Caste Dynamics In Village India

Caste Dynamics in Village India is a welcome addition to the literature on sociology of caste in India. It examines some of the classical characteristics of caste-commensality, endogamy, occupation, and so forth-in the context of rapid changes that are taking place in Andhra Society. The accent on change adds significantly to the worth of this study. The discussion of chan ging bases of social status, of caste organization and occupa tional mobility, and of the impact of democratization and modernization is especially to be commended.

In this book Dr. C. Lakshmanna has supplemented the earlier accounts of caste in the Andhra region and in doing so he has adopted a research strategy different from those of his predecessors. My Indian Village, written in the tradition of community studies, was focused on the village and examined the working of caste in the setting of this village. Dr. N. S. Reddy described the caste system in relation to the Mala and the Madiga-two Harijan castes he set out to study. Dr. Laksh manna, on the contrary, has attempted a macro-sociological study of the entire caste system in eleven districts of Andhra Pradesh. He has excluded, for practical reasons, the Telangana region from his study and has intensively studied a sample of one thousand persons. This procedure has enabled him to take note of regional variations and to present a remarkably lucid picture of how the system works.