ABSTRACT
Bodies marked by caste, gender and disability are devalued and excluded from the dominant discourses and practices. Discourses, that construct and replicate social power and hierarchies, use gender, caste and ableist ideologies to proscribe and limit disabled women’s access to work. The cultural representations, social processes and institutions that determine the creation and reproduction of gender and disability in everyday socio-cultural practices are affected by the caste locations of the people in a particular context. This chapter examines how caste interacts with gender-disability identities to determine access to work for disabled Dalit women across the country. Using Census of India 2011 data, the chapter attempts to understand the larger participation of women with disabilities in the workforce, which challenges the prevalent ideologies of incapability and dependency. This participation in and experience of paid work, which affects their life chances, the choices available to them and the ways in which they are able to make use of the multiple status positions they occupy, are illustrated by qualitative case studies that explore the ways in which gendered experiences of caste and impairment influence the work lives of disabled women in both rural and urban contexts.
