There were various reasons why people in Kerala started to narrate their life in the 19th century. Some of them were written by people engaged in protestant Christian missionary activity and some others were by men of public standing. In the 20th century, people belonging to different caste- positions attempted to record their lives in print. Many of them were reformers, leaders, communists and writers, who have experienced/ negotiated or tried to escape their caste. The private/ public nature of their caste experience introduces new insights to their modern subjectivities. My scope of research focuses on two specific periods. The first period covers the renaissance and the formation of a politically conscious public sphere around the first half of the 20th century. What is the role of caste in this? How did the political men of the particular time engage with the caste in their personal accounts? Caste is often associated with Dalits as it forms a crucial part of their lived experience. At the same time, when people belonging to upper caste/ dominant caste write their life narrative, caste often goes unnoticed. This difference in caste experience read in personal narratives can be read alongside the history of Kerala. In the second part of my study, I will be reading a few selected Dalit first person narratives (post-1990s) from Kerala. Again, I am addressing the question of private/ public- ness of Dalit/ caste experience. The second focuses on a subaltern (counter) public sphere represented in the Dalit life narratives. They reflect the ways by which the category of caste has been historically represented/ written/ engaged/ negotiated in the Kerala context.