India's Caste System. From Ancient to Modern

India's Caste System. From Ancient to Modern PDF Author: Nadiia Kudriashova
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3346036839
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 15

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2017 in the subject Sociology - Individual, Groups, Society, grade: MA, Oregon State University, language: English, abstract: This paper analyses India's caste system from Ancient to modern. During the 20th and the beginning of the 21st centuries, many countries of the East developed along the path of modernization of social, political, and socio-economic life. In some states, this process was interrupted by social explosions, which led to a rollback to the past. Others appeared capable of finding a viable balance between traditional and modern values. In both cases, specific political systems emerged, which are characterized by the coexistence of Western democratic principles and traditional social institutions. Thus, in India, on the one hand, the involvement of the caste in political life led to some transformation of this ancient social structure and retained its position in modern society; on the other, it created such a phenomenon as "democracy of the castes". Castes/jati are formed on the basis of a related self-organization; they have a different origin, but most of them go back to archaic tribes and tribal fragments; they are characterized by endogamy, hereditary profession, originality of culture. Ideological substantiations of the caste mode of communication are directly related to the fundamental concepts of Hinduism, dharma, karma, and sansara, which describe Indian ideas about the laws of the existence of the Universe and nature. Modern Indian society is distinguished by its phenomenal mosaic composition. Numerous and diverse linguistic, ethnic, confessional, caste groups not only coexist, but they are intertwined in the fabric of a social organism. Indians' identity is usually vague; its different variants come to the fore in different contexts; they overlap and complement each other. Entire communities do not have an unambiguous scientific nomination.

India's Caste System. From Ancient to Modern

India's Caste System. From Ancient to Modern PDF Author: Nadiia Kudriashova
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3346036839
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 15

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2017 in the subject Sociology - Individual, Groups, Society, grade: MA, Oregon State University, language: English, abstract: This paper analyses India's caste system from Ancient to modern. During the 20th and the beginning of the 21st centuries, many countries of the East developed along the path of modernization of social, political, and socio-economic life. In some states, this process was interrupted by social explosions, which led to a rollback to the past. Others appeared capable of finding a viable balance between traditional and modern values. In both cases, specific political systems emerged, which are characterized by the coexistence of Western democratic principles and traditional social institutions. Thus, in India, on the one hand, the involvement of the caste in political life led to some transformation of this ancient social structure and retained its position in modern society; on the other, it created such a phenomenon as "democracy of the castes". Castes/jati are formed on the basis of a related self-organization; they have a different origin, but most of them go back to archaic tribes and tribal fragments; they are characterized by endogamy, hereditary profession, originality of culture. Ideological substantiations of the caste mode of communication are directly related to the fundamental concepts of Hinduism, dharma, karma, and sansara, which describe Indian ideas about the laws of the existence of the Universe and nature. Modern Indian society is distinguished by its phenomenal mosaic composition. Numerous and diverse linguistic, ethnic, confessional, caste groups not only coexist, but they are intertwined in the fabric of a social organism. Indians' identity is usually vague; its different variants come to the fore in different contexts; they overlap and complement each other. Entire communities do not have an unambiguous scientific nomination.

Castes of Mind

Castes of Mind PDF Author: Nicholas B. Dirks
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400840945
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 386

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Book Description
When thinking of India, it is hard not to think of caste. In academic and common parlance alike, caste has become a central symbol for India, marking it as fundamentally different from other places while expressing its essence. Nicholas Dirks argues that caste is, in fact, neither an unchanged survival of ancient India nor a single system that reflects a core cultural value. Rather than a basic expression of Indian tradition, caste is a modern phenomenon--the product of a concrete historical encounter between India and British colonial rule. Dirks does not contend that caste was invented by the British. But under British domination caste did become a single term capable of naming and above all subsuming India's diverse forms of social identity and organization. Dirks traces the career of caste from the medieval kingdoms of southern India to the textual traces of early colonial archives; from the commentaries of an eighteenth-century Jesuit to the enumerative obsessions of the late-nineteenth-century census; from the ethnographic writings of colonial administrators to those of twentieth-century Indian scholars seeking to rescue ethnography from its colonial legacy. The book also surveys the rise of caste politics in the twentieth century, focusing in particular on the emergence of caste-based movements that have threatened nationalist consensus. Castes of Mind is an ambitious book, written by an accomplished scholar with a rare mastery of centuries of Indian history and anthropology. It uses the idea of caste as the basis for a magisterial history of modern India. And in making a powerful case that the colonial past continues to haunt the Indian present, it makes an important contribution to current postcolonial theory and scholarship on contemporary Indian politics.

Who Were the Shudras

Who Were the Shudras PDF Author: B. R. Ambedkar
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789354991028
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
The general proposition that the social organization of the Indo-Aryans was based on the theory of Chaturvarnya and that Chaturvarnya means division of society into four classes-Brahmins (priests), Kshatriyas (soldiers), Vaishyas (traders) and Shudras (menials) does not convey any idea of the real nature of the problem of the Shudras nor of its magnitude. Chaturvarnya would have been a very innocent principle if it meant no more than mere division of society into four classes. Unfortunately, more than this is involved in the theory of Chaturvarnya. Besides dividing society into four orders, the theory goes further and makes the principle of graded inequality. Under the system of Chaturvarnya, the Shudra is not only placed at the bottom of the gradation but he is subjected to innumerable ignominies and disabilities so as to prevent him from rising above the condition fixed for him by law. Indeed until the fifth Varna of the Untouchables came into being, the Shudras were in the eyes of the Hindus the lowest of the low. This shows the nature of what might be called the problem of the Shudras. If people have no idea of the magnitude of the problem it is because they have not cared to know what the population of the Shudras is.

The Republic of India

The Republic of India PDF Author: Alan Gledhill
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 309

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Book Description


Indian Caste System

Indian Caste System PDF Author: R.K. Pruthi
Publisher: Discovery Publishing House
ISBN: 9788171418473
Category : Caste
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Contents: Introduction, The Caste System, India s Social Customs and Systems, The Changing Concept of Caste in India: History and Review, Society: Class, Family and Individual, Division of Castes, Expulsion from Caste, Caste System: A Case of South India, Caste System in India, Various Rules: Religion and Caste, Organisation and Jurisdiction, Disintegration and Multiplication of Caste, Caste and Structure of Society, Our Social Heritage.

The Pariah Problem

The Pariah Problem PDF Author: Rupa Viswanath
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231537506
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 417

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Book Description
Once known as "Pariahs," Dalits are primarily descendants of unfree agrarian laborers. They belong to India's most subordinated castes, face overwhelming poverty and discrimination, and provoke public anxiety. Drawing on a wealth of previously untapped sources, this book follows the conception and evolution of the "Pariah Problem" in public consciousness in the 1890s. It shows how high-caste landlords, state officials, and well-intentioned missionaries conceived of Dalit oppression, and effectively foreclosed the emergence of substantive solutions to the "Problem"—with consequences that continue to be felt today. Rupa Viswanath begins with a description of the everyday lives of Dalit laborers in the 1890s and highlights the systematic efforts made by the state and Indian elites to protect Indian slavery from public scrutiny. Protestant missionaries were the first non-Dalits to draw attention to their plight. The missionaries' vision of the Pariahs' suffering as being a result of Hindu religious prejudice, however, obscured the fact that the entire agrarian political–economic system depended on unfree Pariah labor. Both the Indian public and colonial officials came to share a view compatible with missionary explanations, which meant all subsequent welfare efforts directed at Dalits focused on religious and social transformation rather than on structural reform. Methodologically, theoretically, and empirically, this book breaks new ground to demonstrate how events in the early decades of state-sponsored welfare directed at Dalits laid the groundwork for the present day, where the postcolonial state and well-meaning social and religious reformers continue to downplay Dalits' landlessness, violent suppression, and political subordination.

Caste in Contemporary India

Caste in Contemporary India PDF Author: Pauline Kolenda
Publisher: Waveland Press
ISBN:
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
It is often assumed that the caste system in South Asia has faded away. Yet it is indeed unlikely that a social structure organizing the political, economic, and ritual life of a people for over one thousand years could be totally expunged within a few decades. In this brief, cogent, and clear presentation, caste is first considered as a system of descent-groups. Then the traditional caste system is analyzed, the evidence for its decline discussed, and the characteristics of the emerging new caste system examined.

Caste system and case studies # indian_society

Caste system and case studies # indian_society PDF Author: Bhaskar Pandey
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 0359980899
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description


Caste, Society and Politics in India from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age

Caste, Society and Politics in India from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age PDF Author: Susan Bayly
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521798426
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
The phenomenon of caste has probably aroused more controversy than any other aspect of Indian life and thought. Susan Bayly's cogent and sophisticated analysis explores the emergence of the ideas, experiences and practices which gave rise to the so-called 'caste society' from the pre-colonial period to the end of the twentieth century. Using an historical and anthropological approach, she frames her analysis within the context of India's dynamic economic and social order, interpreting caste not as an essence of Indian culture and civilization, but rather as a contingent and variable response to the changes that occurred in the subcontinent's political landscape through the colonial conquest. The idea of caste in relation to Western and Indian 'orientalist' thought is also explored.

Caste

Caste PDF Author: Isabel Wilkerson
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 0593230272
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 545

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Book Description
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK • “An instant American classic and almost certainly the keynote nonfiction book of the American century thus far.”—Dwight Garner, The New York Times The Pulitzer Prize–winning, bestselling author of The Warmth of Other Suns examines the unspoken caste system that has shaped America and shows how our lives today are still defined by a hierarchy of human divisions—now with a new Afterword by the author. #1 NONFICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR: Time ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The Washington Post, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, O: The Oprah Magazine, NPR, Bloomberg, The Christian Science Monitor, New York Post, The New York Public Library, Fortune, Smithsonian Magazine, Marie Claire, Slate, Library Journal, Kirkus Reviews Winner of the Carl Sandberg Literary Award • Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize • National Book Award Longlist • National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist • Dayton Literary Peace Prize Finalist • PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction Finalist • PEN/Jean Stein Book Award Longlist • Kirkus Prize Finalist “As we go about our daily lives, caste is the wordless usher in a darkened theater, flashlight cast down in the aisles, guiding us to our assigned seats for a performance. The hierarchy of caste is not about feelings or morality. It is about power—which groups have it and which do not.” In this brilliant book, Isabel Wilkerson gives us a masterful portrait of an unseen phenomenon in America as she explores, through an immersive, deeply researched, and beautifully written narrative and stories about real people, how America today and throughout its history has been shaped by a hidden caste system, a rigid hierarchy of human rankings. Beyond race, class, or other factors, there is a powerful caste system that influences people’s lives and behavior and the nation’s fate. Linking the caste systems of America, India, and Nazi Germany, Wilkerson explores eight pillars that underlie caste systems across civilizations, including divine will, bloodlines, stigma, and more. Using riveting stories about people—including Martin Luther King, Jr., baseball’s Satchel Paige, a single father and his toddler son, Wilkerson herself, and many others—she shows the ways that the insidious undertow of caste is experienced every day. She documents how the Nazis studied the racial systems in America to plan their outcasting of the Jews; she discusses why the cruel logic of caste requires that there be a bottom rung for those in the middle to measure themselves against; she writes about the surprising health costs of caste, in depression and life expectancy, and the effects of this hierarchy on our culture and politics. Finally, she points forward to ways America can move beyond the artificial and destructive separations of human divisions, toward hope in our common humanity. Original and revealing, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents is an eye-opening story of people and history, and a reexamination of what lies under the surface of ordinary lives and of American life today.