About the Authors and the Text

"Memories of Childhood" is not a single story but a lesson made of two short autobiographical accounts, each written by a woman who grew up in a community pushed to the margins of society. In the CBSE Class 12 English NCERT syllabus (Vistas), the two pieces are placed together because, although they come from very different parts of the world, they tell strikingly similar stories: in each, a child looks back on an early encounter with prejudice and oppression, and that memory becomes a turning point in her understanding of the world. One account deals with the oppression of race, the other with the oppression of caste, and together they show how discrimination, wherever it appears, wounds the young and yet can also awaken in them the will to resist.

Part I — Zitkala-Sa

The first part, "The Cutting of My Long Hair," is by Zitkala-Sa, whose given name was Gertrude Simmons Bonnin (born 1876). She was a Native American writer, musician and activist who worked to preserve the culture of her people and to defend their rights at a time when severe prejudice prevailed towards Native American culture. Under the pen name 'Zitkala-Sa' she began, in 1900, to publish articles criticising the Carlisle Indian school. Writing from her own experience, she recalls the pain and humiliation of her first day at such a boarding school, where the customs, dress and appearance of her people were treated as things to be erased. Her account gives a child's-eye view of how a dominant culture tried to crush a native identity.

Part II — Bama

The second part, "We Too are Human Beings," is by Bama, a Tamil writer from a Dalit community in southern India. Bama is known for writing about the lives and struggles of Dalits, and especially about the experience of Dalit women, drawing directly on her own memories. The extract is taken from her autobiography 'Karukku' (1992); she has also published a novel, 'Sangati' (1994), and a collection of short stories, 'Kisumbukkaaran' (1996). In this piece she recalls the moment in her childhood when she first became fully aware of untouchability and caste discrimination — the humiliating way in which people of her community were treated as lesser beings — and how a conversation with her elder brother turned that hurt into a resolve to rise above it.

Why the pairing matters

By bringing together a Native American voice and a Dalit voice, the lesson makes a universal point: prejudice based on race or caste is not confined to any one country or people, and its cruelty is felt most sharply by children. Yet both accounts also carry a note of strength. Zitkala-Sa resists the humiliation forced upon her, and Bama, guided by her brother's advice, decides to fight discrimination through education and hard work. Reading the two parts side by side is the key to the lesson: the forms of oppression differ, but the pattern is the same — an innocent child confronts a system that declares her people inferior, feels the sting of it, and begins the long journey towards dignity and self-respect.