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Gendering Caste: Through a Feminist Lens (2003) Led to This Revised Edition Which Analyses the Recent Socio-Economic and Political Changes That Have Taken Place

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Gendering Caste: Through a Feminist Lens (2003) Led to This Revised Edition Which Analyses the Recent Socio-Economic and Political Changes That Have Taken Place UMA CHAKRAVARTI The continuous demand for Gendering Caste: Through a Feminist Lens (2003) led to this revised edition which analyses the recent socio-economic and political changes that have taken place. Caste-based marriage and control over women's sexuality have been crucial for the continuation of the caste system in India. Thus, caste and gender are linked. Brutal reprisals GENDERING have followed when dalits and women have tried to challenge caste-based marriage and inequality which allots strict rules of conduct for women and all dalits. CASTE Maithreyi Krishnaraj, the Series Editor, highlights the author’s discussion on through a feminist lens the new ways in which caste violence targets women and on the changes within the family—immediate and extended—that still keep women REVISED EDITION subservient to caste norms. She points to the new discussion on an economy in transition to capitalism, and persistent conflicts over religion, language, ethnicity and other differences that relate to gender. GENDERING CASTE The book also includes a new ‘Afterword: Caste and Gender in the New Millennium’, which provides an updated discussion on the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989 (known in short as Prevention of Atrocities Act: POA). Erudite, yet accessible, this book enables the reader to understand the ramifications of caste today. Uma Chakravarti is a feminist historian who taught at Miranda House, University of Delhi, from where she took early retirement in 1998. UMA CHAKRAVARTI SERIES EDITOR: Maithreyi Krishnaraj, Senior Honorary Fellow, Research Centre for Women’s Studies, SNDT Women’s University, Mumbai. Cover Image: ‘Chameleons’ by Prem Chowdhry Cover Art Credit: Vidushi Kedia ` 495 ISBN 978-93-81345-44-3 SAGE was founded in 1965 by Sara Miller McCune to support the dissemination of usable knowledge by publishing innovative and high-quality research and teaching content. Today, we publish over 900 journals, including those of more than 400 learned societies, more than 800 new books per year, and a growing range of library products including archives, data, case studies, reports, and video. SAGE remains majority-owned by our founder, and after Sara’s lifetime will become owned by a charitable trust that secures our continued independence. Los Angeles | London | New Delhi | Singapore | Washington DC | Melbourne GENDERING CASTE Also in the series Gender V. Geetha Patriarchy V. Geetha Interrogating Motherhood Jasodhara Bagchi THEORIZING FEMINISM Series Editor Maithreyi Krishnaraj GENDERING CASTE through a feminist lens REVISED EDITION UMA CHAKRAVARTI Copyright © Uma Chakravarti, 2018 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. First published in 2018 by SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd STREE B1/I-1 Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area 16 Southern Avenue Mathura Road, New Delhi 110 044, India Kolkata 700 026 www.sagepub.in www.stree-samyabooks.com SAGE Publications Inc 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, California 91320, USA SAGE Publications Ltd 1 Oliver’s Yard, 55 City Road London EC1Y 1SP, United Kingdom SAGE Publications Asia-Pacific Pte Ltd 3 Church Street #10-04 Samsung Hub Singapore 049483 Published by Vivek Mehra for SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd, typeset in 11/13 pts Goudy by Zaza Eunice, Hosur, Tamil Nadu, India and printed at Chaman Enterprises, New Delhi. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available ISBN: 978-93-81345-44-3 (PB) SAGE Stree Team: Aritra Paul, Amrita Dutta and Alekha Chandra Jena To Sudesh Vaid C. V. Subba Rao Madha Sathe comrades in the democratic rights movement, Krishna Raj Alice Thorner Sharmila Rege and Rajni Tilak for being what they were and for doing what they did. Thank you for choosing a SAGE product! If you have any comment, observation or feedback, I would like to personally hear from you. Please write to me at [email protected] Vivek Mehra, Managing Director and CEO, SAGE India. Bulk Sales SAGE India offers special discounts for purchase of books in bulk. We also make available special imprints and excerpts from our books on demand. For orders and enquiries, write to us at Marketing Department SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd B1/I-1, Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area Mathura Road, Post Bag 7 New Delhi 110044, India E-mail us at [email protected] Subscribe to our mailing list Write to [email protected] This book is also available as an e-book. Contents A NOTE FROM THE SERIES EDITOR Maithreyi Krishnaraj ix ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS xv Prologue 1 1 Understanding Caste 6 2 The Axis of Gender Stratification in India 24 3 Caste, Class and Gender: The Historical Roots of Brahmanical Patriarchy 36 4 The Formation of Patriarchy and the Subordination of Women 63 5 The Diversity of Patriarchal Practices 77 6 Critiques of Caste and Gender Stratification 88 7 Pre-Colonial Structures of Caste and Gender: An Eighteenth-Century Example 100 8 Caste in the Colonial Period 108 9 Caste and Gender in Contemporary India 132 EPILOGUE 162 AFTERWORD: CASTE AND GENDER IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM 166 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FILMOGRAPHY 193 INDEX 196 ABOUT THE AUTHOR AND SERIES EDITOR 204 Gendering Caste viii A Note from the Series Editor GENDERING CASTE IN INDIA This series presents introductory texts to draw in readers outside academia as well as for those inside it. Written by well-known scholar-activists of women’s studies, the books seek to explain ideas and theories in a simple way and place them securely in the Indian context. Many feminist theories originated in the West and therefore reflected the social and cultural background of the writers and the nature of social con- figurations within which they sought explanations. Dominant features like the nuclear family, advanced capitalism, different marriage patterns and cultural ethos naturally shape their understanding of women in society (in the beginning they omitted race). More relevant for us are the family, immediate and extended; security; an economy in transition to capital- ism; a deeply hierarchic society stratified by class and caste; and persistent conflicts over religion, language, ethnicity and other differences. Scholars here have used standard feminist theories in innovative and imaginative ways, modifying them, elaborating them and offering us a comparative perspective. Hence a very important aim of this series is to bring together Third World feminism and feminist theorizing in the broad sense of conceptualizing social reality. Each book is meant to be self-sufficient in itself and yet cumulatively add to the theory-building. As each is written by a different author, the style would vary. The constituent essays in the series are not repetitive but additive. The emergence of autonomous grass- root women’s movements here has forced us to rethink our views on liberation and questions of who speaks for whom. It has brought to the forefront a fundamental dilemma: we began by a strong notion of universal sisterhood and now we realize there are divergent interests among us. How do we reconcile them? From saying we are tied by a common bond of oppres- sion to saying we do not have the same kind of oppression, are we stranded in theory? We hope these books will be used widely not as ‘prescribed texts’ to be memorized for examinations but for debate and discussion in the classroom and outside; as a springboard for further thought and not as congealed wisdom. In the quick and easy recipes of ‘gender awareness’ programmes, what is missed is that behaviour change occurs never by rhetoric but only when there is a clear understanding of what the limita- tions and possibilities are for gaining one’s freedom in the present situation. Gendering Caste by Uma Chakravarti was the first systematic attempt to work out the interface between caste and gender. Delving into historical sources, religious texts, anthropological and sociological literature, Uma shows how gender is critical to the formation of caste. It is truly an astounding piece of inter- disciplinary work. Caste as the bulwark of Indian society that has persisted despite many transformations has been much written about, debated about but we had hitherto lacked the theoretical framework to show that gender constituted caste. The first edition originally published in 2003 has been very successful, reprinted three times. Because of the ways caste has changed and gender is perceived during the years since the book was published, a revised edition was in order. As the author’s Acknowledgements state, an update was required on various issues, particularly on the new ways caste violence targets women. Sexuality, hitherto not aired in India, has come to the fore. Its connection to pervasive violence against women has demonstrated the ideological and material hold of patriarchy in its manifest forms. Feminists had resorted to reform of laws and of law enforcing agencies. Despite all these efforts, the media work as eye-openers on the strength of the ideology of patriarchy in India, with its foundations still secure in caste, family, marriage practices; where female sexuality has to be curbed, where women are violated on issues of ‘honour’ or revenge or caste vengeance. Gendering Caste x A Note from the Series Editor Uma has worked assiduously on ancient Indian society and her work on historiography demolished for the first time the standard version of women’s position in ancient India, popularized by Altekar, uncritically accepted and taught to gen- erations of post-independent students. Uma’s involvement in civil rights movement gives her a ringside view of contemporary politics. With her training in history, and her knowledge of Pali, she has over the years retrieved our past through a femi- nist sensibility.
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