A Refutation of M.N. Srinivas’s Theory of Sanskritization

by Ankur Betageri (July 2018)

Iron Law, Odd Nerdrum, 1984

 

In memoriam Prahlad Betageri

 

The Indian sociologist M.N. Srinivas has proposed the concept Sanskritization to explain caste mobility in the hierarchical Hindu caste order. “The caste system” he says, “is far from a rigid system in which the position of each component caste is fixed for all time. Movement has always been possible, and especially in the middle regions of the hierarchy. A caste was able, in a generation or two, to rise to a higher position in the hierarchy by adopting vegetarianism and teetotalism, and by Sanskritising its ritual and pantheon. In short, it took over, as far as possible, the customs, rites, and beliefs of the Brahmins, and adoption of the Brahminic way of life by a low caste seems to have been frequent, though theoretically forbidden. This process has been called ‘Sanskritisation’ in this book, in preference to ‘Brahminisation’, as certain Vedic rites are confined to the Brahmins and the two other ‘twice-born’ castes.”[1] Elsewhere, he defined Sanskritization as a process by which “a low or middle Hindu caste, or tribal or other group, changes its customs, ritual ideology, and way of life in the direction of a high and frequently twice-born caste. Generally, such changes are followed by a claim to a higher position in the caste hierarchy than that traditionally conceded to the claimant class by the local community.”

 

I will analyse Sanskritization by looking at the two processes Srinivas delineated under the concept: the supposed emulation of Brahmins by non-Brahmin castes, and the supposed emulation of a “high and frequently twice-born caste” by a low/middle Hindu caste or a dominant caste by a non-dominant caste.

 

On the Supposed Emulation of Brahmins by Non-Brahmin Castes

 

Brahmins placed themselves at the top of the hierarchy and it was accepted because they had state power, were feudal landowners, and had a monopoly over knowledge-production for a good part of Indian history. However, in constructing this model of caste mobility Srinivas, himself a Brahmin, makes numerous ideological assumptions influenced by Brahminical narratives about Brahmins:

 

i) Srinivas misattributes the superior status of Brahmins in the varna hierarchy to the practice of vegetarianism and teetotalism and to “customs and beliefs” which, in spite of his disclaimers to the contrary, he assumes were unique to Brahmins “for all time.” When Brahmins first came up with the hierarchy of varnas in the Purusha Sukta (c. 600 BCE)[2] of the Rig Veda they, far from being vegetarians or teetotallers, were voracious meat-eaters and drinkers of the inebriating drink soma.

 

Purusha Sukta, which describes the dismemberment of the “cosmic giant” Purusha, is itself very likely an allegory of human sacrifice. But, whether Brahmins practiced human sacrifice or no, they were certainly meat-eaters. There are numerous references in the Rig Veda itself that Brahmins ate beef: the meat of cow, ox and buffalo. The Rig Vedic hymns which refer to the slaughter and eating of these animals are provided in the end notes[3]. The Vedic rituals of sacrifice also required them to sacrifice animals. For example, the twelve-day Agnichayana or Atiraatra ritual requires the sacrifice of fourteen goats.[4]  

 

[6]. But Wasson (1971)[7], who wrote a book on the subject with the well-known Indologist Wendy Doniger, claims that soma is actually the bright red fly agaric mushroom—Amanita muscaria—known for its psychotropic qualities. There are many other contenders including cannabis juice (or “bhang” as it is widely known, still prepared and consumed, especially during Holi festival), Indian Lotus or Nelumbo nucifera containing psychoactive alkaloids and known to produce feelings of euphoria on ingestion (McDonald 2004)[8] and ragi or finger millet—Eleusine corcana—“still used in the Eastern Himalayas for making the intoxicating drink called marua,” as proposed by Havell (1920)[9]. Regardless of the exact botanical identity of soma, what is beyond dispute is the fact that it was an intoxicant, and that the Rig Vedic Brahmins were brewing and consuming it when they came with the model of hierarchy of castes cited in the Purusha Sukta. This means that the superior status that the Brahmins ascribed to themselves had nothing to do with either vegetarianism or teetotalism.

 

ii) Srinivas sees the practices that Brahmins adopted from others as unique to Brahmins and essentializes certain qualities as specific to Brahmins much like the Guna theory of Brahminism which sees Brahmins as the bearers of the sattvic (goodness-inducing) quality. As we have already seen Brahmins gave up animal sacrifice and took to vegetarianism and teetotalism at a certain point in history by imbibing the value system of ahimsa (non-violence) and by imitating and adopting the non-violent practices and customs that originated among the Sramanas, the Buddhists, and the Jains.

 

Srinivas uses the word Brahmin not only as a signifier for a caste but, ideologically, as a semiotic placeholder for all that is good, excellent and accomplished, that is, as the very locus of culture (etymologically samskriti/sanskrit=the refined, the cultured) and whenever someone is accomplished, or something is cultured, it is always associated in his mind with the Brahmin and the Brahminical.

 

Therefore, Sanskritization as a theory of social/caste mobility is invalid because Srinivas does not interrogate the ideological idea of the Brahmins as the standard-bearers of society.

 

iii) Srinivas, following the Brahminical guna theory, essentializes qualities and practices as specific to castes, and presupposes a uni-directional model of cultural transmission in which Brahmin cultural practices are adopted by non-Brahmin castes to rise in the hierarchy of castes. But this uni-directional model of cultural transmission, as we have already seen, is patently false and ideological.

 

If we look at the history of cultural transmission between castes, sects, and tribes one gets a completely different picture. Brahmins, far from being the originators and bearers of customs and practices that the non-Brahmins imitate and adopt, are appropriators of non-Brahmin and non-Brahminical values, customs, practices and gods.

 

The history of the expansion of Brahminism from Vedic Brahminism to Puranic Brahminism to modern pan-Indian Brahminism/Hinduism is a history of cultural appropriation. This process of adopting pre-vedic mother goddesses and symbols, non-vedic village gods and goddesses, folk songs, prayers and hymns, tribal narratives and music, subaltern dance-forms (Sadhir as Bharatanatyam), popular non-Brahmin shrines, pilgrimage sites, totemic symbols, non-Brahminical system of monasteries (Sramanic system of ashramas), and non-Brahmin customs, practices, and value systems has been identified as “Brahminization” by D.D. Kosambi and “Deshification” by Wendy Doniger. Srinivas does not mention this process though he talks about Secularization and Westernization implying, without any hesitation or doubt, that the only form of cultural transmission taking place within “Hindusim” is from Brahmins to non-Brahmins.

 

On the Supposed Emulation of “High and Frequently Twice-born Caste” by a Low/Middle Hindu Caste or of a Dominant Caste by a Non-dominant Caste

 

[10]) Women of these three varnas, since they are considered Shudra, are not allowed to undergo the upanayana ceremony and wear the cross-thread.[11] This means an entire half of the members of Brahmin, Kshatriya, and Vaishya varnas are not considered dwija or “twice born.” How then can the members of these castes/varnas as a whole, or the castes themselves, be called “twice born?” They can’t be. There are no “twice-born” castes, there are only “twice-born” Brahmin, Kshatriya, and Vaishya men. And since “twice-born” castes don’t exist the question of emulating them does not arise. 

 

ii) Caste, whether high or low, is a concept. It is a reified (concretized) generality that stands in for a population of real people. Since this concept attributed to a people does not think and act—and it is only individuals who think, act and imitate—agency cannot be attributed to a caste. It is always the individuals who have agency, and a caste has agency only when individual members express a collective will to move in a certain direction. If the collective will of a caste group is consciously expressed we call it a politics, and if the collective will is unconsciously expressed we call it a social tendency.

 

If Sanskritization is real, it must satisfy at least one of the following conditions:

1. Members of a caste placed lower in the Brahminical hierarchy must have a conscious collective project to imbibe the practices of a caste placed higher in the Brahminical hierarchy to enhance their status in the Brahminical hierarchy. That is, there must be a caste politics.
2. Members of a caste placed lower in the Brahminical hierarchy must have an unconscious desire to imbibe the practices of a caste placed higher in the Brahminical hierarchy to enhance their status in the Brahminical hierarchy. That is, there must be a caste tendency.

 

Since one has never come across a consciously expressed collective desire—that is, a politics—of any caste to imitate and imbibe the practices of a caste placed higher in the Brahminical hierarchy, one assumes Sanskritization implies the unconscious desire—that is, a social tendency—of the members of a caste to imbibe the practices of a caste higher in the Brahminical hierarchy. Note that Brahminical hierarchy is not the same as social hierarchy or social status, it is just one of the aspects which contributes to social hierarchy. 

 

[12] after which the restrictions on caste-exogamy solidified.

 

One can cite examples of other castes (like the Vishwakarma) whose varna-status is disputed and the act of wearing janeau by its males is therefore seen as Sanskritization. In almost all these cases members of the disputed castes cite reasons to claim a varna status which is not very different from the reasons to belong to a varna cited by those whose varna status is not disputed. One of the oft-cited reasons to claim Brahmin status are the priestly engagements of a caste and the priestly regard in which they are held by others. The Brahmin status of such castes can’t be questioned on any sure ground because, with the exception of a handful of Brahmin castes whose Brahmin status is unquestioned, and who have also maintained genealogical records which are accurate at least to a dozen generations, there are many Brahmin castes whose Brahmin status has been conferred during the course of Brahminization. That is, when non-Brahminical groups were brought into the ambit of Brahminism the priestly families of such groups were anointed Brahmin by the Brahmins who converted them.

 

[13] While many military leaders easily acquired Kshatriya status after military success the Maratha king Shivaji faced great difficulty in getting himself crowned due to resistance by local Brahmins who objected to his Shudra status. Shivaji famously invited Brahmins from Benares who promptly prepared a genealogical chart to establish his Kshatriya status and crowned him king. The case of the Vaishyas is quite different.

 

[15]

 

The case of the emulation of dominant castes by non-dominant caste is different in that the dominance of the dominant caste depends not so much on their rank in the Brahminical hierarchy but on their economic and political power and their numerical strength. One distinct marker of dominant caste status in the countryside is the ownership of locally available arable land. Since dominance in this case is not defined by Brahminical hierarchy but by local hierarchy and general markers which confer status to social groups this is more or less like class emulation which is a universal phenomenon. But when Srinivas says the non-dominant castes adopt the practices and way of life of the dominant caste he is significantly off the mark because it is exactly the opposite phenomena that we see in the non-dominant castes. Non-dominant castes, precisely because they do not possess economic and political power, do not own large tracts of land and do not have the numerical strength, know that their sense of identity is founded on culture and hold on to their unique food cultures, social practices, dresses and ornaments, religious rituals and social customs. I don’t know whether this tendency to preserve cultural markers that are unique to a caste is typical of Indian social groups, but it is definitely something that one can find in social groups which are of Indian origin, like the different Roma (gypsy) groups which are found in the countries of East Central Europe and in the USA.

 

Srinivas’s concept of Sanskritization, whether it talks of the emulation of the higher castes by low and middle castes or the emulation of dominant castes by non-dominant castes is founded on the assimilation-into-Brahminism or the assimilation-into-Dominant-caste model, which, if true, should have led to the disappearance of caste differences, with all castes giving up their own practices and acquiring those of the so-called higher-castes. Since the status of the low and middle castes on acquiring the practices of the higher castes is also supposed to change in a space of two to three generations it should have also led to all the castes having the same status in the Brahminical hierarchy. This obviously has not happened in the two thousand years of the history of caste.

 

What has happened though is interesting: castes, whether high or low, have held on to practices with extraordinary tenacity, as if their identity depended on these practices and despite popular condemnation. Among the so-called upper-castes we see this in their resistance to give up the practice of widow-burning or sati and in their extreme unwillingness to allow widow-remarriage. It took the force of legislation to bring an end to the former and allow the latter.

 

Among the so-called lower or Dalit castes we see an extreme unwillingness to give up eating beef despite majoritarian religious disapproval of that practice, persecution, and caste atrocities. Dalit castes have refused to give up beef though their persecution and the practice of untouchability has been connected to the practice of eating beef. These two examples show us how castes, far from easily taking to practices which would grant them greater social approval and higher status, stick to their practices despite popular censure and repeated attacks. Whether this tendency is good or bad is a different issue but what it proves, quite conclusively, is that Srinivas’s theory of Sanskritization in which he presents a model of caste ascendency through the adoption of rituals, customs, and way of life of a higher caste is ideological, unscientific, and theoretically unsound—the implications of the theory being denied by the history of caste itself.

 

 

The Real Sanskritization

 

If Brahmins did not transmit culture as Srinivas describes what is it that they did transmit unidirectionally and with a singular force? What the Brahmins transmitted (and continue to transmit) was the idea of caste, and, they did not just unidirectionally “transmit” it, they parasitized[16] our brains with it, turning us all into casteists (i.e. transmitters—and practitioners—of the idea of caste). They transmitted caste by producing and reproducing the following:

 

1. A model of hierarchy of castes (à la Purusha Sukta) and a set of punishments for those who violated it. That is, construction of the schema of caste and the imposition of it through social decree and state law.

2. The idea of caste, that is, the idea that the degree of “purity” and “pollution” of a person/a people is determined at birth.

3. The “discipline” of caste endogamy and a horror of exogamy (with the exception of anuloma— “uppercaste” male and “lower caste” female —marriages).

4. The legitimization and constant reproduction of Brahmin megalomania through megalo-narratives of scriptures, puranas, epics, kavyas, dramatic and poetic conventions.

5. High-culturification (through Vedanta) and popularization (through Bhakti) of megalomania by making megalomania the way to God through formulations like aham brahmasmi.

6. Institution of the theory of karma which provides metaphysical justification for higher and lower births, and the suffering and misery associated with lower birth.

 

But who parasitized the brains of the Brahmins? Where did they get the idea of caste from? One has to ask this question because one cannot find caste system in any of the Central Asian or European Aryan groups. The short answer to this question is that Brahmins acquired a primitive idea of caste from the people of the Indus Valley Civilization but developed it into a powerful tool of social and ideological control on their own.                      

 

 

 

 

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End Notes

 

[1] Srinivas, M.N. 1952. Religion and Society Amongst the Coorgs of South India. Oxford: Clarendon Press, p.32

 

[3]

Let us serve Agni with our hymns, Disposer, fed on ox and cow,

Who bears the Soma on his back.

Rig Veda, 8.43.11
 

The bridal pomp of Surya, which Savitar started, moved along.

In Magha days are oxen slain, in Arjuni they wed the bride.

Rig Veda, 10.85.13
 

Thou who, O Bold One, armed with thunder smotest Vrtra with might, and every hostile being.

Drink it thou God who art impetuous victor, Lord of our hymns, with beauteous jaws, the Hero,

Render of kine-stalls, car-borne, thunder-wielding, so pierce thy way to wondrous strength, O Indra.

Drink as of old, and let the draught delight thee. hear thou our prayer and let our songs exalt thee.

Make the Sun visible, make food abundant, slaughter the foes, pierce through and free the cattle.

Rig Veda, 6.17.1-3

 

He dressed a hundred buffaloes, O Indra, for thee whom all accordant Maruts strengthen.

He, Pusan Visnu, poured forth three great vessels to him, the juice that cheers, that slaughters Vrtra.

Rig Veda, 6.17.11  
  

 Griffith, Ralph T.H. (1896) The Rig Veda
 

here.)

 

[5] Flattery, David and Martin Schwartz (1989). Haoma and Harmaline: The Botanical Identity of the Indo-Iranian Sacred Hallucinogen ‘Soma’ and its Legacy in Religion, Language, and Middle Eastern Folklore. Berkeley: University of California Press. (University of California Publications Near Eastern Studies, Volume 21.)

 

[6] Falk, Harry (1989) ‘Soma I and II’, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London: UCL Press, 52/1 (1), pp.77–90

 

[7] Wasson, Robert Gordon (1971) ‘The Soma of the Rig Veda: What Was It?’ Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 91, No. 2, pp.169-187.

 

[8] McDonald, Andrew (2004) ‘A Botanical Perspective on the Identity of Soma (Nelumbo nucifera Gaertn.) Based on Scriptural and Iconographic Records’, Economic Botany, Vol. 58, Supplement (Winter, 2004) p.58

 

[9] Havell, E. B. (1920) ‘What is Soma?’ Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, No. 3, pp. 349-35

 

[10] Muller, Max ed., (1882) Sacred Books of the East Vol. XII: The Satapatha-Brahmana, Part. 1, trans. Julius Eggeling. Oxford: Clarendon Press, p.49.

 

[11] Kane, P.V. (1941) History of Dharmashastra: Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law, Volume 2 Part 1. Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, pp.292-295.

 

[12] Priya Moorjani, Kumarasamy Thangaraj, Nick Patterson, Mark Lipson, Po-Ru Loh, Periyasamy Govindaraj, Bonnie Berger, David Reich and Lalji Singh, (2013) “Genetic Evidence for Recent Population Mixture in India,” The American Journal of Human Genetics, 93(3):422–438. doi.org/10.1016/j.ajhg.2013.07.006. 

 

[13] Kosambi, D.D. (2012) An Introduction to the study of Indian History. Bombay: Popular Prakashan, p.370.

 

[14] Bhagavad Gita 9:32: ‘Son of Pritha,/those who seek refuge in me,/even those/ who come from evil wombs,/ or women, vaishyas,/ even shudras,/ they, too, go on/ the highest path.’ All, except the Brahmin and Kshatriya men, according to this verse from the Bhagavad Gita, ‘come from evil wombs.’ The Bhagavad Gita, trans. Laurie Patton (London: Penguin Books, 2008), 109.

 

[15] Habib, Irfan and Vijay Kumar Thakur. 2006. The Vedic Age: and the coming of Iron c.1500-700 BC. Delhi: Tukila Books, p.53

 

[16] Though I use the word ‘parasitized’ I conceive the idea of caste as being closer to the specific kind of ‘parasite’ called virus. Because, like virus, the idea of caste is inanimate but when it comes in contact with the human brain it becomes animate and spreads exponentially, causing the epidemic of caste-mindedness—an epidemic which rearranges lives, relationships, and causes grievous harm to a large segment of Indian society placed at the middle and bottom rungs of the Brahminical hierarchy.

 

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Ankur Betageri is a poet, short fiction writer and visual artist based in New Delhi. He is the author of The Bliss and Madness of Being Human (poetry, 2013) and Bhog and Other Stories (short fiction, 2010). He teaches English at Bharati College, University of Delhi. His poetry has appeared in New English Review, Mascara Literary Review and London Review of Books.

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