Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-8bhkd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-09T21:42:55.771Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Kingship and Caste

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Get access

Extract

One of the major areas of dispute among social scientists working with South Asian material has been over what criteria enable one to isolate and define those characteristics attaching to the phenomenon of caste by which it can be described and analysed. Some scholars posit a set of fundamental attributes pertaining to caste which are so constituted as to limit caste solely to a Hindu context, while other scholars postulate a series of primary principles which permit comparative undertakings. One of the most vigorous and sophisticated proponents advocating the limiting of caste to the Hindu social system is Dumont. Dumont denies the validity of applying the term caste to non-Hindu social systems because for him the essential structural principle underlying caste is the polar opposition of purity and impurity. Hierarchy arises because of and is structured by this polarity. In turn, the requisite condition permitting the development of pure hierarchy is that ritual status and secular power must be conceived as completely separate domains and that status be made superior to power, the priest taking precedence over the ruler (Dumont 1972, p. 114). Caste exists only where this necessary disjunction between status and power is present and, furthermore, this disjunction is only found within the Hindu social system.

Type
Observer's Analysis of Caste and Clientele
Copyright
Copyright © Archives Européenes de Sociology 1975

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bista, D. B., Matwali Chhetris, Regmi Research Series, III (1971), 176181.Google Scholar
Dumont, L., Marriage in India, the present state of the question: post-script to Part I, Contributions to Indian Sociology, VII (1964), 7798.Google Scholar
Dumont, L., Homo hierarchicus (Paris, Gallimard, 1966), translated by Mark Sainsbury (London, Paladin, 1972).Google Scholar
Greenwold, S. M., Buddhist Brahmans, European Journal of Sociology, XV (1974), 101133.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, F., An Account of the Kingdom of Nepal (Edinburgh, Archibald Constable and Co, 1819).Google Scholar
Hasrat, B. J., History of Nepal (Hoshiarpur, The V. V. Research Institute Press, 1970).Google Scholar
Heesterman, J. C., Priesthood and the rahmin, Contributions to Indian Sociology [New Series], V (1971), 4347.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hodgson, B., On the law and legal practices of Nepal as regards familiar intercourse between a Hindu and an outcaste, The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, I (1834), 4556.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Landon, P., Nepal (London, Constable and Co, 1928).Google Scholar
Lévi, S., Le Népal: étude historique d'un royaume hindou (Paris, Ernest Leroux, (1905).Google Scholar
Nepali, G. S., The Newars (Bombay, The States People Press, 1965).Google Scholar
Oldfield, H. A., Sketches from Nepal: historical and descriptive, etc. (London, W. H. Allen, 1880).Google Scholar
Regmi, D. R., Medieval Nepal. Part. I: Early medieval period, 750–1530 A.D. (Calcutta, Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay, 1965).Google Scholar
Regmi, M. C., Judicial arrangements for Maithili Brahmans, 1853, Regmi Research Series, II (1970), p. 48 [here quoted as 1970 a].Google Scholar
Regmi, M. C., Law on untouchability, Regmi Research Series, id. pp. 5257 [1970 b].Google Scholar
Regmi, M. C., On Jaisi Brahmans, Regmi Research Series, id. pp. 277285 [1970 c].Google Scholar
Rosser, C., Social Mobility in the Newar Caste System, in Hcrerhaimendorf, Christoph von (ed.), Caste and Kin in Nepal, India and Ceylon (London, Asia Publishing House, 1966), pp. 68139.Google Scholar
Thapa, N. B., A Short History of Nepal (Kathmandu, Ratna Pustak Bhandar).Google Scholar
Wright, D., History of Nepal (Calcutta, Rajan Gupta, 1966).Google Scholar