Ruth Manorama is a Dalit woman. Born in 1952 in Madras, her parents escaped the worst consequences of being Dalits by becoming Christians. In 1975 Manorama took a Master's degree in social work from the University of Madras and has trained in both the community organisation methods of Saul D'Alinsky and the conscientisation methods of Paolo Freire. In 2001 Manorama was granted an honorary doctorate "for the distinguished contribution made to church and society" by the Academy of Ecumenical Indian Theology and Church Administration. Dr. Manorama has been consistently associated with a range of issues – the rights of slum-dwellers, domestic workers, unorganized labor and Dalits, and the empowerment of marginalized women. She stresses the interconnectedness between these issues, and the common cause that marginalized people share the world over.  Her work crosses the borders between grassroots movements, mass mobilization, and international movements. Dr. Manorama's working life has been spent on organization building, mobilization of people and advocacy on behalf of Dalit women through a large number of organizations. She is the General Secretary of Women's Voice, founded in 1985, to work with women in slums, struggling for land, shelter and survival rights of the urban poor, the President of the National Alliance of Women, set up following the Fourth World Conference of Women in Beijing in 1995 to monitor government performance on its various commitments to women and lobby for change, the Joint Secretary of the Christian Dalit Liberation Movement, formed in the 1980s to mobilise Christian Dalits for affirmative action and President of the National Federation of Dalit Women (NFDW), set up in 1995. In addition, she has a number of regional and international roles (Asian Women's Human Rights Council, International Women's Rights Action Watch – Asia – Pacific, Sisters' Network). She has also been a member of the Karnataka State Planning Board, the State Commission for Women, the Task Force on Women's Empowerment of the Government of India and a number of other state and national bodies.