Mero Dhangadhi

Hello, I have a problem and need some help. My family (chhetri) doesn't recognize their privilege in Nepal. This all started when my mom saw a post on FaceBook and it was honoring these 2 Newari people for being the first doctors in their village and my mom said "well they weren't this happy when a chhetri person became a doctor" (she's from the same village) and i said why does this make you so mad and that baun and chhetris have been oppressing everyone and they only help each other succeed

cont…. And my mom just went off saying “it doesn’t matter all you need is the mind of a doctor” she was basically saying lower class people don’t have the ability to be a doctor. God I was so pissed. It was so hard for me to explain her privilege to her because both of my parents grew up poor and didn’t finish school and no one in their family did either so I couldn’t use school/ money as an example of privilege. Sorry if this is hard I googled this but nothing really came up :/

First of all, good job on actually bringing up the topic with your mom because even talking about privilege with our parents is not an easy task. It can be difficult to see upper cast privilege especially if someone grew up in poverty in Nepal as that is a massive, massive struggle on its own. Can you maybe find some points in their lives when their status as a Chettri in Nepal somehow benefited them? Living in poverty in Nepal regardless of caste is very difficult so I can understand why you family isn’t recognizing their privilege. On top of that for your mom, being a woman in Nepal is another topic entirely. But a lot of times it’s also about connections. For example, there are a lot more Bauns and Chettris that work in companies or government positions, or education sector and even if someone grew up in poverty they have a higher chance of getting out if they’re upper-caste by using these connections through their relatives or family friends etc and getting opportunities through these connections. And on top of that some upper-caste people working in these industries probably have prejudices against people of lower caste, so they wouldn’t hire them and instead would opt for hiring a baun or chettri. And then there is the whole thing with marriage and how you shouldn’t marry outside your class; this further makes the situation worse and adds to people keeping the privilege and wealth within the already privileged and the wealthy. 

Sorry for getting to this answer this late. I have finals coming up so I took a break. Perhaps some of my followers are more knowledgeable about this issue and can share their opinions or experiences. 

I’m also going to attach some scholarly articles that I briefly examined relating to this issue. Do check them out because they are very informative:

• The Caste System: Effects on Poverty in India, Nepal and Sri Lanka , (Section V for Nepal)
  
• Poverty of Dalit Community in Nepal Caused by caste-based Discrimination (An analytical approach on eastern philosophy)
  

is there any way to learn newari if my parents don't speak it neither? i live in the US btw?

Your local Nepali community in the states might have classes, or someone available to teach the language so you can send them an email or call them to  see if something like that is possible. If not, here are some online resources:

• Find Newari Pen Pals that you can talk to or email 
  
• Google Play App for learning Newari
• This forum has info from the Tribhuban University’s Newari language course and a link to the University’s Newari lessons
• Here are some basic Newari vocabulary words and phrases
• This is a very short video in Nepali that teaches basic Newari Phrases and pronounciations. You can hear an actual Newari speaker pronounce the words so I think that might be helpful.

There are lots of resources available. These should me more than enough for you to get started with. If you want me to get you in touch with a Newari speaker to practice with, perhaps you’d feel safer with someone I personally know rather than finding someone from the website above, then please come off anon, and send me a message.