Vijila Chirappad

Vijila Chirappad
Born1980 or 1981 (age 44–45)
Kozhikode, Kerala, India
OccupationPoet
Writing career
LanguageMalayalam

Vijila Chirappad (born 1980 or 1981) is an Indian Dalit poet who writes in Malayalam.

Life and work

Born in Kozhikode, Kerala, Chirappad's poems speak of the experience of living life as a Dalit woman. Her poetry explores how the double burden of gender and caste shapes the lives and struggles of Dalit women in Kerala in distinct ways than women of dominant castes. Her work also discusses how, despite Kerala's communist history, casteism pervades everyday life there.

In our home
There is no TV
No fridge
Neither mixer
Nor grinder
No LPG
Not even an iron-box.
Yet my mother knew
How to operate these
Much before I did.
Because
Like in Madhavikutty’s stories
And the novels of MT
She is Janu-
The servant.

— She Who Flew Afore, Vijila Chirappad

Chirappad's work includes three collections of poetry in Malayalam: Adukala Illathaa Veedu (A Home without a Kitchen, 2006), Amma Oru Kalpanika Kavitha Alla (Mother is not a Poetic Figment of our Imagination, 2009), and Pakarthi Ezhuthu Archived 27 April 2019 at the Wayback Machine (Copied Notes, 2015). Her poems "A Place for Me", "Can't Grow My Nails" and "The Autobiography of a Bitch" have also been included in the 2012 Oxford India Anthology of Malayalam Dalit Writing.

chandrika chechi of the Wasteland
talks
about the homes one enters
only through the back door.

of the flats
where one enters
through the front door —
the ones with the porch light on.

returning daily from the marketplace
both the fish and she share
the same path —
the one through the back door.

entering through the very same route,
while hearing the television
blare the pledge aloud on August 15 —
all Indians are my brothers and sisters.

— Wasteland, Virila Chirappad

Chirappad has participated in the Kerala Literature festival and also in the prestigious Hay Festival of Literature and Arts as part of an event on Dalit Poetry in Malayalam.

References

  1. ↑ "Wasteland". The Third Eye. 10 November 2020. Retrieved 5 August 2023.
  2. ↑ "Vijila Chirappad - Hay Festival Artist Profile". Hay Festival. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  3. 1 2 Anil, Chintha Mary (18 April 2016). "For all its communist history, casteism inherent in Kerala society: Dalit poet Vijila Chirappad". The NewsMinute. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  4. ↑ Ibrahim U, Shiji (September 2017). "The Burning Embers: Poems of the Dalit Writer Vijila Chirappad as Works of Caste and Gender Discriminations". International Journal of English Language. V (IX): 596–605 – via Academia.edu.
  5. ↑ Gumpenapalli, Sanjeev (11 January 2018). "5 Dalit Women Poets Who Remind Us That Caste And Patriarchy Are Not Exclusive". Feminism India. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  6. 1 2 Mahurkar, Vaishnavi (18 April 2017). "6 Books By Dalit Women Writers Exploring Lives Lived On The Margins Of Caste And Gender". Feminism India. Retrieved 27 April 2018.
  7. ↑ Priya N., Lakshmi (August 2018). "Poetry is Protest: The Contemporary Dalit Female Experience in Kerala" (PDF). Annals of Art, Culture & Humanities. III (II): 1–8 – via S.R.S.D. Memorial Shiksha Shodh Sanstha.
  8. ↑ Chirappad, Vijila (2009). Amma oru Kalpanika Kavithayalla. Thiuvananthapuram: Maithri Books.
  9. ↑ Chirappad, Vijila (2014). Pakarthiyezhuththu. Chintha Publishers. ISBN 9789385018121.
  10. ↑ M. Dasan; V. Pratibha; C. S. Chandrika; Pradeepan Pampirikunnu, eds. (2012). The Oxford India Anthology of Malayalam Dalit Writing. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. pp. 37–39. ISBN 9780198079408.
  11. ↑ "FIRST SATURDAY @ KLF". DC Books. 3 February 2017. Archived from the original on 27 April 2019. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  12. ↑ "M.B.Manoj, Vijila Chirappad, M.R. Renukumar, Sunny Kapikkad, S.Joseph. We Sing of Earth: Dalit Poetry in Malayalam". Hay Festival. 17 November 2011. Retrieved 27 April 2019.