The Oxford handbook of Caste / edited by Surinder S. Jodhka, Jules Naudet.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Acknowledgements
Notes on Editors and Contributors
Introduction—Studying Caste: Conceptual Currents and Emergent Perspectives, Surinder S. Jodhka and Jules Naudet
SECTION I: CONCEPTUAL FRAMES
Editors' Introduction
1:The Idea of Caste through the Ages: Concept, Words, and Things, Roland Lardinois
2:Hierarchy, Martin Fuchs
3:The Jajmani System, Peter Mayer
4:Caste and Capital, Carol Upadhya
5:Caste and Class, Jules Naudet
6:Caste and Kinship, Janaki Abraham
SECTION II: HISTORY, STATE, AND THE SHAPING OF CASTE
Editors' Introduction
7:Caste and Kingship, Harald Tambs- Lyche
8:Transformations of Caste in Colonial India, Dilip Menon
9: Census, Caste Enumeration, and the British Legacy, Leigh Denault
10:Caste Disputes in Colonial India: Conflicts and the Legal Shaping of Caste, Julie Marquet
11:Caste and the Law, Gautam Bhatia
12:Reservations and Affirmative Action, Ashwini Deshpande
13:Backwardness, S. Anandhi and Kalpana Kannabiran
SECTION III: CASTE AND THE RELIGIOUS REALM
Editors' Introduction
14:Hinduism and Caste System, Mathieu Claveyrolas
15:Hindu Sects and Caste in South Asia, Raphaël Voix
16:Sanskritization: The Inheritance of an Ideational Category, George Kunnath
17:Caste and Hindutva, Joel Lee
18:Caste among Muslims in North India and Pakistan, Julien Levesque
SECTION IV: LOCAL POWER AND THE POLITICAL PROCESS
Editors' Introduction
19:The Dominant Caste, Nicolas Martin
20:Caste Associations and the Post-Mandal Politics of Caste, Rajeshwari Deshpande
21:Do Indians Vote Their Caste or Their Jati, or Their Class, or . . .?, Christophe Jaffrelot
22:Caste, Patronage, and Criminalization of Politics, Lucia Michelutti
SECTION V: COMMUNITY PROFILES AND REGIONAL TRAJECTORIES
Editors' Introduction
23:How to Write New Histories of Caste, Ramnarayan Rawat
24:The Brahmins of Urban India, Haripriya Narasimhan
25:Agarwal Banias of Delhi, Ujithra Ponniah
26:Caste Logos: A View from Tamil Nadu, Zoe E. Headley
27:The Invisibility of Caste in Bengal, Sarbani Bandhopadhyay
28:Caste in Punjab, Surinder S. Jodhka
29:Caste, Ethnicity, and the State in Nepal, David N. Gellner
SECTION VI: DALIT LIVES AND PREDICAMENTS OF CHANGE
Editors' Introduction
30:Ambedkar's Legacy, Anand Teltumbde
31:Changing Dynamics of Untouchability, Suryakant Waghmore
32:Dalit Movements in India, Hugo Gorringe and Karthikeyan Damodaran
33:The Mahars and Dalit Movement of Maharashtra, Harish Wankhede
34:Dalit Activism and Transnational Mobilization, Eva-Maria Hardtmann
35:Caste, Race, and Ethnicity, Deepa S. Reddy
36:Caste and Tribe, Jai Prasad
37:Denotified Communities, Kalpana Kannabiran
SECTION VII: EMERGING ENTANGLEMENTS OF CASTE
Editors' Introduction
38:The Economics of Caste, Guilhem Cassan
39:Caste and Merit, Ajantha Subramanian
40:Caste and Mobility, Divya Vaid
41:Caste and Gender, Pushpesh Kumar
42:Caste and the Diaspora, Radha Modi
Name Index
Subject Index

"'Caste' invokes tradition, a remnant of the ancient past. According to this popular view, caste was a closed system of hierarchy and it was/is unique to South Asia. It presumably tied everyone to the social collective that they were born into, with no individual choice of occupation, mobility, or marriage. Privileges and statuses were all pre-given, with no one ever questioning the social order. This notion of caste also claimed that the source of its origin and legitimacy lay in the religious cosmos of the Hindus, who practised it as a matter of dharma or faith. The traditional order thus persisted without any change and reproduced itself for ages in the spatial universe of its innumerable village communities"--