Social Sciences and the Law

What is a caste?

Link to this answer

CloseClose

Link to this answer

Share this credible answer with others. Simply paste this code into your blog or Web page:

<a href="http://qanda.encyclopedia.com/question/caste-83299.html" >What is a caste?</a>
E-mail this answer Link to this answer

... caste [Port., casta =basket], ranked groups based on heredity within rigid systems of social stratification, especially those that constitute Hindu India. Some scholars, in fact, deny that true caste systems are found outside India.

Answer verified with
Get more facts and information about caste . Or, view the full encyclopedia entry from The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition.

Similar questions: What is the social system of Hindu India? What is a ranked groups based on heredity? What is the social structure of Hindu India? [ Hide these questions ]

Related research questions

Related research articles

Caste, class, and community in India: an ethnographic approach.
Magazine article from: Ethnology ...and material aspects of caste and class, this article...federation of potter castes or as simply a bloc of...help to understand how caste and class get constructed...3) that it explains caste in idealist ways as a...pollution, along which all castes in India can purportedly...
Caste in question: identity or hierarchy?(Book review)
Magazine article from: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute ...claims that the terms 'low caste' or 'middle caste' have little or no meaning (p. xiii). Most castes, even those traditionally...the assertion that each caste has its own identity yet still places castes in hierarchical relationships...
Caste, Class and Family Structure in West Bengal Villages.(Statistical Data...
Magazine article from: Journal of Comparative Family Studies ...among nonagricultural castes regardless of their position in the caste hierarchy. In explaining...relationship between caste and family structure...hypothesis that landed castes are more likely to...family than landless castes in her survey of...association between caste status and ...
Caste aside. (social relations in India) (Asia)
Magazine article from: The Economist (US) ...being further divided by caste. Traditional Hindu society had four broad castes. They were, in descending...was split into hundreds of castes more narrowly defined, and each narrow caste into dozens of sub-castes. People married and mixed...
Caste in stone.
Magazine article from: Harvard International Review ...against the lower castes continues unabated...policies have made caste identities more salient...against the lower castes continues unabated...policies have made caste identities more salient...stratification by caste. Though advances...representation of the lower castes, in many ...
See all results at HighBeam

HighBeam gives you access to newspaper, magazine, and trade journal articles plus press releases, facts, information, and biographies from thousands of sources.