The Interpretation of Caste (Oxford Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology)

This book provides a radical alternative to prevailing theories of caste which either build on indigenous rationalizations of the Brahman's supremacy or reduce hierarchy to material factors. Drawing on a wide range of historical and ethnographic sources as well as four years' fieldwork, Declan Quigley proposes a comparative approach which locates caste-organized communities in the context of complex agrarian societies generally. At the heart of caste, he argues, there is a tension between the centralizing forces of kingship and its associated ritual and decentralizing forces of kinship. Dr. Quigley believes that it is this tension, rather than Brahminical ideology, which generates the characteristic patterns of hierarchy and the preoccupation with purity and pollution. In making kingship central to the explanation of caste, this book calls for a considered reexamination of the theory of caste proposed by A.M. Hocart over half a century ago, and offers an elegant and wide-ranging comparative interpretation of facts which have until now eluded satisfactory explanation.