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Uma Chakravarti, Gendering Caste Through A Feminist Lens

Uma Chakravarti argues that caste is best understood as a system of graded inequality rather than merely economic exploitation. She analyzes how caste ideologies provide a basis for cultural oppression, especially of Dalit women. Caste hierarchies exist along with class hierarchies, with ritual purity and economic status determining social power. Chakravarti also examines how caste manifests in cultural codes like marriage and reproduction, governing these spheres even with new technologies. She contributes to understanding how caste intersects with patriarchy in complex and often indistinguishable ways, with women's lives located at these intersections and subject to various forms of subordination and limited power.

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529 views

Uma Chakravarti, Gendering Caste Through A Feminist Lens

Uma Chakravarti argues that caste is best understood as a system of graded inequality rather than merely economic exploitation. She analyzes how caste ideologies provide a basis for cultural oppression, especially of Dalit women. Caste hierarchies exist along with class hierarchies, with ritual purity and economic status determining social power. Chakravarti also examines how caste manifests in cultural codes like marriage and reproduction, governing these spheres even with new technologies. She contributes to understanding how caste intersects with patriarchy in complex and often indistinguishable ways, with women's lives located at these intersections and subject to various forms of subordination and limited power.

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Psycho Scorpion
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Uma Chakravarti,Gendering caste through a Feminist

lens

Historian Uma

Chakravarti argues that this definition is popular because it is convenient for the upper
castes as it erases their own location within the hierarchy structure (Chakravarti, 2003). Ambedkar’s
formulation of caste system is system of ‘graded inequality’ in which castes are arranged according
to as ascending scale of reverence and descending scale of contempt. This definition by Ambedkar
provide an analysis of the power hierarchies version the ideology of caste system. This definition as
‘graded inequality’ also helps to understand how caste ideologies provide a base for the cultural
oppressions in the lives of men and women, especially Dalit women. Caste in that sense is very far
from a mere economic exploitation. Gail Omvedt talks about caste as a material reality with a
material base (Chakraborty,2003, p.12). Inequality based on assumed ritual purity and economic
Inequality both exist together to perpetuate the caste system. To understand the relationship
between caste and class, it is important to recognize the two hierarchies which are operative in
Indian context, one based upon the ritual purity with the Brahmana on top and the other based
upon the political and economic status with the landlord at the top. Post independent India has also
witnessed the emergence of caste organizations, new forms of assertions (e.g. Dalit Panther
Movement) and the emergence of feminist collectives (autonomous women’s movement). The
intersections of gender and caste which Periyar and Ambedkar had addressed in their work did not
get adequate attention during this period of new forms of gender and caste assertions. Dalit
women’s engagement with feminism in the 1990’s and academic engagement with feminist scholars
like Uma Chakravarty and Sharmila Rege brought these intersections of gender and caste back into
the discourse. To quote Chakravarti (2003), If we look at women today their lives are located at the
intersection of class, caste and patriarchy/ies. These structures can wor all work to oppress them, as
in the case of dalit women, but most other women are located in a way that they can be both
subordinated and also wield a degree of power. This is so especially if women belong to an upper
caste and have access, through their menfolk, to economic resources and social power (p. 144). It
has much wider reference to the relationship between caste and patriarchy, as well as women’s
material location in a complex structure which expects compliance from women and also grants
them some degree of power. Uma Chakravarti (2003) argues that the manifestations of upholding/
enforcing cultural codes is visible in arenas of marriage and reproduction. For instance, if you look at
the Matrimonial Columns, we can analyse how the institution of marriage is still governed by caste.
If you recall the units on ‘Reproductive Technology’ and ‘Surrogacy’ in MWG 004, you will be able to
analyse the inter-linkages between caste and reproduction and can see how caste and race are
governing the sphere of reproduction even with the help of reproductive technologies.

“Women, key players in the process of socialisation……………………………the task of safeguarding food,


averting danger and in a broad sense, attending to the grammatical rules which govern the relational
idiom of food falls upon women. The concerns of purity and pollution centering on food begin at
home” (c.f. Chakravarti, 2003, p. 147). Women those who conform to Ambedkar (1990) has
commented “the real remedy for breaking caste is inter-marriage Nothing else will serve as the
solvent for caste” (c.f. Chakravarti, 2003, pp. 145-146). Thus, the problem of the bounded nature of
the circulation of women is explicitly tied to the formation of caste (Chakravarti 2003).
Conclusion:
The study by Uma Chakravarti contributes significantly to the understanding of caste as it
exists at a fundamental level as a system of hierarchy along with other hierarchical systems
such as patriarchy and often, one is indistinguishable from the other.

Date: 03/04/2018
Subject: B.A.(H) Sociology(Subsidiary)
By: Chaitanya Rawat, B.A.(H) Political Science Semester IV
To: Dr. Saumya , Dept. of Sociology

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