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The main focus of this book is to examine the nature and motivation of caste hierarchy and factionalism among the different religious communities in India like Hindu, Muslim and Christian. This study also explores the connections between economic and political power, through analysis of local political systems and discussion of the extent to which class and party’s interest link people of different castes and subcaste groups. Many newly emerging social questions have also been discussed, i.e., the degree to which these changes have affected patterns of rank, the extent to which the caste system is still a factor of social organisation, and to what extent, to which the new situation, has stimulated larger caste groupings in the form of regional and national caste associations.
CONTENTS PREFACE (V) 1. INTRODUCTION 1 Definition 1 Traditional Origin of Varnas 3 Traditional Origin of Jatis 5 Criticism of Manu’s Theory 7 Justification of Manu’s Varna Division 9 Risley’s Theory on Varna Division 12 Senart’s Theory about the Origin of the Caste System 13 Criticism of Senart’s Theory 15 Colour Question 16 Occupational basis of Caste System 18 Criticism of Nesfield’s Theory 18 Tribal basis of Caste 20 Cosmopolitanism and Law of Karma 22 2. THE ESSENCE AND REALITY OF THE CASTE SYSTEM 27 The Reality of the System 31 Essential Tendencies of Indian Caste System 37 3. THE NATURE OF CASTE HIERARCHY: SOME REFLECTION 57 Characteristic Feature of Caste System 60 Dualist Interpretation 63 Re-examination of Varna and Caste 68 The Rank of Caste and its Relation with other Castes 70 Landowning Caste and Agricultural Labour Caste 75 4. CASTE ‘BOUNDARIES’ AND THE PRINCIPLE OF KINSHIP AMITY: A MARATHA CASTE PURANA 81 A Maratha Caste Purana 86 The Evidence of Kin Classification and Comparative Evidence 91 Conclusion 94 5. CASTE DOMINANCE AND FACTIONALISM 101 Analysis of Ethnographic Data 106 Concluding Comment 126 6. UNTOUCHABLES AND THE CASTE SYSTEM: A TAMIL CASE STUDY 129 Existence of Untouchable Sub-Culture 133 Analysis of the Internal Social Organisation 141 7. CASTE IN ISLAM AND THE PROBLEM OF DEVIANT SYSTEMS: A CRITIQUE OF RECENT THEORY 145 8. CASTE AND CASTELESSNESS AMONG SOUTH INDIAN CHRISTIANS 167 Mass Movement Conversion 172 Individual Conversion 173 Self-Identities 180 Ideologies of Caste 185 The Ideology of ‘Castelessness’ 191 Conclusion 194 9. CASTE AND RELIGION IN URBAN INDIA: A CASE STUDY 203 Objectives 204 Sample and Method 206 Setting 206 The Persistence of Caste 209 Caste Ranking 212 Some Associations between Varna and Selected Variables 216 Conclusion 221 BIBLIOGRAPHY 227 INDEX 241
ISBN - 9788182205727
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