Over a period of twenty years the Dalit movement has had significant repercussions on Indian social behavior, particularly within the more educated and cosmopolitan groups in urban areas. Dalit has now replaced the uncomfortable label, untouchable, and their cause has been acknowledged politically as a national issue. But has the political movement of the Dalits actually succeeded in eradicating untouchability? Is Dalit now an anthropological category synonymous with untouchable. In this book Rosa Maria Perez presents field work done on the Vankar, a caste of untouchable weavers in Gujarat. The ethnographic data, collected over two visits spanning over four years, has led her to a re-evaluation of the traditional approach that focused on the singularity and also the rigidity of caste in Indian society. Louis Dumont’s Homo Hierarchicus has had a significant impact on anthropological theory. Rosa Perez confronts this Western perception of untouchability with the notion of reversibility, and a fresh translation of social norms.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Bijayananda Kar
Professor Bijayananda Kar (b. 1940) was educated at the Ravenshaw Colegiate School, the Ravenshaw College (both at Cuttack), and Universities of Utkal and Bihar. He visited U.K. (1978) as a British Council Fellow, Greece (1987) as a Fellow under cultural Exchange Programme, Thailand (1992 and 1995) as a Visiting Professor, U.S.A. (1995, 1966 and 1999) as participant in the International Congress on Vedanta, Republic of Trinidad, Tobago (1999), and Bangladesh (1999) in connection with participation in International Seminar / Colloquim. He has been the regular member of the Indian Philosophical Congress, Indian Philosophical Association and All Orissa Philosophy Association. He has chaired, participated in number of national and international Seminars / Conference / Colloquim both in India and abroad. He has to his credit about a dozen of philosophical books (both in English and Oriya) and around 150 philosophical papers published both in national and international sources. His major interest has been to explore the analytic trend in Indian philosophy and also to expose the humanistic value in the Indian Philosophical tradition.
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