Caste and Race in India/G.S. Ghurye. Reprint. First published by Routledge,
London in 1932. Mumbai, Popular Prakashan, 2008, viii, 494 p., (pbk). ISBN 81-7154-205-5.
Caste and Race in India/G.S. Ghurye. Reprint. First published by Routledge,
London in 1932. Mumbai, Popular Prakashan, 2008, viii, 494 p., (pbk). ISBN 81-7154-205-5.
Contents: Preface. 1. Features of the caste system. 2. Nature of caste-groups. 3. Caste through the ages--I. 4. Caste through the ages-II. 5. Race and caste. 6. Elements of caste outside India. 7. Origins of the caste system. 8. Caste, sub-caste: fusion or fission? 9. Caste, sub-caste and kin. 10. Caste during the British rule. 11. The Scheduled Castes. 12. Caste and politics: general. 13. Caste and politics in Tamil Nadu. 14. A casteless society or a plural society? Appendices A to G. Bibliography. Index.
"Caste is the most dominant single aspect of Indian Society and no study of Indian Society can be complete without getting into the ramifications of the Hindu Caste system. Caste and Race in India, since its first publication in History of civilization series, edited by C.K. Ogden in 1932, has remained a basic work for students of Indian sociology and anthropology, and has been acclaimed by teachers and reviewers as a sociological classic.
The present edition is an expanded version with five new chapters, comprehensive enough for a separate volume. Answering his critics, the author elaborates his arguments on the evolution of sub-castes and examines caste, sub-caste and kinship in its proper perspective.
The relationship between caste and politics, which he had briefly dealt with in the 1932 edition, is developed in the present edition, with a provocative and thorough-going analysis of caste and politics in Tamil Nadu from early times to the present day.
The concluding chapter is an incisive analysis of contemporary India : the author apprehends that India will develop into a plural society and not a casteless one which was the dream of the architects of her constitution."