the caste politics of the Naxalite movement in India. [6]

References[edit | edit source]

  1. "Book on discrimination against Dalits written by an "untouchable born in Andhra Pradesh", creates buzz in US". Indian Express. Retrieved 9 August 2017. {{cite web}}: |archive-date= requires |archive-url= (help)
  2. "Memories of an 'untouchable' New York subway staffer". Hindustan Times. 25 July 2017. Retrieved 9 August 2017.
  3. "Book on discrimination against Dalits creates buzz in the US". The Economic Times. 28 July 2017. Archived from the original on 31 July 2017. Retrieved 9 August 2017.
  4. "The defiance of an 'untouchable' New York subway worker". BBC News. 25 July 2017. Retrieved 9 August 2017.
  5. Kakutani, Michiko (17 July 2017). "'Ants Among Elephants,' a Memoir About the Persistence of Caste". The New York Times. Retrieved 9 August 2017.
  6. Mishra, Pankaj (21 December 2017). "God's Oppressed Children". The New York Review of Books.