Survival, Silence, and Negotiation: Subaltern Agency in Suman Pokhrel's Selected Poems

Abstract

This article examines Suman Pokhrel’s poems “Khorampa” and “Among Freed Bonded-Labourers” through the lens of Subaltern Studies. These poems portray the plight of socially, politically, economically, and geographically marginalized communities occupying the lowest strata of Nepal's hierarchical social order. Although these communities are conscious of the systemic oppression imposed by the ruling elite, these marginalized individuals rarely engage in overt political resistance. Instead, they negotiate with oppressive social structures and adopt strategies of survival to cope with their marginal existence. Drawing on the theoretical insights of Antonio Gramsci, Ranajit Guha, and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, this article examines how subaltern subjects negotiate oppressive structures through everyday practices of survival. Through close textual analysis, it argues that the apparent silence of the subaltern figures should not be interpreted as mere passivity but as a historically conditioned response to unequal power relations that severely constrain the possibilities of resistance. By challenging readings that equate agency solely with overt political resistance, the study concludes that Pokhrel's poems reconceptualize subaltern agency by portraying survival, silence, and negotiation as meaningful forms of response to enduring structural oppression.