I think I found this after reading an email sent out on the ASATA listserv; it asked for participants for a survey on caste and Sikhism. Since I’m interested in both, I decided to take a quick look. The first notes wafted tentatively through my iBook’s wee speakers and I smiled: Van Halen. I knew exactly what kind of video this would be. We used to make ones just like it for JSA‘s Fall and Spring “State”, usually to open the conference. Well, it was either that or we’d blare Public Enemy‘s “Fight the Power“…
After watching it, I was moved, because I felt like so much of it was applicable to all of us, not just Sikhs. Someone Malayalee needs to make one of these, stat, I muttered…and then I realized that they didn’t. Maybe they should just watch this, I thought and that’s when I knew it belonged here, in a space where it would get the attention it rightly deserves.
Ravidasia // Khatri // Jatt // Tarkhan…The labels that divide us are endless. Caste, gender, class, and power tear apart our Qaum, our Gurdwaras, and our Pariwars. How do we overcome? How do we forge unity without silencing voices? [Jakara]
My closest friend in college was a Sikh girl from Fremont, who happened to be Tarkhan. My boyfriend from Freshman through Junior year was Jatt. So were all of his friends. They made fun of her when she wasn’t around and ignored her when she was. This baffled coconut-flavored me. “Why are you so mean to her?” I’d ask him, over and over. “She’s nice.”
“Because she’s…Tarkhan. They’re lower class. And so backwards– didn’t you say her parents tried to get her married when she was 17, that they didn’t even want to send her to college? Who the hell does that?”
“That’s not her fault, why are you taking it out on her?”
“Look, it’s a Sikh thing…it’s probably difficult to understand. Don’t you have a sorority thing to go to?”
::
I’m amazed at how often caste shows up on our comment threads, among second gen kids who should know better. Then I am humbled as I remember that I’m complicit in this too, when I tease my best friend about doing TamBrahm stuff or when I embroider stories from bygone UC Davis days with an extra adjective which probably isn’t necessary:
“Well a lot of students were from the Central Valley or Yuba City…so a good number of the desis I befriended were Jatt Sikh.”
It’s so insidious, the way this need to inform others of where we are in some dated hierarchy persists. Right now, we need to ask ourselves…why?
A question for Sikhs out there: at a small Gurdwara I used to go to when I was living in another part of the country, they used to give Prasad to the Amritdhari (initiated) Sikhs before the rest of the Sangat. The Prasad was also, as I understand it, prepared separately from the Prasad given to everyone else.
It always felt a little strange to me — a kind of caste ritual that I hadn’t seen anywhere else, and that made no sense to me. In other ways, the Gurdwara was very strict and conservative (no new-fangled rituals, and the majority of the sangat were Kesh-dhari Sikhs from Punjab).
Anyone have an explanation for this?
[BTW, I have now had my fix of Van Halen for the day!]
The first time I became aware of my caste was when I reached around 21 and my parents knowing that I wasn’t going to med school, felt that the only legitimate thing for me to do was to get married. So for me, when marriage was discussed that’s when caste came up – my parents hope that they would find a good boy of our caste; When I talked to my South Asian friends, they also told me that’s when caste came up for them. So it’s odd for me to hear such things as caste groupings in My Space.
I realized then, that judging from the last names of my parents’ contingent of friends, that we have a very diverse caste-background social group, so I’d never felt the sting of caste exclusivity.
And then I did some research on my caste, and found to my surprise that it was more than likely considered Sudra, or even untouchable or converts from buddhism. So I found all of this interesting b/c I started looking at my family’s socioeconmic background and their Malyalee friend’s socioeconomic background in Kerala…I didn’t see a correlation between wealth and caste – whether someone was Nair, Brahmin, or Thiyaan.
Then I started realizing who this Guru was that my family had statues and pictures of in our house….this Guru who had temples in Kerela named after him. Sree Narayana Guru in Kerala at the turn of the century (he was originally thiyaan caste) started a movement to open up all the temples to every caste. What a remarkable, holy man.
From what I can tell when I visit Kerala, (and I know that so much probably goes over my head,) but Kerala has made great strides in overcoming caste discrimination.
(sorry for spelling mistakes; I just write quickly and can’t be bothered to go back and change mistakes)
I come from a hindu Brahmin family, my grandparents never really mentioned it, nor did my father. It was my mother who took great pride in the caste we had. It matters a lot to many of my family, who use it to put down many others in the community. “we are Brahmins, we are closest to godâ€. And when parents tell their kids that they can only get married to someone of their own caste, and then children would inherit that same mentality.
A aunt and uncle came to our house to give a wedding invite for their daughters wedding. When they were describing the boy, the first thing they would mention is that he is a Brahmin boy.
These people find it more important to have huge mandirs in their home showing how religious they are instead of being people who serve other people. Madness.
It was completely irrelevant during my school/college times in Mumbai. Except when it got in the way of me and my friends trying to get into a very limited number of seats available at premier B-Schools, that were further limited becasue of the SC/ST and OBC quotas. But none of us took a flame thrower to…anywhere. Caste will increasingly fade, just like the much vaunted Indian “culture”, in the face of economic growth and opportunity. To resurrect later, into newer, better forms.
I am ‘mixed caste’ by the way, folks.
I grew up knowing clearly that I’m a Jat Sikh. It was in all the songs played at weddings and parties, and my parents made sure we “knew who we were.” They also talked about family friends and made references to their castes–basically stereotypes like, “Tharkans are very good with business matters.” Not that different from racial stereotypes in the U.S.
Recently, I decided to do a bit of research on the matter for myself and discovered some interesting bits of info. The Mudfort of Kuchesar was a Jat ruled fort centuries ago. I wondered what that Jat clan might have to do with the Jats in Sikhism and whether the clan preceded Sikhism. In other words, were there Jats before Sikhs? If that’s the case, then Jats are actually a clan, rather than a caste. If you check the Wikipedia reference to Jats, it states that there are Muslim Jats and Hindu Jats as well as Sikh Jats. In fact, Sikhs have the lowest number of Jats at 20 percent, with Hindus having the highest at 47 percent. Funny. I always thought I was Sikh first and Jat second.
Very Shakespearean, however, this clan against clan business. Reaches way back into antiquity and works itself into casteism and nationalism. A lot of carnage based on religion actually is carnage within the family.
Wow!!! Are you guys living on another planet??? What about all the caste discrimination that goes on India? The violence, the murders, the rapes??? Or maybe everyone here is from a high caste and that’s why thinks that we’re living in a rosy paradise.
Sorry for that rant – but it is the end of the semester and I am tired of grading papers.
*a group of highly educated Sikh writers, journalists etc.
Please address the person who’s apparently irked you. What’s this “you guys and everyone” business?
Apologies JOAT – and everyone else – was probably annoyed with my students and took it out on this blog.
It’s just so sad reading these comments about their experiences with caste — it can be such an evil.
Aniruddha – I said I was from a lower caste, but Kerala’s history and social justice movements and advances in education seem to have helped a lot in ameliorating caste discrimination and prejudice.
razib writes: >>it makes sense that the 1st gen of brownz would keep up with the old habits, but the perpetuation in gen-2 is really, really, something that i think is basically a cultural maladaptation
Cultural maladaptation and intellectual bankruptcy.
M. Nam
Shodan,
Bhappes is supposed to refer to “Khatri” Sikhs who came from West Punjab after the partition, I think now though its used for any Sikh that isnt Jatt. I think it supposed to mean both, city slicker and the caste/community/whatever. Bhappe is supposed to be a negative connotation, It is the reason alot of Sikhs are angry at Bollywood because when they do have Sikh characters they will use the “bhappa” stereotype.
Funny, I didnt know that Sikhs have caste until I came to US, when I was 15. My second day at a new high school, this kid started to talking to me in Punjabi and asked where and what “kind” of sikh I am? He is a labana and I am apparently a pappa cuz i am grew up in a city instead of a pind. I still dont know how these actually work…
Aniruddha:
I’m not naive about what caste distinctions have meant over the centuries. Nevertheless, torture from accidentally hearing prayers, or not being able to drink water at someone’s house are fairly rare in the urban, middle-class milieu. On the other hand, what you eat at home, the particular vocabulary you use (at least in Tamil) can be significant identifiers of caste. And it seems to me that these are the sort of things that tend not to go away, in spite of urbanization, modernization, etc.
I think caste is very much learned — at least for those us born here State-side. I didn’t even know about the whole caste thing until I made desi friends. Neither my family or hubby’s family ever brought up the word.
I am always shocked when I hear discussions about caste from highly educated desi friends. I want to scream “Who the f*ck cares?????”
I am with Sonia. My kids will never be taught to have pre-conceived notions about a person based on caste/race/sexuality/socioeconomic status etc.
Easy! Jatt vs. Everyone else
:p I’m kidding…though I’m kinda not.
I’ve done a lot reading on the Sikh religion and I just find it such a travesty how caste has infiltrated that religion as well; really makes me sad at the state of things now as compared with Sikhism’s orgins.
it definitely depends on the temple. we’ve been to quite a few temples in india, and i think we only had problems at 2 of them. my mom, my (white) gramdmother, and i weren’t let into one because we were too white (but my brother was allowed), and another one wanted my mom to sign a statement saying she believed in hinduism.
honestly, i think it probably would, although maybe less so. color has never seemed to be an issue in my family, we’re pretty dark as it is. it’s more the shame of my dad and uncles marrying outside the race/caste system. i made the mistake of of asking my grandmother, when her brother was looking for a bride for his son, why the girl had to be iyengar. that set her off on a rant (in tamil, which i don’t speak) about how if her kids had stayed in india they would have married iyengars and she wouldn’t have all the problems she has now.
Regarding the statement below:
A question for Sikhs out there: at a small Gurdwara I used to go to when I was living in another part of the country, they used to give Prasad to the Amritdhari (initiated) Sikhs before the rest of the Sangat. The Prasad was also, as I understand it, prepared separately from the Prasad given to everyone else.
When a Sikh becomes baptized, it is common for them to be told to refrain from consuming food that has been touched by a non-amritdhari (non-baptised). For instance, you are not to drink from the same glass, share a meal, etc. I don’t know how that started. I doubt it has roots in actual Sikh teachings. Also, some gurudwaras really prioritize encouraging the congregation to get baptised. This may have been such a gurudwara.
Sometimes who is conducting the amrit ceremony makes a difference. One bhai jee may have different rules or priorities he stresses to those who get baptized.
And, as a side note, since so many here brought up that Sikhism is so progressive, has any one struggled with the fact that almost all of the Sikh gurus were of the Khatri caste ( I think it is 8 or 9 out of 10)?
From what I understand there are rules at some of the larger temples in India and quite a bit of the rules are ‘made up based on who it applies to’
Some temples have dress codes too, for what it’s worth. My cousin and I were both not allowed into a famous temple in Kerala because we were “inappropriately attired.”
My parents never brought up caste…it was ME who asked them what caste we were, probably in 2nd or 3rd grade, because that’s when I learned in school (in New Jersey) that India has a caste system. I remember being very happy to learn that we were from a ‘warrior’ caste. In my extended family, there are relatives who don’t care at all (in fact there’ve been quite a few mixed-marriages) as well as others who seem quite wrapped up in the whole thing. I myself went through a phase in high school where I got really proud, and was determined to only marry a girl from my own caste one day…that phase was over by college. Among my friends (mostly 2nd gen), opinions seem to differ. One of my friends came back from vacation in India recently, and this is what he said…”I think the whole caste-system is going down the tubes…people in my caste are marrying whoever they feel like. It’s such a shame….people have preserved these genes for hundreds of years.”
Thanks to everyone for the info about going to temples. I think I am going to try it out. :0)
All were khatri. I don’t think that in any way impacts on the progressiveness.
….people have preserved these genes for hundreds of years.”
What a statement! Maybe some scholars on this blog can support this, but my understanding was that caste was actually a lot more fluid in the past and plenty of mixing going on.
. It’s such a shame….people have preserved these genes for hundreds of years.
oh, boo. you know what you should tell him? it is a zero sum world, he can keep the inbreeding coefficient up by hittin’ it with his sis. hot dog! she so pure!
I don’t think anyone sets out saying, “Ok son, this here is the caste heirarchy… on the top there are…X’s, on the bottom there are Y’s, on the…” These sort of things are taught in a very implied and subtextual manner. Additionally, I still see caste in the states as mostly a compatibility characteristic rather than a superior/inferior demarcation. Because in the states, there’s no infrastructure or institutional girth to execute caste discrimination in any real way.
Thanks very much for your informative comments, DCP Kunal Singh. I do find it interesting that with Sikhs, the caste values seem to have become inverted…that is, the caste associated with agricultural work/working class life/rural life is elevated over the educated city-slicker. Am I misinterpreting things?
Did you see Gaddar? Would the hero have been ‘bhappa’ or Jatt? He was a truck driver, I think.
All were khatri. I don’t think that in any way impacts on the progressiveness.
Why do you think so? Don’t you think this sends a message to the followers that one group is more superior than the other? And, I’m not trying to start anything. Just interested in how people feel about this.
Maybe some scholars on this blog can support this, but my understanding was that caste was actually a lot more fluid in the past and plenty of mixing going on.
there are correlations between castes and genes. that is, there is a correspondence between ancestry and caste identity. but, it is imperfect, and there seems to have been a fair amount of intermarriage. remember, on the scale of thousands of years a 1% proportion of outmarriage can be genetically extremely significant. specifically, the practice of hypergamy, low status women marrying into higher status lineages (which is cross-cultural, not a brown thang) has left a definite impact on higher castes (whose female descent lines are far more similar to lower castes than their male descent lines).
LOL..wouldnt there be ret**ds, sorry, mentally impaired offsprings after a while?
wouldnt there be ret**ds, sorry, mentally impaired offsprings after a while?
inbreeding depression would kick in immediately. in fact, hittin’ it with the pure sis would increase miscarriage probability A LOT. one must make sacrifices to keep the cross-eyed blood pure!
It’s so insidious, the way this need to inform others of where we are in some dated hierarchy persists. Right now, we need to ask ourselves … why?
Identity and comfort have a lot to do with it. What was once a dated hierarchy is now an identity unto itself, regardless of position on the proverbial rung. In the East, much less India, caste and sects have a lot more to do with cultural leanings, rituals and habits (more so than in the US, or the west in general). Also, I’m proud to be TamBrahm, not because of misbegotten notions like “we are Brahmins, we are closest to god,” I’m more educated than non-Brahmins or keeper of the religious texts, but because that – Sanskritized Tamil, Vedic texts, 9 yard saris, etc. – is what I culturally know best, enjoy learning and offers me the most solace in times of need. It didn’t stop me from being an avid carnivore and marrying a Lutheran midwestern farmer’s son.
For others, it has a lot to do with identity, comfort and making mummy, daddy, aunty, uncle happy.
As for those who think caste is evil, perhaps talking about it may put millenia of misperception and wrongdoing aside. Hindu castes were not set up as birthrights – they were merely job groups that every society needs. That it became a stupid hierarchical thing is sad, sad, sad, but society still needs the working class, businesspeople, warriors and thinkers, meaning a society cannot work on just one vocation or economic group. This is what India has reattained in the 20th and 21st centuries, for the most part, but the identities and tangible cultural habits persist.
People who go to extremes to maintain their caste as sole identity are merely insecure and ripe for self-examination. Then again, I will fight against a possible cultural extermination of my beliefs and culture as they have the right to exist as any other way of life does.
In the end, how different is all this from the Boston Brahmins, in whose home of bean and cod, the Lowells talk only to the Cabots and the Cabots talk only to God? Or from New Orleans Creoles (don’t call them “black”) won’t let their own mixed children marry anyone darker than themselves?
First of all, Anna, nice post, and more power to you and the Jakara folks, and props to all the commentators. This is a great discussion.
Now I put on my amateur anthro-socio hat. I think, to understand why caste and caste consciousness (even discrimination) persists, one needs to understand why it arises in the first place. My view is, it arises to insure against complete reproductive failure at an individual level. In much the same way that cliques arise to prevent complete social failure, that tribes arise to prevent complete biological-economic failure, or that gangs arise to prevent, well, total physical failure.
A form of socio-biological organization being necessary, a tradeoff is worked out – reduce individual mate choice from the most fit (tallest, prettiest, richest, etc) by restricting them to mate from within the pool, and reducing the risk from the least fit (short, fat, ‘ugly’ etc) that they will never reproduce. And thus a form of endogamy arises – biological caste.
But, since this will eventually decrease genetic variety, and inbreeding and related genetic disorders will propagate etc, some rules are worked out, under some systems, for selective exogamy. One way is by introducing a hierarchy of castes. Hierarchy within castes can also arise to ensure success in socio-economic competition (not just prevent failure) – and castes will form alliances to put down others (‘Brahmins’ and ‘Rajputs’ vs ‘the Others’, for example).
Since religion arises for other reasons – caste systems can survive wholesale within new religious systems, as long as the fundamental socio-economic rules (inter-generational capital transfer – mainly inheritance) don’t change. For this same reason, castes can survive large scale ethnic group migration. New castes, can, however, form when there are new, persisting, changes in socio-economic circumstances. In India, for example, the IT workers may well come to constitute a new caste.
Caste groupings that are the most successful in achieving success along the greatest number of dimensions will persist the longest. Others will morph, be subsumed, will reorganize, or just die out. Those that last long also generate cultural capital – music, cuisine, philosophy, literature, religious-ideology supporting the system etc, so that then becomes another reason they will persist.
So caste (‘endogamous groupings supported by cultural, financial, social and ideological capital’) will tend to indefinitely survive, in some form, as long as fundamental biological and socio-economic rules don’t change. Immigration changes some things, but the fundamentals of living – biological and socio-economic are mostly the same. When these are different, for example, when they change the balance between the chance for an individual to succeed by himself/herself versus succeeding only as a member of a group – then immigration can reduce or increase the form and rate of caste survival.
This doesn’t mean we don’t try to understand why caste happens and persists, try to ameliorate it’s worst depredations, or try to counteract the worst implications of its supporting ideologies.
So I once again salute Anna for the thought-provoking post, the commentators for the fine discussion, and the Jakara folks for what they are trying to do.
I am with Sonia. My kids will never be taught to have pre-conceived notions about a person based on caste/race/sexuality/socioeconomic status etc.
Yeah, but we’re going to teach our kids the important ways to discriminate. Like, my husband has already decided that no kid of ours will ever date a Packers fan! 😉
In the end, how different is all this from the Boston Brahmins, in whose home of bean and cod, the Lowells talk only to the Cabots and the Cabots talk only to God? Or from New Orleans Creoles (don’t call them “black”) won’t let their own mixed children marry anyone darker than themselves?
it isn’t different, and is equally pernicious. and pathetic.
A form of socio-biological organization being necessary, a tradeoff is worked out – reduce individual mate choice from the most fit (tallest, prettiest, richest, etc) by restricting them to mate from within the pool, and reducing the risk from the least fit (short, fat, ‘ugly’ etc) that they will never reproduce. And thus a form of endogamy arises – biological caste.
i don’t want to get too nerdy, but please note that biological group selection is far more problematic than culture group selection. more here.
“I don’t know where these children got all this nappy hair from.
It must be your father’s side of the family.
We are…”
“I know Mom, say it with me-Pura Castilian blood!“
Sheesh.
That’s ok, hema, because my yet non-existent kids will be disqualified from the will if they root for any team other than the Packers. You betcha! I envision a Montague-Capulet / Jets-Sharks scenario in the works already.
It just saddens and sickens me when people (and I have seen this in my own family) use it to put people other people down.
“We are Brahmins therefore we are honest doing god work, they are hindu jains, look at them all rich, they must have lied and been sly to earn their millionsâ€.
These same Brahmins would be willing to outcast their own sister for having a Punjabi boyfriend.
Thanks DCP Kunal Singh. Cool initials btw. Thanks for the laffs, Razib @ 77. See Preacher. Blasphemy + Inbreeding + Violence.
This doesn’t mean all Brahmins behave in such a fashion. Derogatory generalization of any sect is as stinky as general discrimination.
As my mom says, “if people invoke the label of Brahmin to put other people down, they aren’t really Brahmin.
amardeep
parshad, given as acceptance of the guru’s hukam, is traditionally given to the panj piaray, as symbolic of the khalsa, before it is distributed to the rest of the sangat. because in this day and age, there often is not a panj present everytime there is bhog, the custom is not practiced in many of our new-age gurdwaras, though that is the tradition that has been followed for centuries.
it is not traditionally separately prepared however. i hope that was just a wrong assumption and not actually practiced at the gurdwara you visited.
other than that, culture is a living force. while caste has grown to be a deeply ingrained aspect of south asian society, we can shape the immediate culture we are living in.
a while ago i was getting along swimmingly with a prospective biodata chap, when he suddenly began to hound me on my caste. i told him i don’t believe in belonging to a caste and don’t practice it and so i refused to divulge the information to him. it is my own personal way of killing off this relic from a system developed to divide, isolate, and denigrate.
not to mention that i really don’t understand why it matters if my ancestors farmed and lived in a village during the last few decades or if they farmed and lived in a village a few centuries past. ultimately we’re all the evolutionary grandkids of monkeys!
no kid of ours will ever date a Packers fan!
So you don’t worship at the church of Favre
It was the church of Lombardi (after whom the trophy was named ahem) long before Apostle Favre came along, although I’ve been meaning to have a word with young Brett lately.
I have to say that I can’t really relate to this thread. I had no idea what my caste was until I was in 9th grade and my social studies class was studying India. My dad mentioned our caste in passing one night, but I can honestly say that I haven’t thought about it much since then and always thought most ABCDs felt the same way about caste. I don’t even identify myself as having a caste because I am American and I can’t imagine anyone ever caring about my caste identity (only one person has asked me about it in my 26 years on earth, and I didn’t know the answer when I was asked) and I can’t imagine being friends with anyone who did care. Plus, the caste system is as un-American as it gets and I’ve always felt that being American was a huge part of my identity and that it was one that couldn’t coexist with a caste identity.
This post also reminded me of why I am sometimes reluctant to make friends with other Indians/Hindus/South Asians. I honestly can’t imagine saying anything about caste and wouldn’t know how to react if someone made remarks like the ones you all detailed here in my hearing. The saddest part of the immigrant experience is the loss of cultural identity and family ties, but it also leads to most exhilirating part of the immigrant experience- the chance to create something brand new and to have children that won’t be stifled by the rules and demands that were placed on our parents and grandparents. (Cue the violins :)……
i was the same way amitabh – i didn’t really pay too much attention to caste until i asked my parents. and i remember being vaguely pleased at our “level.” the next time it came up i was in college in a hindu philosophy class and a (white) classmate asked me what caste i was. i pointed to it on the page and he acted so shocked like “nooo waay really?” it was a weird thing to be awed by because it didn’t really have any relevance to my life.
Anyone been asked what their caste was by a non-South Asian – like a white American?
Anyone been asked what their caste was by a non-South Asian – like a white American?
Sure, many times. I find that most Americans are seriously misinformed about the caste system (or caste non-system), and I use the question as a way of satisfying their curiosity while also trying to demystify the whole thing. Of course, I try to make it clear that the system has no personal value for me…
…or maybe the whole thing is just my attempt to rationalize what cannot be properly rationalized.