Includes bibliographical references (pages 271-291) and index.

Dalit studies: new perspectives on Indian history and society / Ramnarayan S. Rawat and K. Satyanarayana -- The Indian Nation in its egalitarian conception / Gopal Guru -- Probing the historical -- Colonial archive versus colonial sociology: writing Dalit history / Ramnarayan S. Rawat -- Social space, civil society, and Dalit agency in twentieth-century Kerala / P. Sanal Mohan -- Dilemmas of Dalit agendas: political subjugation and self-emancipation in Telugu Country, 1910-50 / Chinnaiah Jangam -- Making sense of Dalit sikh history / Raj Kumar Hans -- Probing the present -- The Dalit reconfiguration of modernity: citizens and castes in the Telugu public sphere / K. Satyanarayana -- Questions of representation in Dalit critical discourse: Premchand and Dalit feminism / Laura Brueck -- Social justice and the question of categorization of scheduled caste reservations: the Dandora debate in Andhra Pradesh / Sambaiah Gundimeda -- Caste and class among the Dalits / Shyam Babu -- From Zaat to Qaum: fluid contours of the Ravi Dasi identity in Punjab / Surinder S. Jodhka.