Overview
- Provides a bold reconceptualision of caste
- Argues that the dominant descriptions we have today are results of originally Christian themes and questions
- Uniquely ties together theological reflections on India, Orientalist scholarship, and contemporary social science and legal understandings of caste
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Table of contents (8 chapters)
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Front Matter
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Back Matter
Keywords
About this book
This book argues that the dominant descriptions of the ‘caste system’ are rooted in the Western Christian experience of India. Thus, caste studies tell us more about the West than about India. It further demonstrates the imperative to move beyond this scholarship in order to generate descriptions of Indian social reality.
The dominant descriptions of the ‘caste system’ that we have today are results of originally Christian themes and questions. The authors of this collection show how this hypothesis can be applied beyond South Asia to the diasporic cultures that have made a home in Western countries, and how the inheritance of caste studies as structured by European scholarship impacts on our understanding of contemporary India and the Indians of the diaspora.
This collection will be of interest to scholars and students of caste studies, India studies, religion in South Asia, postcolonial studies, history, anthropology and sociology.
Editors and Affiliations
About the editors
Martin Fárek is the Head of the Department for the Study of Religions, University of Pardubice, Czech Republic.
Dunkin Jalki is the Director of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Humanities and the Social Sciences, SDM PG College, Ujire, India.
Sufiya Pathan is Associate Professor at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Humanities and the Social Sciences, SDM PG College, Ujire, India.
Prakash Shah is a Reader in Culture and Law, Queen Mary, University of London, UK.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Western Foundations of the Caste System
Editors: Martin Fárek, Dunkin Jalki, Sufiya Pathan, Prakash Shah
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-38761-1
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Cham
eBook Packages: Social Sciences, Social Sciences (R0)
Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-319-38760-4Published: 20 July 2017
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-319-81743-9Published: 28 July 2018
eBook ISBN: 978-3-319-38761-1Published: 07 July 2017
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XI, 274
Topics: Social Structure, Social Inequality, Cultural Studies, Historical Sociology, Ethnicity Studies, Imperialism and Colonialism, Religion and Society