Rethinking untouchability

Rethinking untouchability PDF Author: Jesús F. Cháirez-Garza
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 1526168715
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 359

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Book Description
This book examines the transformation of untouchability into a political idea in India during the first half of the twentieth century. At its heart is Ambedkar’s role and the concepts he used to champion untouchability as a political problem. Ambedkar’s main objective was to comprehend the numerous avatars of untouchability in order to eradicate this practice. Ambedkar understood untouchability beyond aspects of ritual purity and pollution by stressing its complex nature and uncovering the political, historical, racial, spatial and emotional characteristics contained in this concept. Ambedkar believed the abolition of untouchability depended on a widespread alteration of India’s political, economic and cultural systems. Ambedkar reframed the problem of untouchability by linking it to larger concepts floating in the political environment of late colonial India such as representation, slavery, race, the Indian village, internationalism and even the creation of Pakistan.

Rethinking untouchability

Rethinking untouchability PDF Author: Jesús F. Cháirez-Garza
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 1526168715
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 359

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book examines the transformation of untouchability into a political idea in India during the first half of the twentieth century. At its heart is Ambedkar’s role and the concepts he used to champion untouchability as a political problem. Ambedkar’s main objective was to comprehend the numerous avatars of untouchability in order to eradicate this practice. Ambedkar understood untouchability beyond aspects of ritual purity and pollution by stressing its complex nature and uncovering the political, historical, racial, spatial and emotional characteristics contained in this concept. Ambedkar believed the abolition of untouchability depended on a widespread alteration of India’s political, economic and cultural systems. Ambedkar reframed the problem of untouchability by linking it to larger concepts floating in the political environment of late colonial India such as representation, slavery, race, the Indian village, internationalism and even the creation of Pakistan.

Reconsidering Untouchability

Reconsidering Untouchability PDF Author: Ramnarayan S. Rawat
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253222621
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 299

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Book Description
"Challenges and revises our understanding of the historical and contemporary role of Dalits in Indian society. A pathbreaking book that rightfully restores the historical agency of and gives voice to Dalits in North India." --Anand A. Yang, University of Washington --

Dr. Ambedkar and Untouchability

Dr. Ambedkar and Untouchability PDF Author: Christophe Jaffrelot
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231136020
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
"For years Ambedkar battled alone against the Indian political establishment, including Gandhi, who resisted his attempt to formalize and codify a separate identity for the Dalits. Nonetheless, he became law minister in the first government of independent India and, more important, was elected chairman of the committee which drafted the Indian Constitution. Here he modified Gandhian attempts to influence the Indian polity. He then distanced himself from politics and sought solace in Buddhism, to which he converted in 1956, a few months before his death." "Jaffrelot focuses on Ambedkar's three key roles: as social theorist, as statesman and politician, and as an advocate of conversion to Buddhism as an escape route for India's Dalits. In each case he pioneered new strategies that proved effective in his lifetime and still resonate today."--BOOK JACKET.

Dynamics of Caste and Law

Dynamics of Caste and Law PDF Author: Dag-Erik Berg
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108855601
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 263

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Book Description
Dynamics of Caste and Law breaks new ground in understanding how caste and law relate in India's democratic order. Caste has become a visible phenomenon often associated with discrimination, inequality and politics in India and globally. India's constitutional democracy has had a remarkable goal of creating equality in a context of caste. Despite constitutional promises with equal opportunities for the lower castes and outlawing of untouchability at the time of independence, recurring atrocities and inadequate implementation of law have called for rethinking and legal change. This book sheds new light on why caste oppression persists by using new theoretical perspectives as well as Bhimrao Ambedkar's concepts of the caste system. Focusing on struggles among India's Dalits, the castes formerly known as untouchables, the book draws on a rich material and explains, among other things, mechanisms of oppression and how powerful actors may gain influence in institutions of law and state.

Religion as Social Vision

Religion as Social Vision PDF Author: Mark Juergensmeyer
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780520043015
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 357

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Book Description


Rethinking Social Justice

Rethinking Social Justice PDF Author: Karthick Ram Manoharan S Anandhi
Publisher: Orient Blackswan Pvt Limited
ISBN: 9789352879076
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
The discourse of social justice has been much contested in India ever since the time of the Mandal Commission report. Nearly four decades on, debates on culture and identity remain strong. Rather than studying the concept of social justice in isolation, in distinct social, political or economic terms, Rethinking Social Justice offers a more transdisciplinary approach to envisioning a just society that encompasses the intersecting issues of caste, capital, nationalism, gender, region, urban planning and visual representation. Divided into five broad thematic sections Politics of Culture and Identity; Critical Social History; Nation and the Region; Political Economy; and Cinema and Society this volume brings together perspectives from across disciplines to rethink the question of social justice, in the process opening up a view of the panorama of Indian politics. This collection is an homage to M. S. S. Pandian who, through his writings on political economy, Dravidian politics, film studies, and social and intellectual history, interrogated questions of caste, identity and cultural elitism in his broader quest for social justice. In this volume, eminent scholars friends and colleagues of Pandian enter into a dialogue with Pandian s life-work, cut short by his untimely demise in 2014. They build upon his legacy to not only critically evaluate politics and society, but also subject mainstream culture to an equally critical evaluation. Social scientists, activists, journalists, policymakers and film critics will find immense value in this insightful collection of essays.

Outcaste Bombay

Outcaste Bombay PDF Author: Juned Shaikh
Publisher: University of Washington Press
ISBN: 0295748516
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 243

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Book Description
Over the course of the twentieth century, Bombay’s population grew twentyfold as the city became increasingly industrialized and cosmopolitan. Yet beneath a veneer of modernity, old prejudices endured, including the treatment of the Dalits. Even as Indians engaged with aspects of modern life, including the Marxist discourse of class, caste distinctions played a pivotal role in determining who was excluded from the city’s economic transformations. Labor historian Juned Shaikh documents the symbiosis between industrial capitalism and the caste system, mapping the transformation of the city as urban planners marked Dalit neighborhoods as slums that needed to be demolished in order to build a modern Bombay. Drawing from rare sources written by the urban poor and Dalits in the Marathi language—including novels, poems, and manifestos—Outcaste Bombay examines how language and literature became a battleground for cultural politics. Through careful scrutiny of one city’s complex social fabric, this study illuminates issues that remain vital for labor activists and urban planners around the world.

The Truth About Us

The Truth About Us PDF Author: Sanjoy Chakravorty
Publisher: Hachette India
ISBN: 9351950263
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
‘India...has an information space packed with numerous sources and agents – from politicians and activists to profiteers and extortionists – all competing for attention and legitimacy in a growing information market... Whom does one believe?’ The political manipulation and simplification of information about a dizzyingly complex society have fashioned certain ‘truths’ about India. These truths have resulted in the creation of major religious and caste identities, which have been the defining features of the country’s politics and history for over 200 years. An unsparing study of how this situation has come about, The Truth about Us explores answers to crucial questions: Is India a homogenous Hindu nation sprinkled with minorities, or a pluralistic, heterogeneous one? Is our knowledge of the inequalities in our society founded on facts or perceptions? What are the real origin stories of India’s social categories, and how are they being constructed and challenged today? At a time when India is in the throes of an existential debate, convulsed by contesting claims over identity and history, Hindutva and Dalit consciousness, nationalism and freedom of speech, and the rights and realities of minorities, this deeply provocative book is urgent reading for every thinking Indian.

Rethinking Religion in India

Rethinking Religion in India PDF Author: Esther Bloch
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135182795
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 209

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Book Description
Critically assesses recent debates about the colonial construction of Hinduism. Written by experts in their field, the chapters present historical and empirical arguments as well as theoretical reflections on the topic, offering new insights into the nature of the construction of religion in India.

Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar and the Question of Socialism in India

Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar and the Question of Socialism in India PDF Author: V. Geetha
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030803759
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
This book offers a reading of Bhimrao Ambedkar’s engagement with the idea and practice of socialism in India by linking it to his lifelong political and philosophical concerns: the annihilation of the caste system, untouchability and the moral and philosophical systems that justify either. Rather than view his ideas through a socialist lens, the author suggests that it is important to measure the validity of socialist thought and practice in the Indian context, through his critique of the social totality. The book argues its case by presenting a broad and connected overview of his thought world and the global and local influences that shaped it. The themes that are taken up for discussion include: his understanding of the colonial rule and the colonial state; history and progress; nationalism and the questions he posed the socialists; his radical critique of the caste system and Brahmancal philosophies, and his unusual interpretation of Buddhism.