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My Caste

cs.toronto.edu

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Re: My Caste

#31

Post by serialNumber »

curtisblaine wrote: post #19
teachrdan wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just posted this on a probably-dead thread about caste discrimination, but the short of it is the folks who wish to discriminate by caste have a variety of ways to determine what your caste is. From the Vice article below: Indians will not ask outright what caste you are, as it’s seen as overly discriminatory, but they use more subtle methods to identify your place in the caste structure. “Sometimes they ask, ‘Are…

What happens if you are from a lower caste but wear the white thread to misdirect? Or you lie about being / not being vegetarian by choice / at birth?

If someone really wanted to find out, they would be able to.

You could misdirect someone just passively asking, however as soon as the questions got more pointed, you'd have a hard time keeping up the charade.

Something as simple as the clothes you wear or the food you ate or the mannerisms you had could "give you up".

Re: My Caste

#32

Post by sharkjacobs »

curtisblaine wrote: post #19
teachrdan wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just posted this on a probably-dead thread about caste discrimination, but the short of it is the folks who wish to discriminate by caste have a variety of ways to determine what your caste is. From the Vice article below: Indians will not ask outright what caste you are, as it’s seen as overly discriminatory, but they use more subtle methods to identify your place in the caste structure. “Sometimes they ask, ‘Are…

What happens if you are from a lower caste but wear the white thread to misdirect? Or you lie about being / not being vegetarian by choice / at birth?

What happens if you lie on your resume? what if you practice speaking with a more prestigious accent than you grew up with? What if you carefully study your friends who went to private schools and summered in the Hamptons to learn how to imitate their ineffable shibboleth mannerisms?

The answer is yes, you can do these things, and it will confer exactly the benefits you imagine. And the consequences for getting "caught" aren't usually serious, either. But sometimes they are.

Re: My Caste

#33

Post by isanjay »

I worked in 3 different companies (Hyderabad, Bangalore) in South India and did not see any evidence of caste discrimination. Or even people talking about discrimination in office.

While I did see discrimination in college, which was in a rural town in South India.

Re: My Caste

#34

Post by thriftwy »

So my wife is from a shipyard town in Russia which refitted that air carrier ship for Indian navy. So at times they had a lot of Indian citizens in town.

I remember some of her acquaintances, working at child care, discovered that some of Indian kids shun other ones based on Caste, and promptly made them all do kids' dances holding hands with each other.

Re: My Caste

#35

Post by ppsreejith »

Reading the attachments, the data seems to be recent (except for IIT bombay?) and includes assistant, associate, and tenured professors. Surprising that almost 175 of the 180 faculty members are from the "forward castes" (~30% of population) vs 5 (1 obc, 4 sc, scheduled caste) from the remaining 70%. Could also be due to academia skewing older? (i.e reflecting past biases)

Re: My Caste

#36

Post by isanjay »

curtisblaine wrote: post #19
teachrdan wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just posted this on a probably-dead thread about caste discrimination, but the short of it is the folks who wish to discriminate by caste have a variety of ways to determine what your caste is. From the Vice article below: Indians will not ask outright what caste you are, as it’s seen as overly discriminatory, but they use more subtle methods to identify your place in the caste structure. “Sometimes they ask, ‘Are…

What happens if you are from a lower caste but wear the white thread to misdirect? Or you lie about being / not being vegetarian by choice / at birth?

I had a friend in college who was an OBC. But he pretended to be General caste. By the end of final year, most people knew about it, but no one confronted him.

Re: My Caste

#37

Post by dilawar »

isanjay wrote: post #33

I worked in 3 different companies (Hyderabad, Bangalore) in South India and did not see any evidence of caste discrimination. Or even people talking about discrimination in office. While I did see discrimination in college, which was in a rural town in South India.

Pizza delivery is also casteless!

Re: My Caste

#39

Post by serialNumber »

madcaptenor wrote: post #6
LordShredda wrote: post #2

Would it be possible for the government to 'phase out' last names and instead rely on other forms of identification? Instead of putting in your name in an application form, you just list an id number and your address. Then when you show up, you only mention your first and middle name.

I'd imagine you can get some amount of information from a first name as well.

Usually not - maybe if the name is super traditional, however first names are pretty much equal across castes.

Re: My Caste

#40

Post by crooked-v »

raincom wrote: post #21

Maybe, it is time to think what discriminations are, what caste-discriminations are: https://www.hipkapi.com/2011/03/24/normative-assumptions-dis...

> I was invited by some Sadhus from Swami Narayan Temple (BAPS) to visit the temple and have a discussion with them. Because they practice very strict Brahmacharya (eight types of avoiding women, each correlated to an organ: it is called Ashtanga Brahmacharya), the Sadhus said that women could not be present during our discussions, while they were welcome to visit the temple.

> A few years later, one of my teachers from Belgium visited another wing of the Swami Narayan people and found that ‘women were discriminated against’ because they were allowed only to come some distance from the temple when the Sadhus were present.

> The question here is: why did these people (my students and my teacher) experience ‘discrimination’, where I saw none and also knew that none was intended?

Dropped the article right there. Having a genuine religious belief doesn't automatically excuse discrimination, and I have zero interest in reading more from someone who thinks that it does.

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