Had a chance to read the paper presented by Dr. B R Ambedkar at the Columbia University, on the genesis and mechanism of caste.
The paper was pretty enlightening and propounded a theory on the formation of castes and the practices of sati, enforced widowhood and girl marriage. Ambedkar theorizes that the on thing that is characteristic of caste is endogamy (marriage within the community). So in-order to ensure endogamy all castes would require equal number of marriageable men and women, else people would stray or marry outside the caste. So, death of married man would cause a surplus woman and similarly death of a married woman would cause a surplus man. So in-order to address this issue of surplus man/woman, women were subjected to sati or enforced widowhood, and men to worldly renunciation or marriage to a younger girl (girl marriage). According to Ambedkar, men were considered superior to women with respect to contribution to the caste. Hence they were not killed and were married to younger girls, so as to not affect the parity of the number of the marriageable individuals.
The paper gives a rare insight into the deep and analytic mind of Dr. B R Ambedkar. For those interested in reading the paper, below is the link:
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00ambedkar/txt_ambedkar_castes.html
The paper was pretty enlightening and propounded a theory on the formation of castes and the practices of sati, enforced widowhood and girl marriage. Ambedkar theorizes that the on thing that is characteristic of caste is endogamy (marriage within the community). So in-order to ensure endogamy all castes would require equal number of marriageable men and women, else people would stray or marry outside the caste. So, death of married man would cause a surplus woman and similarly death of a married woman would cause a surplus man. So in-order to address this issue of surplus man/woman, women were subjected to sati or enforced widowhood, and men to worldly renunciation or marriage to a younger girl (girl marriage). According to Ambedkar, men were considered superior to women with respect to contribution to the caste. Hence they were not killed and were married to younger girls, so as to not affect the parity of the number of the marriageable individuals.
The paper gives a rare insight into the deep and analytic mind of Dr. B R Ambedkar. For those interested in reading the paper, below is the link:
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00ambedkar/txt_ambedkar_castes.html