The Untouchables¿ Rejection of Hinduism and its Relation to Racial Ideologies

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Essay from the year 2013 in the subject Asian studies, grade: 1, 0, University of Göttingen (Centre for Modern Indian Studies), course: Untouchability and religious identity in modern India, language: English, abstract: This paper will deal with the concept of race as configured by low caste movements in India and social reformers seeking to abolish Untouchability and to improve the status of lower castes by way of opposing Brahmin hegemony. It will be shown that the formulation of a distinct racial identity often goes hand in hand with the rejection of Hinduism, the religion the discriminatory caste system originated from. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries there have been many different strategies by means of which the Untouchables have tried to escape their subjugated position within the discriminatory Hindu social order. Along inevitably came the need for the formulation of a separate identity that, obviously, did not emphasise their supposed ritual impurity or their long history of oppression, but rather a prestigious heritage and equality, if not superiority not only in a moral, but cultural and even biological sense. In line with the nationalist movements of the late 19th and early 20th centuries that drew much of their inspiration from Orientalist knowledge and colonial ethnographic theories regarding the racial origins of Indian society, another factor may have contributed to the Untouchables' rejection of Hindu orthodoxy: That of a racialised thinking and pronounced, separate ethnic identity. Thus, in what ways is the Untouchables' rejection of Hinduism related to racial ideologies?