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The word "caste" is derived from the Portuguese castas. The European class system is essentially what transformed into the Indian caste system. Not to mean th

The word "caste" is derived from the Portuguese castas. The European class system is essentially what transformed into the Indian caste system. Not to mean there was no social hierarchy in India, but the rigid birth based system we have today is the handiwork of the British social engineering. Especially interesting is the population survey which labeled population with a caste, the power to label someone X lay with the enumerator rather than the person being enumerated self identifying with a caste.

rajup 5y ago
Not sure why you're being downvoted, I thought this was common knowledge.
neximo64 5y ago
Do you have evidence for this? The caste system's origins pre dates the British arrival afaik
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- petilon 5y ago
  See first two paras in wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India Excerpt: The British Raj furthered this development, making rigid caste organisation a central mechanism of administration. Between 1860 and 1920, the British formulated the caste system into their system of governance, granting administrative jobs and senior appointments only to Christians and people belonging to certain castes.
  - basicplus2 5y ago
    they incorporated a caste system (that was already operating) into a central mechanism of administration
    - petilon 5y ago
      Caste systems had been operating in Europe as well [1]. But for the embracement, formalization and expansion of the caste system by the British it may have died down as it did elsewhere. [1] https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Sociology/Introduction_to_Sociology/Book%3A_Sociology_(Boundless)/08%3A_Global_Stratification_and_Inequality/8.01%3A_Systems_of_Stratification/8.1C%3A_Caste_Systems https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Sociology/Intro...
- naruvimama 5y ago
  The word does not exist in any Indian language. To justify the "pre-date", proponents combine highly distorted theory of jatti and varna to artificially synthesize Indian caste system. The connection of caste with Europe is much more solid and meaningful given the monopoly of church over God and the king as the representative of God.
User23 5y ago
The English didn’t write the मनुस्मृति. Marriage rules are the most fundamental social hierarchy rules and those are ancient.
yedava 5y ago
>Not to mean there was no social hierarchy in India, but the rigid birth based system we have today is the handiwork of the British social engineering. That is not true. Caste endogamy goes back a long ways[1] before the Brits. 1. https://www.brownpundits.com/2018/06/07/genetical-observations-on-caste/ https://www.brownpundits.com/2018/06/07/genetical-observatio...
- naravara 5y ago
  That's pretty broad conclusions for Razib Khan to be drawing from scant (and biased) data. (The population of Indians in the United States in a non-random sampling of the Indian genome, especially since our immigration policy is largely selected on the basis on already having family networks based in the US. I would expect to see a lot more clustering than in an Indian sampling). This is a better and more holistic description. I'd quibble withs some aspects of its framing but it's mostly nitpicks. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3514343/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3514343/ The gist of it is that there are a lot of discrete, endogamous subgroups within India formed by successive waves of migration by different groups to where they are functionally distinct ethnic populations. So it wouldn't be all that different from racial differences in a plural society like the United States. What's remarkable is the maintenance of this plurality, as well as in-group social norms, over a very long span of time rather than it becoming a genetic melting pot as we might have expected from experiences with Europe. But even there you still have distinct groups with strong endogamy norms (e.g. Ashkenazi Jews). There's also additional complexity because in many places there isn't just a norm of endogamy, but consanguinity (cousin-marriage). Which is certainly going to make groups look more endogamous even though it would lead us to draw subtly different conclusions about what that means in terms of historic cultural norms. TL;DR it's a really complicated matter that doesn't lend itself to summarization into a single, clean, generalizable narrative.
throwawayy37r3 5y ago
This is not true. caste is the foundation of the vedic. Its the division of labour not laboreres. For the scientific minided with verifable facts read the short manual by an actual scientist and later political reformer https://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/mmt/ambedkar/web/readings/aoc_print_2004.pdf https://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/mmt/ambedkar/web/readin...
- anon0192837465 5y ago
  I think vedic period had "varna" which is different from "jati" or castes of today.
- saimiam 5y ago
  The person you’re replying to has a history of denying known issues with Indian society and blaming the britishers and/or Islamic invaders like the Mughals for all of India’s issues. I tangled with them not so long ago. Wasn’t worth the effort, imho.
  - throwawayy37r3 5y ago
    With Mughals its whole different story. Instead of discouraging religion, some emperors tried to solve by marrying Hindu women. But their kids has to belong to one of the Koran or Vedic shit. It did not solve either anything. Now both of you go downvote me.

rajup 5y ago

Not sure why you're being downvoted, I thought this was common knowledge.

neximo64 5y ago

Do you have evidence for this? The caste system's origins pre dates the British arrival afaik

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
petilon 5y ago
See first two paras in wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India Excerpt: The British Raj furthered this development, making rigid caste organisation a central mechanism of administration. Between 1860 and 1920, the British formulated the caste system into their system of governance, granting administrative jobs and senior appointments only to Christians and people belonging to certain castes.
- basicplus2 5y ago
  they incorporated a caste system (that was already operating) into a central mechanism of administration
  - petilon 5y ago
    Caste systems had been operating in Europe as well [1]. But for the embracement, formalization and expansion of the caste system by the British it may have died down as it did elsewhere. [1] https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Sociology/Introduction_to_Sociology/Book%3A_Sociology_(Boundless)/08%3A_Global_Stratification_and_Inequality/8.01%3A_Systems_of_Stratification/8.1C%3A_Caste_Systems https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Sociology/Intro...
naruvimama 5y ago
The word does not exist in any Indian language. To justify the "pre-date", proponents combine highly distorted theory of jatti and varna to artificially synthesize Indian caste system. The connection of caste with Europe is much more solid and meaningful given the monopoly of church over God and the king as the representative of God.

User23 5y ago

The English didn’t write the मनुस्मृति. Marriage rules are the most fundamental social hierarchy rules and those are ancient.

yedava 5y ago

>Not to mean there was no social hierarchy in India, but the rigid birth based system we have today is the handiwork of the British social engineering. That is not true. Caste endogamy goes back a long ways[1] before the Brits. 1. https://www.brownpundits.com/2018/06/07/genetical-observations-on-caste/ https://www.brownpundits.com/2018/06/07/genetical-observatio...

naravara 5y ago
That's pretty broad conclusions for Razib Khan to be drawing from scant (and biased) data. (The population of Indians in the United States in a non-random sampling of the Indian genome, especially since our immigration policy is largely selected on the basis on already having family networks based in the US. I would expect to see a lot more clustering than in an Indian sampling). This is a better and more holistic description. I'd quibble withs some aspects of its framing but it's mostly nitpicks. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3514343/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3514343/ The gist of it is that there are a lot of discrete, endogamous subgroups within India formed by successive waves of migration by different groups to where they are functionally distinct ethnic populations. So it wouldn't be all that different from racial differences in a plural society like the United States. What's remarkable is the maintenance of this plurality, as well as in-group social norms, over a very long span of time rather than it becoming a genetic melting pot as we might have expected from experiences with Europe. But even there you still have distinct groups with strong endogamy norms (e.g. Ashkenazi Jews). There's also additional complexity because in many places there isn't just a norm of endogamy, but consanguinity (cousin-marriage). Which is certainly going to make groups look more endogamous even though it would lead us to draw subtly different conclusions about what that means in terms of historic cultural norms. TL;DR it's a really complicated matter that doesn't lend itself to summarization into a single, clean, generalizable narrative.

throwawayy37r3 5y ago

This is not true. caste is the foundation of the vedic. Its the division of labour not laboreres. For the scientific minided with verifable facts read the short manual by an actual scientist and later political reformer https://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/mmt/ambedkar/web/readings/aoc_print_2004.pdf https://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/mmt/ambedkar/web/readin...

anon0192837465 5y ago
I think vedic period had "varna" which is different from "jati" or castes of today.
saimiam 5y ago
The person you’re replying to has a history of denying known issues with Indian society and blaming the britishers and/or Islamic invaders like the Mughals for all of India’s issues. I tangled with them not so long ago. Wasn’t worth the effort, imho.
- throwawayy37r3 5y ago
  With Mughals its whole different story. Instead of discouraging religion, some emperors tried to solve by marrying Hindu women. But their kids has to belong to one of the Koran or Vedic shit. It did not solve either anything. Now both of you go downvote me.