I guess that I should explicitly add that I am not from India. Cross-cultural communications can be a bit difficult at times and I'd rather not make blunders like that.
> Do you feel threatened when a coworker asks about where you are from? It's something I do ask from time to time (not during interviews obviously, but during lunch for example) out of pure curiosity. Should I stop?
I think its a fair question. Its not as much about where a person is from but "what caste they belong to" type of stuff that might be offensive.
So no, Muslim/Islam religion hasn’t escaped caste trap in India. There are upper caste, lower caste etc. For instance, leather/tanning work is typically done by lower caste Muslims compared to say a merchant.
Let me further drive home my point. “Lingayat” is a religion created explicitly to be outside of caste system. To an extent they consider themselves to be of a different religion from Hinduism. Though superficially you can’t tell the difference because culturally they are very similar to Hinduism. But after a few centuries, Lingayats now have their own caste hierarchy. Almost parallel to Hindu caste system.
https://karepass.cgg.gov.in/CasteReport.do?actionParameter=C...
Although it's not always that straightfoward. In Gujarat, Muslims used to be able to "cancel" caste pollution - that is, if you touched a Dalit and then touched a Muslim you wouldn't have to purify yourself.
Speaking as a Muslim, the way the Indian society perceives us, we are the lowest of the lowest castes.
Muslims themselves perceive our layer as fairly flat. This is mostly because most muslims themselves have been caste refugees to a new religion(Islam) in the past. And for the better wouldn't want to go back to that history.
1 ) https://theprint.in/opinion/indias-muslim-community-under-a-...
2) https://www.opindia.com/2020/10/muslim-social-hierarchy-cast...
3) https://theprint.in/opinion/pasmanda-muslims-missing-from-po...
4) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lENVbLrJOQw
5) https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/we-need-a-caste-censu...
6) https://www.deccanherald.com/opinion/dilip-kumar-the-gardene...
7) https://thewire.in/caste/lower-caste-muslims-in-up-forge-new...
Emancipation of the Dalit Muslims hasn't yet occurred, Hindu-Muslim binary contributes to this oppression of Pasmanda and Dalit/ lower caste Muslims.
The oppressor can never understand the pain of the oppressed. How many lower caste Muslims ruled India? Why 90% of the Muslims politicians are upper caste ashrafs/syeeds? Ashraf hegemony must end.
Dad started with manual labor work, and things like cutting wood in forests when he started. Retired as a taxi driver.
Not seen any caste system in muslims, let alone discrimination of any kind. Looks like desparate attempt from Hindus to drag muslims into this just to be able to say 'Its not just us'.
Just read the oppression Indian lower caste untouchable Muslims face in India.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasmanda_Muslim_Mahaz
Upper caste dominant ashraf/sayeed Muslims in India have tried to label the people of the Mahaz as "un-Islamic heretics", which is a form of propaganda against them. Same is the case in Pakistan.
We all are Muslims and we don't have castes. Unless it's about an upper-caste Muslim woman marrying a lower caste untouchable muslim.
But invisible cultural barriers exist when it comes to language even though caste barriers have gone away.
https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/mumbai/matrimonial-ad-s...
I don't think you should stop asking people where they are from. But perhaps don't interrogate them (we get enough of that at airports), implying that they're obstructing their true origin from you. Also, tone matters, whether you like it or not. Saying "where are you from" can sound genuinely curious, but it can easily sound disgusted and derogatory.
On any implied caste system, I can speak for the London tech startup world in which I've worked for several years. I've probably had dozens of (South) Asian colleagues and have never noticed the slightest hint of intra-Asian racism or classism.
Based on the fact that you took some (minor) offense to the followup questions, I'm assuming you're middle-class or higher?
I've spent a decent chunk of my adult life living in working class, high-immigrant areas (Noble Park and Sunshine, to any other Melbournians - both actually really nice places).
What struck me as interesting is that in these environments, probing about one's ethnicity is nothing more than smalltalk. Everybody has one; they're curious about yours and will ask directly.
In more upper-middle-class environments, though, it can be really taken the other way as ethnicity is something semi-taboo that needs to be treated far more carefully.
Working class racism certainly exists and can be very nasty, but it's not endemic and casual in the way it can be among the middle classes.
One possible explanation is that the working classes know they're at the bottom of the heap, while the middle classes are much more finely tuned to differentiation markers of all kinds.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/mar/07/white-...
Possibly I was offending some folks in Australia.. in 2022, as a white man without Mediterranean roots, I'd probably not say your username out loud in either country :)
If you'd like, I'd be more than happy to print you off a W-word pass. :P
I never ask, as I don't want to offend, however I am often quite curious. Not because I doubt anyone's claim to being British - most British Indians are likely more British than I am. Usually, I just want to talk about food, ask if you've been to India, hear your life experiences, reminisce about when I visited India, etc.
One of my favourite work relationships was with an older Indian man who, when he found out I was vegetarian and liked Indian food, he would bring me food his wife had made and give me recipes to cook myself. Sadly he died of Covid, but I still cook the recipes he gave me often - albeit with less ghee.
I feel like it's a little sad that racists have made it hard to talk about any issue touching on ethnicity without worrying that one may be coming from a place of hatred or aggression. My girlfriend is a Filipina so I can pick up the accent, and when I was making small talk with someone I asked if they were from the Philippines. They said yes, but instantly clammed up and didn't really talk to me for the rest of the interaction. But hey, I'm autistic so maybe I'm misunderstanding what I did wrong.
The majority of the time it isn't asked from a place of genuine curiosity but as a way of boxing you in and "other"ing you. I shouldn't need to justify my existence to you just because my skin color stands out.
Also restricting your exploration to just food topics doesn't make you curious or cultured. There's more to experiencing a culture than looking up a recipe online, going to an "authentic" restaurant or going backpacking while surrounded by expats of a similar cultural background as you.
Ultimately I'm not a zoo animal for you to poke or probe at. I'm a complicated individual with my own personal story just like you are & I deserve the same respect I give you.
How would you feel if I just met you and started interrogating you on whether you are an Angle, Saxon or a Jute?
Now how would you feel if every single non-white person you met asked you this dozens of times over the span of a decade?
Obviously I can't know what it's like to be asked this kind of thing constantly for years, but I can say that travelling in non-white countries as a white person, you do get asked that kind of stuff a lot (or people touch my hair, beard, talk about how tall I am etc.). Or stuff about Scotland or the royal family. I've never minded, but perhaps after years it would get annoying.
As far as I understand it from Americans I know, quite a few people in the US have a fascination with where their, and others', ancestors came from, so it could be a fairly innocuous question. Pretty much any American I know would happily rattle off an answer of 'oh, I'm half Irish, a quarter French, and a quarter Spanish' or something similar.
Here in the UK, even though we're also a nation of immigrants and invaders throughout history, there is much more of an attitude of 'people whose ancestors have always been here' ('British') versus 'immigrants' ('not really British') - even if the 'immigrants' are from families who have also been here for generations.
So yeah. Generally 'but where are you really from?' means something a little like 'I don't believe that you're one of us people who have always been here'. Whether that's malicious or just naive depends on the person, but I can imagine it gets pretty tiring.
(I'm the son of a Chinese immigrant, but due to my other parent being Scottish I pass for white and thus I've never actually been asked the question!)
I'll ask "Where are you from?" as a way to understand someone's heritage only if it's obvious, from accent or other markers, that they are literally from another country.
I like learning more about people and the world so I like to ask people about where they’re from. The immigrants I’ve spoken to are proud of their heritage and don’t take offense. I have noticed though that their descendants can take offense, perhaps because they take it as implying they’re somehow inauthentic. All that’s required is a little delicacy. Instead of asking “where are you really from” instead ask something like “it sounds like your family has a really interesting story, would you like to tell me about it?”
California withdrew it's Cisco case but you wont' see any coverage of that here.
https://thewire.in/caste/california-drops-caste-discriminati...
I am from India and have been in the US for more than a decade.
I come from a low caste. The only folks who have asked about my caste and asked if I am from a higher caste are white Americans due to my vegetarianism (voluntary for ethical reasons).
> Do you feel threatened when a coworker asks about where you are from?
No, not at all.
But I did get upset when my PhD advisor (a white American) wanted to know if I was from the priestly class.
There is definitely casteism in India, but I have not seen it in Silicon Valley.
Casteism is there in India and is unfortunately widespread but steadily disappearing. India's PM and President are from lower castes but you won't see coverage of that in Western news.
Because other Indians will identify your caste based on your last name, food habits, dialect, your family business (etc). They don't need to ask you.
False. This is a broad generalization. Some large states in India use paternal names as last names.
> they assume my caste based on how I look
I'm curious in this comment, are you dressing up a certain way that is typical of brahmin, or are there some other characteristics that makes you look brahmin?
These patterns are often used by people as a shorthand for categorizing another's relative caste and often as the basis for discrimination.
At a very broad generalization, upper caste individuals tend to skew more toward more west asian, and less regional/indigenous phenotypes.
The trait most strongly associated with higher caste is fairer complexion, which is the basis of great deal of South Asian discrimination, and has ancient roots reaching back millennia, though it was reinforced by colonial powers. There are many exceptions to this though, and a lot of stories about people being misidentified as one caste it the other on the basis of complexion.
People pay close attention to this because phenotypes are a type of currency, especially in matters related to marriage and community identification, and also power relationships.
He wants a cultural genocide, not a biological one.
If every Ukrainian tomorrow declared themselves Russian, Putin would be ecstatic. Compare a Dalit declaring himself Brahmin.
One man's crisis is another opportunity. I wonder how hard it is to enter the Ukraine now and then cross to Europe with no papers as a 'refugee, formerly expat-student.'
They want to go back to India, not go stay in another European country. What do you think they are going to do when they arrive in another EU country? They can't stay there as refugee since they have Indian passport and India isn't fighting some war. Also being refugee is no fun either. I can't believe some people feel like there is some fun to walk over to a country without any resource and legal means and stay there as a refugee.
Even if what you are saying is true, what do you expect is the solution? Keep them all in Ukraine and let them die in some war which they have nothing to do with.
Arm them and bus them to the frontlines, pour encourager les autres?
Some brahmins have lighter skin and brown eyes compared to average Indian who has brown/dark brown skin and black eyes. So some brahmins think they are different(better) to other Indians and prefer to marry amongst their own kind.
For this reason, my state got rid of surnames ~50 years ago. It sure is inconvenient in some places: I have to explain that I don't have a last name and that they're calling me by my father's first name. But given the pros, I don't know why the other states haven't followed suit
Severe defensiveness. Not trying to undermine testimony, but life is a spectrum. On the spectrum of all testimonies, there is without a doubt corroborating testimonies that are the result of trauma.
I’ll give an example. I’m an alcoholic. There are times my shame is so great that even in random stores where I go to buy some beer, I can feel eyes on me as if the whole world knows I’m an alcoholic. It’s an intense feeling of guilt and shame. Other examples of this are imposter syndrome arising from being doubted. If you ever been doubted in any meaningful way, you can palpably feel the doubt on your skin in new situations - all from past trauma. But in reality, no one may be doubting you in these new situations.
I would not be surprised if a majority of them were based in India, or based in the US but working for an Indian company (similar to Chinese companies in Italy, who set up factories with exclusively Chinese workers to make leather purses that can be stamped with "Made in Italy").
I don't think any one would be threatened by asking where they are from, even in India unless you grew up around in the same state or region, location is not a nuance (in the caste sense) you would be able to easily get. For example some one from the south, won't know anything about punjabi castes or where they hail from, even one state over it is hard to know they would usually speak a different language after all.
A foreigner asking is generally not considered threatening, they however might be worried you would say something to another indian colleague without understanding the implication and that can be difficult for them.
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Most of the article is certainly true, it is important to note that all groups discriminate not just ones on top, disproportionately high representation of forward communities among the Indian diaspora makes it seem it similar to black racism here it is more complex than that [1]
There many groups collectively known as dalits, form one end of the spectrum, other castes form the middle, and forward/dominating castes a the end, every group discriminates against everyone else, and there are sub groups within groups. family, lineage, language, color, religion[2], region and dozen other factors to break into further sub groups.
It shouldn't be that surprising, India as country has as much or more diversity and double the population of Europe. You find similar discrimination of Europeans too, by country (Poland,Serbia etc), region of a country, language (Catalans), groups (gypsies) race/skin, religion (even with Christianity: Catholic, orthodox, Protestants etc ) and so on and on.
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[1] This happens because these groups have access to more funding/ education, relatives already living give a boost and so on
[2] Caste is not limited to Hindus, there are plenty of communities where you will find mix of Hindus and Christians, or Muslims , depending who is dominant the others would be discriminated
In some cases the village might indicate one's caste. In most cases, it does not.
If two Indians are from the same region, they know the demographic of that region pretty well.
So, that might be revelatory. But this is only true for some regions in India where villages are segregated.
Most villages in India are not segregated, i.e. Brahmins, upper-caste (they call themselves that), general castes, Dalits live together. But the neighborhoods are often segregated. But they do go to the same schools.
But as you are not an Indian, whether the one being asked is a Brahmin or a Dalit, will not tell you his village name- simply because you will not know it.
And in megacities, people from every caste are there.
As someone from outside India, you can safely ask where someone is from. They will probably tell you- "Mumbai" or "a small village near Delhi". No risk there.
Never ever ask people their caste.
As such I don't really feel particularly threatened by being asked where I'm from. I do have a bias towards groups with more diverse teams (ie not just Indians) but that's more about enjoying the cultural exchange that comes with that instead of the homogeneity and conflict that can come from staying within one's own cultural influence.
If anything I've seen much more nepotism than casteism.
- Have found regional identities to be stronger than others. Some regional identities based on languages and ability to form together as a group are much stronger than others (Punjabis, Gujaratis and last decade or 2, Telugu people)
- Some communities in India like business communities of Jains and Marwaris are quite closed like Jewish folks in some instances. They do not allow other folks inside their sanctum
- Fights are mostly a symptom of other issues - limited resources, significant population and a lot of it are kept alive by the democratic nature of the country where politicians exploit the divisions
- Affirmative action has made it much easier for people for downtrodden communities (SC, ST) to get Govt jobs, promotions etc. However a lot of these benefits are only accruing to second and third generation of privileged people from their caste and festers resentment in middle class whether urban or otherwise including myself who is classified as OBC (Other backward classes) which is one of the most illogical way of grouping people as any. A lot of OBCs have a lot of land and wield a lot of power
I just want to say that the issue is very complicated and also has a lot of colonial influence still hanging around it to this day. Having said that, things are so much better than what they were 3-4 decades ago based upon my conversation with family elders.
PS. - Anecdata. I was rejected by many SC/ST i.e. women from backward castes in arranged marriage website because they did not want to lose the "privilege" affirmative action will bring to their children. Ultimately I had to find someone from my own caste. My attempt to be open minded and different fell flat on its face.
This is true with European names too (masson, taylor, carpenter, miller ....), and has the exact same origin.
However, today due to the politicization first by the colonialists and the church, and now mostly by a leftist-church nexus it has become politically incorrect if it feels like they have an agenda behind it.
Strangely at least among the current generation, I have experienced probing questions about my diet as well as probing hands (pretending to be a friendly shove or pat) not from Hindus but from Christians.
In my understanding it is a way for them to ensure that I am not an "evil Brahmin" and can be trusted enough to part take in what every gossip they have and an assumption I would have to submissively accept their "righteousness".
India is a diverse country with many subcultures, each with their own unique traditions dating back many thousands of years.
Why should everyone loose their unique identity?
Why should people not be proud of their identity or uniqueness?
A lot of privileges that the "Brahmins" have can be mostly attributed to the fact that they were not competing with the colonial interests like business and were used as native informants and peons & clerks.
This gave them a head start compared to the rest of the population who were reduced to penury and in many case ended up as substitutes for black slavery in the form of bonded labourers.
So in using the caste card people are covering up the devastating effects of colonisation.
The privileges held by the colonising classes and collaborators, esp. Christians as they gobbled up enormous amounts of state resources, temple lands in the form colonial grants and 99 year lease to the church. Yet it is politically incorrect to point out these privileges.
Nonsense.
> and their caste is also obvious from their last name
What exactly do you suggest be done about this?
It is a well known fact that the primary form of caste discrimination occurs against lower castes by upper castes. Your attempts at subterfuge are futile.
Of all the things you found out of line is my comment calling out one of these lies.
If you are engaging in good faith, you would be replying to any of the several lies being trotted out in this thread, such as "caste system was created by British and Indian Christians via colonialism" instead of expressing hostility to somebody who is countering the lies - by trying to make some irrelevant meta point to distract from the core issue.
Going back to the original comment- I was making it clear that nobody needs to pat someone on the back to figure out if they are brahmins - you can tell from the last names.
I dont really know the castes of my friends except Brahmins, because they keep informing me.
1. Tamil brahmins - any domestic post on Facebook has a reference to the "TamBram" community.
2. My manager informed me once that the reason he was light skinned while south Indian was because his ancestors were north Indian brahmins who moved to the south to work as priests. I never asked him about his skin color. He brought it up himself.
3. One of my peers - a maharashtrian brahmin explained to me how his particular brahmin subcaste was even superior to other brahmins because of some XYZ reason. I didn't know he was a Brahmin before this.
There are several more instances. Of course, there must be brahmins amongst my friends where I don't know about their caste. But the only friends who have brought up their caste voluntarily were brahmins.
Yes, this is called selection bias. In what context did your friends talk about their caste?
I'm still not sure what you suggest about people's last names. This is not unique, it's also true for the last names of all sorts of people who have faced discrimination or discriminated against others - "white" people can be eg. Jewish, Irish, Italian, Anglo, German etc and there are names common to each of those groups.
Asking people to change their names is quite a heavy lift and impractical - I know some parts of India have historically made it easy for people to drop their last names and move to a system similar to Iceland where each generation uses the their parents' names as their last name.
And I have not asked anyone to change their name. All I did was refute the fake allegation against the Indian Christians patting the back of brahmins to figure out their caste. For anyone coming from India this is a hilariously absurd lie.
If you are offend by them carrying their tradition or culture that they have inherited for 100s of generation.
How would you then think of Indians named John or Mohamed? You know that, these political religions spread almost exclusively through violence and colonisation.
India is a strange country where it is ok to engage in hate against indigenous people/culture, yet political incorrect to even speak of the violent history of Christianity or Islam.
You are perhaps engaging in the same kind of hate the Nazis spread of the jews.
This is again pseudo history peddled by the RSS. Another instance of Hindu exceptionalism. This is completely counter to actual history and is a lie propagated by the Indian right wing. You should talk to an actual historian instead of relying on WhatsApp forwards by RSS.
> You are perhaps engaging in the same kind of hate the Nazis spread of the jews.
Re: Godwin's law.