Unfinished Dreams

The progress of civilizations in different parts of the world has taken a definite shape and some common forms of institutions are prevalent in different cultures at different places and times. Patriarchy is one such institution which has institutionalized in different parts of the world. India is also a patriarchal society. In patriarchal societies, the ‘public’ and ‘private’ spheres of women are demarcated and various boundaries are drawn and different appellations are done for this boundary in different cultures.  These boundaries have defined the limits to freedom of the female members of the society which is affecting the life chances in other dimensions of the life like health, opportunity, work, etc. The society has many norms and values which justifies the act of society in the name of the institution of patriarchy. The most powerful value among these values is the right to make decisions and through these decisions they shape the desires of people and especially female members. They think that they have right to control the female body.

The ‘power’ in just being a different sex has turned the social character of society. The social settings are seemed to be in equilibrium and these values or norms are mistakenly taken as the cause of the social equilibrium. So, there is another justification in the name of the functionality of social institutions. The voluminous titles on morality are available in the market and after reading some of the famous works I am confused that it is the morality of the society or the balancing act of the philosophers to reinforce the old values and justify it in the language and the tone of the elites. Many of the apologist philosophers have justified the imprisonment of the body and the soul of the women in the name of communization of wife and other theories. The role of the religions is even more glorious in this cause.

Man does not only control female’s sex but also rule. There are different theories on the origin of the institution of the patriarchy. Some of these theories are less convincing and some are more convincing. But the key for the emancipation of women does not lie in the antediluvian thesis. It is around and inside us. The concept of ‘modernity’ which promised people elysian journey towards rationality and the intelligentsia have celebrated the transition from ‘tradition’ to ‘modernity’. The superiority of matter over mind has given the notion of objectification in all the spheres of the society. The objectification of women has intensified with the intensification of capitalism.

The most progressive form of the capitalism called globalization, which changed the definitions of the political vocabulary like nation-state, citizenship etc., also has affected the status of w,omen in the society. Globalization has turned emotions into commodity. Now love is more easily accessible, available and exchangeable in the market. It is now more attractive and accepteable to most of the people. So, the new age religion of ‘consumerism’ has changed the diagram of women in the social picture. The inherent flaw in the so called concept of ‘enlightenment’ is now more easily visible and enumerated in the various discourses of life.

The ideological notion of female oppression is not understood by the masses because of having justification of the acts. The creation of ‘pink collar jobs’ and then justifying it in the name of the physical characteristics and social norms has taken the deep divide into a new paradigm. Sexual harassment is common. Also, the judges are not sometimes gender sensitive (pre-mathura cases). The traumatic experiences of female sex in their childhood in the form of sexual harassment and other discriminations is one of the main cause for low reporting rate of the crime against women. Even most of the reported cases of rape are against the people known to the victim which shows the hermunitical conclusion of family and neighbourhood as the most repressive organ of the society.

After the 16^th Dec incident in Delhi, every media houses, intelligentsia, legislators etc have called for gender sensitive education, inculcation of moral values, better policing, amendments in CPC for more severe punishments, police reforms ,special police force for women, empowerment of women. Some steps were taken but most of the structural changes were not taken and the improvement in the rate of crime against women is not seen.

The inculcation of value can be done through family, education and society and the inculcation of value is very necessary in lieu of the surge in the new forms of crime. But, the external environment has to be made more conducive for change. The problems of poverty and hunger, unemployment, corruption, rising middle class and new technologies have gender dimensions and the society has to be seen in the totality to find the solution of this problem. The concept of women empowerment has to be revisited to provide total empowerment and the vague notion of isolated economic empowerment and social empowerment has to be changed.

The short cut steps to pacify the protestors and the media will not help in solving the problem. The need of the hour is a gender sensitive state and having the clear goal of giving at least equality of opportunity to all the sexes. The reforms in every sector are necessary to curb the problems of gender discrimination viz. giving the subsidy in the name of the female head of the family. Every small step is going to bring a change in the psyche of the members of the society and a better future. The unfinished dream has to be completed very soon.

Changing Perspectives of Ethnography

The subject matter of anthropology has undergone many changes and so the research methods and evidence collection methods. Ethnography, which shows the way of life of the people, was first introduced into the social sciences by the anthropologists for the study of small-scale, pre- industrial societies. Malinowski is regarded as the one who brought ethnography in the realm of anthropology while studying Trobriandars. The initial debate in anthropology was related to the use of the methodologies and various questions were posed before the anthropologists like should anthropology use natural science methods or it is not science at all. In the intellectual tradition, there was division between ‘Nomothetic’ and ‘Ideographic’ disciplines on the line of Kantian division of knowledge. German intellectual tradition developed by Kant and Hegel out rightly rejected the polarisation of disciplines into two different blocks. Hegel says that all branches of knowledge developed out of the human consciousness. Therefore, one cannot make the distinction between natural and social sciences. Neo-kantian scholars like Windelband and Ricket indicate that there is a logical gap between ‘what it is’ and ‘what it ought to be’. So, when science studies ‘what it is’ then social sciences should study ‘what it ought to be’. Therefore, natural sciences are objective, factual ant they can go for qualitative analysis. This theory has a profound effect on postmodern anthropology. They further said that natural sciences are nomothetic discipline and social sciences are ideographic discipline. Hence, division of discipline can be done on the basis of theory, methods, and subject matters.

Radcliff Brown considers that comparative anthropology is a nomothetic discipline that is different from other social sciences.  When the wave of positivism started in France then it also left imprints on the methodologies of various British and German intellectuals, which can be seen in the works of Brown, Malinowski, Pritchard. But, first time Malinowski gave deep thoughts on the research methods and techniques in his work on Trobriander islands, where he suggested “imponderabilia of everyday life“and importance of it in the understanding of different cultures. He stated that the goal of the anthropologist, or ethnographer, is "to grasp the native's point of view, his relation to life, to realize his vision of his world" (Argonauts of the Western Pacific, Dutton 1961 edition, p. 25.). So, ethnography for the first time got established in the discipline of anthropology.

Ethnography can take different forms and can be used by different types of anthropologists. It is widely used by interactionists and critical ethnography is a common type of study amongst critical social scientists (Haralambos et al. 1013-14). Ethnography can take different qualitative research methods but the common amongst them is participant observation, interview and biography. However, participant observation is one of the most common practices among the ethnographers of the various schools.

Participant observation has a wide history of usage in the discipline of anthropology. First, the functionalist scholars used it as a tool for knowing qualitatively the culture of the tribal or the primitive people as Radcliff’s study of aborigines, Pritchard’s study of Nuer tribe, Malinowski in Trobiarand Island.  However, the ethnography’s relationship with the anthropology took a turn after the work of Clifford Geertz.  Clifford Geertz used the concept of “Thick Description” and started a new paradigm in the field of ethnography. Interactionists are mainly concerned about the social reality of the social construct and they do not pay so much attention towards cause-effect relationships as positivists are. Geertz advocates explaining the ‘reality’ through thick description rather using ‘thin description’. Thick description explains various conceptual frameworks, structure and meaning while thin description is mainly about the facts and empirical data. He finds thin description as the misleading one and says that ethnographer’s task is to find the meaning structures and to find meaning structures, one need to find out the meaning attached with the data, its interpretation and interpretations of the interpretation. He postulates four parameters for thick description in his book “Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture”. These four parameters are the followings:-

•     Interpretative study:- ethnographers has to find the manners of the meanings and it can only be find      out through interpretation.
•  The subject of interpretation is the flow of social discourse:-  Ethnographers has to provide the code  to decode the facts and data.
•   Interpretation deals with extrovert expressions:-  extrovert expressions of the culture is necessary to  unravel the data of the informants.
•   Ethnographic description is microscopic:- local behaviours and truth are described by the  ethnographic data and here contextualizing and finding specified happenings can provide the thick descriptions.

Geertz also added the literary approach to his writings and his ethnographies are filled with the rhetoric. A new insight into the ethnography changed the classical narratives of writing ethnography.  However, later James Clifford in his work ‘writing Cultures’ tried to present the discussions on the various schools of thought and problems and development of various paradigms like Literary, post-literary, postmodern etc. . James Clifford says that ethnographic writings can be determined in at least 6 ways contextually, rhetorically, institutionally, generically, politically, and historically. He says that ‘these determinations govern the inscription of coherent ethnographic fictions.’(Clifford, page-6).  Further, he pressed the point that ethnographies are the “partial truths” and he focuses on the representation of ‘truth’, which later constructed as a paper by Paul Rabinow in the same book. He also talks about the fictionalised sense of ethnographic text. For Clifford, culture is composed of seriously contested codes and representations and poetic and politics are inseparable. For him, search of the culture is not so important but the representations. He divides the ethnography in phases i.e. from Heroic ethnography to crude ethnography to realistic ethnography and says that realistic ethnography is the only way to find the truth attached with the culture.

Paul Rabinow talks in detail about the ‘representations’ and compare it with the social facts. Post modern school, which do not have belief in finding the objective reality and believes that objectivity is impossible. They also find fieldwork unnecessary and say that all interpretations of the culture and history are valid and equal. Further, he talks about the problems of epistemology and interactionists school’s method, ideological biasness, role of ideologies in ethnography and new issues arising out of use of ethnography in the discipline of anthropology.

Representation is a word which has a very deep history in philosophical discourses. From Aristotle to modern day western scholars have used this word. For Aristotle, there was no sharp division between external and internal reality. So, the representations were not observable. Descarte took a plunge in the Aristotlic view and gave representation an internal reality, so, making it quasi-observable. But, epidemiological doctrines are itself a product of certain civilization, having history in certain territory can be a source of biasness in the social research. So, ethnography through the epidemiological research could not show us a way to find the anthropology a ethnographic process. Pragmatic school of thought tried to develop psychological epistemology of research but they were not able to provide a way out from the epidemiological age. Reason and logic cannot show us the truth the absolute truth because reason is itself founded on the historical processes and sometimes it creates beautiful myths, which are unable to falsify. So the problem is not falsification as Karl Popper thinks but it is the representation. Scientific methodologies which are too much concerned about value-neutrality finds itself in the trap of the value of ‘value-neutrality’. 

Foucault finds ‘a kind of nostalgia for a quasi transparent form of knowledge’ behind the curtain of ideology (1980: 117) and relates ideology as the close kin of epistemology. He gives three interrelated characteristics of modern form of ideology:-

•  Opposed to something like ‘truth’ so, the false representation.
•   Produced by a subject in order to hide the truth and fitting data into the  researcher’s frame of ideology,
•  Secondary to something more ‘real’ and an infrastructural dimension.

He rejects all these three claims. So, he takes post-modern framework of ‘discovering something which is neither true nor false’ (1980; 131-133) and he proposes to study the regimes of truth ‘’ as an effective component in the constitution of social practices”. His regime is neither ideological nor structural rather the condition for the development of ideas. Further, he proposes the hypothesis of using power dimension in circular relationship with the system.

Ian Hacking in his famous work “Language, Truth and Reason” gives a new concept of ‘truth’ vs. ‘style of thinking’ in opposition to “Truth vs. Falsity” and says that logic cannot be the source of the truth. He is not against the ‘logic’ but he finds the domain of logic very limited. So, he says that “Hence although whichever propositions are true may depend upon the data, the fact that they are the candidates for being true is a consequence of an historical events”(56). So, a relativist position is acquired by Hacking in sort of accepting the subjectivism and denying Popperian claim of truth.

 So, we have found out till now that how the representations can play a crucial role in determining the truth and earlier methods of ethnography has certain inherent ‘falsity’ in the very structure of the methodologies. Representations can work as the social facts if the ideological biases and epistemological biasness can be curtailed. Also, epistemology is the product of historical events and the indigenous epistemological theory cannot be the solution and also Occidentalism cannot be seen as the replacement of Orientalism.

Anthropology has seen the waves of scientific ethnography in classical times to the denial of any role of ethnography in post modern era. Ethnography, as process, tried to simulate the anthropological discourse on the culture in a fashioned way of natural science and the distinction of nomothetic and ideographic disciplines, however short lived, shaped the future advancement of the discipline. The problem in initial days was to prove it an objective discipline so the ethnography became the process and the product of the anthropology. But, after the advent of interactionist school, it took a leap towards representation and these representations were ‘voluntaristic’, which created a new age in ethnography. Further, the superstructure-infrastructure notions of feminist works were refuted by various schools for not having requisite ethnographic evidences. So, history and development of anthropology can be summed in the changing meanings of ethnography.

In the latter half of the 20^th century, the book “Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography” started a fresh debate on the ethnography. Various scholars from the field of anthropology, history and literature started a new paradigm in the ethnography. However, post-modern thoughts are more prevalent in the discussions but these post-modern thoughts are the product of the inadequacies of the ‘modern’ ethnographic systems. The power and political dimensions are given importance in the interpretation of ethnographic data, and also, the subjective orientation of the results was justified in the discipline of social sciences. Objectivity is a myth and it can only give the false representation or partial representations.

THE HYPERGAMY OF THE PATIDARS (D.F.POCOCK)

The Patidars of Gujarat got the name from the Pattidari system of land revenue. Patidars, having the occupation of trade and other professions, are scattered throughout the world. The Patidars are divided into two groups- Lewa and kadwa. These two groups are separated in kinship relationships. However, the Lewa are considered to be higher in status but it is not visible in practice. Lewa Patidars are predominant in Charottar, which is considered as ‘the pleasant land of Patidars’. They generally share their village with the other caste groups of Brahmin, Bania, Baria, Patenwadia, Occupational, Servants etc. Most of these castes are influenced by hypergamic practices like that of Patidars. It is very tough to find a fundamental pattern of kinship system of Patidars. But, as Pocock writes

“We can best say that the form of any one particular joint family is a working out of the ideal of ‘jointness’  as it is held up by ancient law and extolled by religion and economic possibility of fulfilling it”

For status, one has to belong to a distinguished line or the head of the family has to start a new line to be known after his name. The head of the family has to organise a feast, where he has to arrange hospitality for the relatives of five to six generations. The depth of the generations in the kin relationship is very important factor for the status in the larger group. If for some reasons, he is not able to arrange it or the guests refuses to accept the invitation then the family is likely to be merely the residue from which a break is made, not the group which breaks away. Pocock equates it with the ‘formal expression of the caste’ towards the offenders.

PATIDAR HYPERGAMY

Pocock calls it the ‘free Kulin’ hypergamy and ‘free’ in the sense that Patidars do not pose restrictions like Bengal and Malabar. However the expression of Kulin is for the famous six villages of Charottar but the notion has been transmitted deep into the smallest village of the obscure. Patidars hypergamy is based on two principals -

•  Daughters are given as gift to  superiors and they pay dowry instead of accepting money for the        daughter,
• Differing status of the areas.

Charottar areas are of high status and they only take daughters from the neighbouring areas but do not give daughters to these areas. Also, the Baria caste conducts its own hypergamy upon a regional basis in which they take daughters form the East, West, and North and giving only in the South. When Patidar caste broke the rule then they accepts that the girl is of superior origin and also the one who gives daughter not in the consonance of the rules are severely treated, but acceptors of daughters are not so severely treated.

MARRIAGE CIRCLES

The Patidars caste is divided into marriage groups called circles within which daughters can be given or taken. Since, the natal village of the members are exogamous so the girls can be married in own group and the higher groups. The name of the circles is based on the number of villages in the circle or the number which the circle used to comprise. There is an informal hierarchical order of these circles. The acceptance of the village in a circle is based on two factors:-

•   Economic criteria, ritual purity like no widow remarriage etc,
•  Chance of raising its status by engaging in ties with higher circle.

Every lower village continuously strives to raise the status in the company of its fellow villages or separately. Since, the acceptance of inferiority which is ascribed in the hypergamic system is degrading so there is an emergence of formal bond between the villages and this formal group is called an ekada and its matrimonial affairs and interests are governed by member village representatives called panch. Now anyone cannot give his daughter to even the higher village. If one do so he might be boycotted or fined heavily. These village groups are of lower or middle hierarchy and imitate the behaviour of the higher groups. However, they will also claim Kulin in relation to lower villages. This is also an expression of caste as Dumont says that every caste accepts itself higher in status in relation to lower group and also lives in isolation to groups lower than theirs.  

The marriage of girl in the higher group is based on dowry and due to this practice of infanticides of the girls came in upper groups, and the boys of the lower groups have to go for sibling-exchange, widow marriage or lower caste women. So, the ekada fights for the more glorious things.

The two ideals Brahmanic and Western govern the movement of the Indian society today and these two ideals are frequently compatible on some points and incompatible on some other points like widow remarriage, divorce, religious observances etc.. Brahmins accepted the new western education and education is playing an important role in the marriage market. In the simple conservation of Charottar, the term ‘good man’ is used for the people with wealth and avoidance of extravaganza and ostentation. Also, he has to give feast to all his relatives and if possible then to the whole village. He is also related with the higher groups in the kinship structure. He is also related to places of public usages like Dharmsala, temple, ponds etc.

PERSISTENCE AND CHANGE  

The effects of hypergamy on the relationship with kin groups are very effective which can be visualised in the dowry practices. Since, every group want to rise in the status and dowry is a medium to improve the status among the groups. So, lower groups give very high dowry for a groom from higher groups. It is accepted as an evil by all groups and sometimes village committees have fixed limit of 301Rs but the practice of high dowry is prevalent among the peoples for rise in the status and father’s desire to marry their daughter in a higher groups. This is one of the prime reasons for persistence of dowry practices and the reform movements have been proved unsuccessful. Those, who do not have sisters or daughters, are forced by their kin who paid high dowry, to accept dowry. The variety of generation depth in large kin-groups can be viewed by this maxim: ‘A good man at ten generations is a brother and; a useless brother is a stranger’.

The persistence of these practices is eroding due to end of the old land revenue system and the wealthy commercial classes are following an adapted pattern of the European type family. Now, the hypergamy is practised in the framework of smaller kin-groups. Also, the rise of lower caste groups can lead to the formation of endogamous sub castes. In the Patidars, affinal relations are for very short durations like the relationship with maternal uncle are forgotten after the fulfilment of his obligation towards sister’s children. At present, each generation creates affinal ties binding groups.

So, hypergamy has an evident function to install belief in the caste upon more closely defined kin groups. A man who does not have daughters can neglect the cast group views but Pocock also find that even for the offence next generation is fined. So, marriage and caste group relationship are getting recognized. The acceptance of dynamics of change among the Patidars is changing some of the functions of the society and also continuing persistence of some of the functions. 

GENDER, FEMINISM AND RELIGION

Religion and the origin of religion have been defined in multiple ways by different school of thoughts but generally, it is defined as the belief system which validates existence of supernatural beings that have a governing effect on life. In sociology, its functions are also viewed differently by different schools as Marxist sees it as a deception, functionalist views it as functional for the dynamic equilibrium of society etc. Somehow, religion as an ideology has a very profound effect on the societal relationship and in every social setting; it plays the crucial roles of bringing social change and continuity even in the post-modernist world. Especially in the South Asian context, sometimes being a part of the culture and sometimes independent of culture, it has significant impact on the peoples. Here religion provided the reason for the partition of Indian subcontinent, rise of Taliban in Afghanistan, and sectarian violence in Pakistan, radicalization of Islam in Maldives.

Religion had very adverse impact on the social conditions of women and Feminist ideologies have produced intensive literature on the plight of the women and causes for the prevailing conditions and exploitation of women. Conventionally, Religion is seen as male-affair and the glorification of male gods is shown in most of the religions. Women are seen as the creation by men. As Anthony Giddens sees that religion is a male affair in its symbolism and argues that “women are portrayed as created from a rib taken from a man”. However, it is true that ‘women’ are not born; they are created by patriarchal psychic of male. In the evolutionary perspective if we will see the function of the religion then it is visible that initially female deities and female priests were present in the society and women were found central to the spiritual pursuit, but after the invasion of Aryans and Semitics male dominated mythology came into prominence and finally it turned into mostly monotheistic religion, which is fully male dominated. Karen Armstrong sees this as the evolution of ‘male god’ in the society.

Feminist theories like Marxian theory divide society into two classes and see religion as a product of patriarchy unlike Marxian theories a product of capitalism. Women and women’s labour is exploited by male for the fulfillment of their need. Jean Holm has reviewed the ways in which female are exploited or subordinated.  She tells that while the classical doctrines of many religions have stresses equality between men and women like in Japanese folk religion and Islam. Women’s status in the society is related to female sexuality. ‘Menstruation’ and childbirth are treated as polluting in all the religions.

Religion portrays women closer to god than men but they are not given position in the power structure of the religious institutions. Mainly the role of the priests is occupied by the male and women are provided differential treatment in entering sacred places. They are provided with false consciousness about their suffering that they will be compensated for their sufferings in the spiritual spheres of the religion. Simon de Beauvoir in her book The Second Sex talks about the oppression of women in the religion and compared it with the oppression in the capitalist society.

Radical feminist like Simon de Beauvoir, sulasmith Firestone consider that gender inequality is founded on the patriarchal institutions like marriage, family, and glorification of reproductive role of women. Therefore, patriarchy is located on the base; ideology, state, mode of production, education are influenced by the culture of patriarchy. Therefore, in every sphere women are put into disadvantaged position against men. So, more we are progressing in economic and political sphere, more significantly gender is evolving into important instrument of social inequality.

They advocate that institution of marriage gives way to loss of control of women over her body and mind. When man is demanding ‘sex’ from the women then it is a matter of right but when women are asking for sex they are treated as slut. Further, they consider gestation is a painful experience, where woman is forced to torture her body. Heterosexuality is a patriarchal construct, which is glorifying the idea of motherhood justifying to sexual division of labour

Maria Becker equates women with ‘Dalits’ of India, Belhooks equates women with blacks of Africa, who create ‘underclass’- which is further divided on the basis of race, ethnicity and class. They are subjected to marginalisation, exploitation, inequality from the beginning of the civilization to the contemporary times. Religion is the patriarchal construct, which creates fear of god in human beings to obey the system of patriarchy.

In sub Saharan and North East Africa, in the name of religion, the genital part of women are circumscribed, which has a very negative effects on the body of female for the sake of female modesty and it is the violation of ‘universal ethics’ provided to every citizen of the world known as Human Rights. It is forcibly done on the female child. Many of the feminist thinkers were jailed for opposing this religious practice like Nawal El Saadawi of Egypt. Men distort religious doctrine to serve their own interests and to legitimize their oppression. Slavery, prostitution and abortion are the cases where they are treated as the second class citizens and they are deprived of their basic rights. These sorts of discrimination are linked with the scriptures to get the justification.

In Hindu social system, if we take ‘hierarchy’ as the structure and within the hierarchy ‘purity’ and ‘pollution’ as the two ‘Binary Opposites’ then we can understand the position of women in the caste system. Hindu women can make the food and other sacred activities impure and male has the responsibility to remain pure to get social honor  So, the female members in the time of menstruation cannot enter the sacred places and prepare the food. They have to take bath before preparing the food and after male members had taken the food then they have to clean that place. They cannot even stand in front of the male members when they are having food because; even the presence of women can pollute the food.

In some parts of India, female sex ratio is very low. The reason for this low sex ratio is abortion of female foetus in the contemporary times and killing of female infants in the past. Indian scriptures say that son is the way through which one can reach heaven. The demand for son in Hindu society gave female a status of ‘second sex’ and their exploitation in the society remained a challenging question in front of the society for centuries. Even after much legislation, the problem of female foeticide is a big question in front of the policy makers. The main reason for the failure of legislation is the differential impact of ‘modernity’ and modern values on the heterogeneous societies of India. Tradition is reinforcing the archaic cultural value of the society and modernity remains isolated in this sphere of social life. However this problem is not only among the Hindus but also other religions have got influenced from these values.

However the Hindu feminist movements has achieved success to the some extent in the area of land ownership rights, access to education, representation in Panchayati Raj Institutions and Urban Local bodies etc. The acceptance of ‘love marriages’ in most of the parts of India and sending girls to the school is showing a good sign for Indian society. Indian society is liberating from the prison of patriarchy. The changes in the mindset of Indian society were influenced by the impact of British colonialism in 17^th century, and the influences of modernist thoughts. Bengal Renaissance started reforms in social structure to provide women more space in public life. People like Raja Rammohan Roy, Dayanand Saraswati, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar and others tried to interpret the scriptures holistically to show the right path for change. These socio-religious movements tried to soften the exploitation by pressing British to pass Widow Remarriage Act, Prohibition of Child Marriage Act etc.

After independence some of the women activists went to Pakistan and some others joined Indian National congress and occupied power positions and the constitution of India gave the equal rights to women as the Fundamental Right and universal adult franchise to safeguard the women’s right. But the establishment of Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) was the first initiative in 1972 by Ela Bhatt to make significant change in the life of women by providing training, technical aid to the women workers of the unorganised sectors. Further anti-dowry campaign, protest against oppression of women by various women organisation started.

The turn came after the landmark judgement of Supreme Court in Shah Bano case (1985 SCR (3) 844), which gave Muslim women right to alimony, was turned down by Rajiv Gandhi Government by passing a law. This act of the government changed the scope of infusion of modern values in Muslim society, which is skewed in favour of Muslim men. This was a great chance for bringing uniform civil code in India. In 2010, a court in Delhi illegalised polygamy in Islam, when the present wife is not sick or any other conditions which make her incapable of producing children etc..

Patriarchy exists in different forms all over the world and that ultimately defines various forms of entitlements both in public sphere and private sphere on the basis of gender criteria. Uma Chakrabarti writes that in India multiple forms of patriarchy like Brahmin patriarchy, kshatriya Patriarchy, Dalit and Islamic Patriarchy, explains the economic roles of women, their domestic roles and their participation in public sphere activities with structure distinction.  This multiplicity of patriarchy has given way to various women’s movements in India emphasizing on equal pay for equal work, regulation of female foeticide and infanticide, protection of women from domestic violence, abolition of dowry, question of feminization of poverty and so on.

Sociology of family and Kinship today is not engaged in looking into functions and dysfunctions of family rather from a gender perspective. Family is defined as a product of patriarchy that is contributing for the domestication of women, demarcation between public and private sphere activities and justification to inherent inferiority of women by creating “Pink collar jobs” in modern industrial society. Therefore, breaking the conventional tradition to the study of division of labour in terms of modern organisation, mode of production, structure of society, Feminist considers that patriarchy in different forms all over the human history  is determining, defining unequal system of division of labour and different forms of entitlements, which have the religious sanctions.

The picture is not so gloomy in the world in the contemporary post-industrial society where service sector is increasingly contributing to the national GDP and the service sector is providing good opportunities for women. The transformation in the position of women can be seen all over the globe. All religions are providing some position to the women in the post-patriarchal societies. The reform Judaism has allowed women to become rabbis since 1972.  ‘New religious movement’ and ‘neo-spiritual’ movements does not discriminate between men and women. Many multinational companies are being run by women and various acts for the safeguards of women at workplaces are being passed by the government.

Modernisation of Indian Tradition

Indian civilisation has always been based on the principle of holism, hierarchy, continuity, and transcendence and its character has influenced from orthogenetic changes and changes in its Great Tradition and Little Tradition but form of the institutions remained unchanged as the endogenous changes were confined only to ‘Sanskritisation' .The real change came from the contact of western civilisation in 17th century, which began through the process of colonization. The earlier encounter with Islam only reinforced the tradition as Islam was a traditional religion and a synthesis of Islamic tradition and Hindu tradition took place which even had the effect in the Persia. The Islam of Indian subcontinent also adopted the features of hierarchy as the most of the Muslims were Hindu convert. In political structure also the feudal system was common to both the religions. Despite having differences in ideologies a syncretic relationship between both the religions was apparent in Indian subcontinent. Social change and modernism are two different things especially while evaluating traditional societies. Social change can be continuous without having the modern or pre- modern type of evolution. In Indian social system applying western evolutionary perspective to study the ‘change' will be injustice to the very pattern of Indian society. Indian social system was undergoing changes without inculcating any modern notion of change which can be studied from qualitatively distinctive evolutionary differentiation.

Various methodologies have been used to study Indian society as M. N. Srinivas gave ‘Sanskritisation' and ‘Westernization' to study the social change in India but Yogendra Singh finds it problematic as the sociology of Srinivas glorifies the idea of continuity and change but never talks about absolute change. Further, he founds the absence of consensus in the historical context of Sanskritisation as the role of dominant caste is more important to legitimize the mobility. In India, plurality of the little tradition was preserved through caste structure and its local cultural expressions of lower castes. As Redfield and Singer finds that these Little Traditions comprises the cultural beliefs and practices held by folk, through oral tradition and ‘' localized adaptations of cultural values and roles of the great traditions. Various religious groups and the groups within the sub-structure of these groups formed plural traditions and micro-structures as kinship and social ties hardly ever extended beyond the borders of 200 km. So the changes from within in the internal structure that is Sanskritisation and from outside that is Islamization were active in the Hindu Little Tradition.  

The frustration of low caste Hindu and repression by Islamic ruler in India accelerated the process of Islamization in India. Yogendra Singh puts that "Islamization also led to some structural changes through continual differentiation and segmentation of new castes who got converted to Islam." The sub-culture and social practices among these converts clearly shows the reminiscence of traditional Hindu system, which led to formation of little tradition of Islam. Further Islamization developed structural similarities with Sanskritisation as a caste of pseudo-Ashrafs emerged. Similarly, here dominant castes did not recognize or oppose the mobility.

Is Marx a sociologist?

Karl Marx was born on May 5, 1818, in Trier a small town in Germany to a lawyer Hirschl Marx-Levy, who was struggling hard to make a living because the Prussians made it illegal for Jews to hold public offices. So, he converted to Protestantism two years before Marx’s birth, which helped him to climb the ladder to become head of the Trier Bar Association. Karl Marx first got admission in the University of Bonn and from this university he was transferred to Berlin University due to his subsequent fighting, habit of drinking and of running up debts. Some of the most famous professors were associated with Berlin university especially Hegel, who died five years before the Marx joined. By the 1840s, Britain was prospering with the help of Industrial revolution and France was the centre of socialist ideas but in 1830s and 1840s, Britain was undergoing political movements named Chartist movement, organised by radical and reformist groups, which wanted working class participation in electoral processes. This movement demonstrated the capability of effective political mobilization of proletariat class. In these decades, the condition of working class in Britain was very severe ad Middle class reformers pressed government to bring series of legislation to regulate the working conditions. Economic depression triggered by bad harvests of 1846 and 1848 brought revolutions, which terrified the ruling classes of whole Europe and the second great revolution in Marx’s lifetime was in 1870, when Napolean III undertook a disastrous war against Germany. The working class, anticlerical, and radical members set up a commune in working class neighbourhood of Paris. Karl Marx wrote in these years so his works have the reflections of these social environmental conditions and the social change associated with this to create a society which has the means to solve this anomic situation.  In the disciplinary discourse of Sociology, Karl Marx is not only treated a sociologist but a “classical sociologist” but as his works have influenced the discipline of History, Political Science, Philosophy, Economics so is he a classical sociologist or just an imported theorist in the sociology discipline as at that time Sociology was holding breadth to devise a methodological approach.  

                           Some theories are called “classical” because they fulfil two criteria, first, they should have an ideological significance and, second, they can be instrumental in developing an autonomous discipline and as an institutionalised profession and these two characteristics are mutually inclusive. Marx’s approach is heavily influenced by his idea of society and social change. All other theorist like Durkheim, Spencer, Comte, Weber, and Simmel’s theories have ideological biases. But, Marx never wanted to conceal ideological character of his work as other theorist of that time did. As George Ritzer writes, “indeed, it is built into the very structure of his theorizing’’. As Marx was critical about the mode of operation of capitalist class in Industrial society and as a humanist he was highly sentimental about the working class situation and in all his works he consistently took this view points.  

                             When Sociology was developing as an intellectual discipline, its fundamental concerns were two fold, first, to define the subject matter of the discipline in order to distinguish the discipline from the other and, second, the methodology that can distinguish the emergent discipline from the other disciplines. So, when Sociology developed as a branch of intellect then classical sociology was divided into two categories:- As a general science that can understand every aspects of social life, a discipline that can study social structures, continuity and change by applying scientific methods, To its contrast German sociologists believed those social institutions are the products of the human behavior that is defined by history, culture, and emotions. Therefore, individual behavior is dynamic, subjective which cannot be studied from scientific perspectives. However, Marx’s approach does not fit in any one of these schools as his methodology was the accumulation of inquiry, epistemology, metaphysics which finally resulted in the formation of  “sociology of knowledge” i.e.; a conception of the purpose of social science inquiry and a schematic notion of what social science results ought to look like. (Theories, Bodies of empirical findings, Statistical laws, Narrative interpretations of important social processes, Groups of causal hypotheses). Marx’s aim was to provide an empirical description of the institutions of capitalist societies, social implication of these institutional arrangements and to illuminate the historical processes through which social change was possible. As Marx in his work Capital (Marx 1977) gives detailed insights into historical description of the societal changes, micro-sociological details about the inherent structural contradictions in capitalist society, reasoning about their institutions and implications, and mathematical political economy. 

                          Marx’s writings have an interdisciplinary approach and where he believes in “Formalist School’s” conception of Sociology .Refuting the view that Political Science is committed to the study of specific objects of society but sociology in terms of approach and method is holistic in character, he writes that social life is a product of negotiation between economic base and power present in the superstructure of the society. Therefore, domination and subordination present in the political structure is the reflection of the inequality present in the economic base. Therefore, doing sociology without Economics, History and Political Science is not possible. Later Neo-Marxian school scholars like Lukas, Gramsci, Althusser, Habermass, Adorono developed a dynamic approach to the study of social life keeping Power at the centre. So, reciprocation of approaches was done by both the discipline which is now considered as the celebration of knowledge or interdisciplinarity in the field of sociology.

                              Conventional meaning of History is the study of chronology of events. In sociological usages, history refers to the understanding of the rise of human civilisations and conditions present in there. When Hegel develops an idealistic explanation to History indicating that History is a product of human consciousness and advancement of ‘Mind’ is responsible for transformation of ‘primitive society’ driven by ‘universal reflexivity’ to ‘civil society’ driven by ‘universal egoism’ and finally ‘state’ driven by ‘universal altruism’. Young Hegelians rejected the metaphysical idea of Hegelian idea and considered that History of all societies is a story of hierarchy, domination and exploitation. Mark took the idea of exploitation and hierarchy from Young Hegelians. Marx adopted Empiricism but rejected the empiricist’s notion of empiricism and further tells that empiricism is directed exclusively to the source of the knowledge but not the form of that knowledge. So it will produce very mechanical form of materialism leaving loop holes for idealism. So, Marx finds History as the creation, satisfaction and recreation of human needs. Human needs make history and changing needs change history. So, History is the making of dynamic needs of human. He gives Human History’s phases--- 

Equality-----Inequality--------Intensified Inequality---Revolution--------Social Equality 

Primitive Society----Slave Society ----Feudal Society-----Capitalist Society---Communist 

Marxian historical analysis left deep footprints in History which later turned History to exchange ideas with sociology confirming the statement that “Sociology with History is rootless and History without sociology is fruitless”.   

SOCIOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE Of MARX WRITINGS:- 

  Karl Marx’s writings have the vision of the future of society as he tells capitalism has inherent contradictions that would be manifested in defecting crises and it would be replaced by socialism which would mount the way for communism. Marx further went on to answer the critical questions of way of transformations of capitalism into communism and the meaning of the term capitalism. In The Communist Manifesto of 1848, Marx suggested the imminent demise of capitalism. If class exploitation in some countries was economically desirable but politically dangerous then that system can be exported. Further he attached history with the form of revolution. So the transition can be peaceful, bloody depending on the degree of the exploitation. Marx saw capitalism as a setting which is distorting the humanness of the society and communist society will have true class consciousness and surplus labour i.e. labor over and above what is required for mere satisfaction of the material necessities of physical subsistence will be used for public welfare, which will help in treating people with humaneness rather than treating like commodity or needy. Marx’s writing influenced capital societies to become progressive in western countries by adding socialistic ideas in the policy makings.                       He also talked about the “Division of Labour’’ in communist societies which will be highly organised. According to Marx, in communist societies “nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity.’’ Nevertheless “society regulates the social production”. Socially regulated work in communist society will not need specialized knowledge and where the specialized labor will be needed, it will not be the sphere of one person. Marx wanted to eliminate the destructive effects of specialization. As David McLellan puts, Marx never believed “that each should do the work of Raphael, but that anyone in whom there is a potential Raphael should be developed without hindrance. The exclusive concentration of artistic talent in particular individuals, and its suppression in broad mass …………..is the consequence of division of labour.” So, the communist society will help people develop to their fullest.          

                            In the Economic and Philosophical Manuscript 1844, he talks about the relationship of human with the production environment, product, self and the process of production. He talks about the causes of alienation and also provides the causes for this problem. Change in production environment and modes of production which help workers to enjoy the integration of self to the product and satisfaction of self is the solution to the alienation. He furthers modifies the ideas of Hegel by defining relationship between “consciousness” and “self”. Hegel says “it is the consciousness that determines being” and ‘self’ defines the embodiment of civilisation i.e. architecture, literature, language and technology develops. Developing a theory for “class for itself” Marx offers a criticism to Hegel to indicate that it is the being who carries the real materialistic experience, on the basis of which he develops “true-class-consciousness” that determines the being, finally, which determines the consciousness.      

                            In his work Capital, Marx talks about the commodification of labour and how through the use of exchange value surplus labour is appropriated. So, capitalism is a product of exploitative system of production and exchange, which is degrading the ethical values, intellectual capacities, humanistic motives present in the ‘being’ and converting them commodities in the market. He makes a comparison between early systems of exchange where exchange was targeted to gratify the consumption needs. In capitalist societies, money is invested to procure commodities in search of profit, which is again re-invested to generate private wealth. So, everything considered as sacred is being converted into profane viz. creative art, literature, and knowledge is reduced into commodity. This development is unique to human history that, ultimately, will lead to the detachment between man and his work, where work will be reduced into a means to an end. Appropriation of surplus of labour leads to a condition where property is theft and that is legitimized by super-structural institutions of society.        

                         Social theories have to draw a distinction between ideas and words they are expressed in. Marx never felt himself to be labelled as sociologists but his work provided the methodologies, theories and pattern to the emerging discipline of sociology. His deep humanistic feelings about the class location of workers in the social setting and their exploitation led him to develop sociological insight about the structure, causes, and notion of change. Marx, even having created a large pool of anti-Marxian thinkers and the sustenance of capitalism, remains one of the leading figures in the discipline of political science, History, Economics, Philosophy and Sociology. Any use of classical authors inevitably involves interpretations but as Alexender puts it the work of interpretation never ceases. 

                           Disputes over the interpretations of the nature of classical theorist constitute one of the distinctive features of social theory. Marx’s theory has been interpreted by various social thinkers with the lens of their ideological biases and various distortions came into existence in the form of vulgar Marxism. 

In true sense, sociology has as much right over Karl Marx as the disciplines of History, Political science and other disciplines have. Also the schools of thought developed after Marx like critical theorist, post-modernist have the influences of Marxian structural model and Post-modernist do not choose any single type of methodology. Marx and Marxian view of society is an integral part to social understanding of social settings. However, there are some contradictions in Marxian theories but so is the case with other theorist also. It is the influencing sociology of Marx that has made Marxism alive even after the death of Marx. Social relevance even in the contemporary society and bringing change in the society by giving alternative way is what makes Marx a sociologist.

• Marx’s Capital –Philosophy and Political Economy. Geoff Pilling 1980http://www.marxists.org/archive/pilling/works/capital/pilling2.htm

• Marxism and Method, Daniel Little University of Michigan-Dearborn (http://wwwpersonal.umd.umich.edu/~delittle/Marxism%20and%20Method%203.htm)

• Economic and Philosophical Manuscript-1844,, Karl Marx.

• Das Capital, Karl Marx.

• George Ritzer- Sociological Theory.

• www.marxists.org.

• Bottomore, Tom and Nislet , Robert (1978)—A History of Sociological analysis.