Normal view MARC view ISBD view

The poison in the gift: ritual, prestation, and the dominant caste in a north indian village

By:

Raheja, Gloria Goodwin

Material type: Text

TextPublication details: London University of Chicago press 1988Description: xiv,286pISBN:

226707288(pbk.)

Subject(s):

DDC classification:

323.2 RAH

Summary: The Poison in the Gift is a detailed ethnography of gift-giving in a North Indian village that powerfully demonstrates a new theoretical interpretation of caste. Introducing the concept of ritual centrality, Raheja shows that the position of the dominant landholding caste in the village is grounded in a central-peripheral configuration of castes rather than a hierarchical ordering. She advances a view of caste as semiotically constituted of contextually shifting sets of meanings, rather than one overarching ideological feature. This new understanding undermines the controversial interpretation advanced by Louis Dumont in his 1966 book, Homo Hierarchicus, in which he proposed a disjunction between the ideology of hierarchy based on the “purity” of the Brahman priest and the “temporal power” of the dominant caste or the king.

Tags from this library: No tags from this library for this title. Log in to add tags.

Average rating: 0.0 (0 votes)

Holdings
Item type	Current library	Collection	Call number	Status	Date due	Barcode
Gratis Resources	Plaksha University Library	Social Science	323.2 RAH (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Available		G000527

Browsing Plaksha University Library shelves, Collection: Social Science Close shelf browser (Hides shelf browser)

Previous				No cover image available	No cover image available			Next
Previous	320.954 SIN Political process in contemporary India	320.954 SIN Constitutional government and democracy in India	322.420962 ANA Inside the muslim brotherhood : religion, identity, and politics	323.2 RAH The poison in the gift: ritual, prestation, and the dominant caste in a north indian village	323.34 GHA A wife for my son	323.44 LIP Freiheit die wir meinen	323.44509544 ROY The RTI Story : power to the people	Next

https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/P/bo3637608.html

The Poison in the Gift is a detailed ethnography of gift-giving in a North Indian village that powerfully demonstrates a new theoretical interpretation of caste. Introducing the concept of ritual centrality, Raheja shows that the position of the dominant landholding caste in the village is grounded in a central-peripheral configuration of castes rather than a hierarchical ordering. She advances a view of caste as semiotically constituted of contextually shifting sets of meanings, rather than one overarching ideological feature. This new understanding undermines the controversial interpretation advanced by Louis Dumont in his 1966 book, Homo Hierarchicus, in which he proposed a disjunction between the ideology of hierarchy based on the “purity” of the Brahman priest and the “temporal power” of the dominant caste or the king.

There are no comments on this title.

to post a comment.