History Of Caste

[acharya]

12 The Geopolitics of South Asia

T he explanation of caste can take many forms. T o some it can be explained

as sui generis – a thing unto itself – unlike anything at other times or in other

cultures – and therefore it can be explained by Hinduism in its own terms. For

others, it has to be explained comparatively, that it is the Indian realisation of a

form that can occur in other guises elsewhere – and sometimes the black–white

divide in the USA is quoted as a parallel. Historically we need look no further

than to Japan in the early 19th century before the Meiji R estoration to recognise

another rigid caste society – which is still not completely erased from the cultural

record.



In Japan the ‘problem’ of untouchability still adheres to the descendants

of the untouchable (cleaners and sweepers) caste – although it is something which

receives little publicity. Go back further in time and in Europe in the Middle Ages

there were hereditary crafts and guilds, and much further back in time unequal

citizens and slaves in Greece, and another caste system in Egypt.



Within Hinduism there is a theoretical or theological explanation of what caste

is – although this theory is a simple and high level abstraction which often bears

little relation to caste in its practical form. T herefore, in saying the following, be

warned that I am generalising and simplifying perhaps excessively.