Social Structure of the Village: Caste, Class and Gender
The intellectual and historical contexts in which social anthropologists worked largely guided the kinds of research questions they identified for their studies.
The tradition of studying tribal communities that emphasised a ‘holistic’ perspective also had its influence on the way village was visualised. Despite their primary preoccupation with kinship, religion and ritual life of the ‘little communities’, documenting their internal structures and village social life could not be completed without looking at the prevailing social differences. Theoretically also the emphasis on ‘unity’ did not mean absence of differences and social inequality. Neither did it mean that these questions were not important for social anthropology. Though not all of them began their work with a direct focus on understanding the structures of inequalities, almost every one of them offered detailed descriptions of the prevailing differences of caste, class and gender in the village social life. Being rich in empirical description, one can construct a picture of the social relations, which may not necessarily fit within the framework with which these studies were actually carried out.
i) The Caste System
Caste and hierarchy have long been seen as the distinctive and defining features of the Indian society. It was during the colonial period that caste was, for the first time, theorised in modern sociological language. The colonial administrators also gathered extensive ethnographic details and wrote detailed accounts of the way systems of caste distinctions and hierarchies worked in different parts of the sub-continent. Social anthropology in the post independence India continued with a similar approach that saw caste as the most important and distinctive feature of Indian society. While caste was a concrete structure that guided social relationships in the Indian village, hierarchy was its ideology.
An individual in caste society lived in a hierarchical world. Not only were the people divided into higher or lower groups, their food, their dresses, ornaments, customs and manners were all ranked in an order of hierarchy. Anthropologist invariably invoked the varna system of hierarchy which divided the Hindu society into five major categories. The first three, viz., Brahmins (the priests or men of learning), Kshatriyas (rulers and warriors) and Vaishyas (traders) were regarded as dvijas or the twice born. The fourth category was that of Shudras, composed of numerous occupational castes that were regarded as relatively ‘clean’ and were not classed as “untouchables”. In the fifth major category were placed all the “untouchable” castes. Hindus all over India, according to Dube, accepted this classification.
The legitimate occupations to be followed by people in these major categories (varnas) were defined by tradition. Within each category there were several sub-groups (jati or castes), which could be arranged in a hierarchical order within them. In this general framework of the varna system, with considerable variations in different regions there were several socially autonomous castes, each fitting into one of the five major divisions but otherwise being practically independent in their socio-religious sphere of life (Dube 1955: 35-36). Though the essence of caste lay in ‘the arrangement of hereditary groups in a hierarchy’, the popular impression derived from the idea of varna that arranged groups in an order with Brahmins at the top and Harijans at the bottom was right only partly. The empirical studies pointed out that ‘in fact only the two opposite ends of the hierarchy were relatively fixed; in between, and especially in the middle region, there was considerable room for debate regarding mutual position’ (Srinivas, 1994:5).
Caste divisions determined and decided all social relations. Most scholars saw caste as a closed system where ‘entry into a social status was a function of heredity and individual achievement, personal quality or wealth had according to the strict traditional prescription, no say in determining the social status’ (Majumdar, 1958:19). However, there were some who admitted that the way caste operated at the local level was ‘radically different from that expressed in the varna scheme. Mutual rank was uncertain and this stemmed from the fact that mobility was possible in caste’ (Srinivas, 1976:175). Dube identified six factors that contributed towards the status differentiation in the village community of Shamirpet: religion and caste; landownership; wealth; position in government service and village organisation; age; and distinctive personality traits (Dube, 1955:161). Attempts to claim a higher ritual status through, what Srinivas called sanskritisation, was not a simple process. It could not be achieved only through rituals and life-style imitation. The group had to also negotiate it at the local power structure. Similarly, stressing secular factors, Dube pointed to the manner in which the caste panchayat of the lower or the menial castes worked as unions to secure their employment and strengthen their bargaining power vis-à-vis the land owning dominant castes. However, a large majority of them viewed caste system as working within the framework of jajmani system and bound together different castes living in the village or a cluster of villages in enduring and pervasive relationships.
ii) Land and Class
As is evident from the above discussion, the social anthropologists studying India during the fifties and sixties generally worked in the framework of caste. The manner in which social science disciplines developed in India, class and land came to be seen as the concerns of economists. However, since anthropologists advocated a perspective that studied “small communities” in holistic terms, agriculture and the social relations of production on land also found a place in the village monographs. While some of them directly focused on economic life as one of the central research questions, most saw it as an aspect of the caste and occupational structure of the village. Land relations to them reflected the same patterns of hierarchy as those present in the caste system. ‘There was a certain amount of overlap between the twin hierarchies of caste and land. The richer landowners generally came from such high castes as Brahmins, and Lingayats while the Harijans contributed a substantial number of landless labourers. In contrast to the wealthier household, the poor one was almost invisible (Srinivas, 1976:169). Some others underlined the primacy of land over all other factors in determining social hierarchy in the village. Comparing a Brahmin dominated village with a Jat dominated village, Lewis argued that ‘While the landowners are generally of higher caste in Indian villages, it is their position as landowners, rather than caste membership per se, which gives them status and power’ (Lewis, 1958:81). However, despite such references to the crucial significance of land ownership in village social life, village studies did not explore the details of agrarian social structures in different regions of the country. Caste, family, kinship and religion remained their primary focus.
iii) Gender Differences
It is rather interesting to note that although ‘gender’ as a conceptual category had not yet been introduced in the social sciences when the social anthropologists were doing their field studies during 1950s and 1960s, village studies were not completely “gender blind”. Since the concept of gender and the accompanying theoretical issues had yet to be articulated, the social anthropologists did not look at man-woman relations in the manner in which it was to be conceptualised and studied later. Still, many of the village monographs provide detailed accounts of the patterns of social relations between men and women in the rural society of India. Some of these monographs even have separate chapters devoted to the subject. In the absence of a critical theoretical perspective, the village studies constructed gender and patriarchy as a ‘natural social order’.
Further, accounts of man-woman relations provided in these studies were largely based on the data collected from male informants. Most of the anthropologists themselves being males, it would have been difficult for them to be able to meet and participate in the “private” life of the village people. Some of them were quite aware of this lacuna in their fieldwork and have written about it in their reflections on their fieldwork experience. Most village studies looked at gender relations within the framework of the household, and participation of women in work. These studies highlighted the division of labour within the family and the overall dominance that men enjoyed in the public sphere. Women, particularly among the upper castes, were confined within the four walls of the house. ‘The social world of the woman was synonymous with the household and kinship group while the men inhabited a more heterogeneous world’ (Srinivas, 1976:137). Compared to men in the Central Indian village studied by Mayer ‘women had less chance to meet people from other parts of the village. The village well provided a meeting place for all women of non-Harijan castes, and the opportunity for gossip. But there was a limit to the time that busy women could stand and talk while they drew their water and afterwards they must return home, where the occasions for talking to people outside their own household were limited to meeting with other women of the street’ (Mayer, 1960:136). In the Telangana village also, Dube observed that women were secluded from the activities of the public space. ‘It was considered a mark of respectability in women if they walked with their eyes downcast’ (Dube, 1955:18). The rules of patriarchy were clearly laid out. After caste, gender was the most important factor that governed the division of labour in the village. Masculine and feminine pursuits were clearly distinguished (Dube, 1955:169).
Writing on similar lines about his village in the same region, Srinivas pointed out that the two sets of occupations were not only separated but also seen as unequal. ‘It was the man who exercised control over the domestic economy. He made the annual grain-payments at harvest to the members of the artisan and servicing castes who had worked for him during the year. The dominant ‘male view’ thought of women as being ‘incapable of understanding what went on outside the domestic wall’ (Srinivas, 1976:140-1).
Men also had a near complete control over women’s sexuality. In the monogamous family, popular among most groups in India, ‘a man could play around but not so a woman. A man’s sense of private property in his wife’s genital organs was as profound as in his ancestral land. And just as, traditionally, a wife lacked any right to land she lacked an exclusive right to her husband’s sexual prowess. Polygyny and concubinage were both evidence of her lack of such rights. Men and women were separate and unequal (ibid, 155). Patriarchy and male dominance were legitimate norms. ‘According to the traditional norms of the society a husband is expected to be an authoritative figure whose will should always dominate the domestic scene. As the head of the household he should demand respect and obedience from his wife and children. The wife should regard him as her ‘master’ and should ‘serve him faithfully’ (Dube, 1955:141).