[Goanet]Caste in Goa
## # If Goanet stops reaching you, contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] # # Want to check the archives? http://www.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet/# # Please keep your discussion/tone polite, to reflect respect to others # ## Hi Cornel, Thanks for your thoughtful article. Because you specifically requested my view on this would be helpful and informative please, I am penning this short response. I am getting ready to leave for Honk Kong for the Pan-Pacific Lung Cancer Conference next week. I am only mentioning this, because any further replies from me will be delayed for three weeks (need time to get caught upon my return) and not from disrespect to you and others participating in this thread. I hope I HAVE NOT given the impression to accommodate a Hindu belief system with a Catholic belief system. However, I am affirming the continued Goan-Hindu social-cultural practices with the Goan-Catholic social-cultural practices. These practices even confused and frustrated the European padres. (This was another reason for introducing the Inquisition in Goa to keep the native-Catholics 'in line'.) I may be opening a new can of worms!:=)) To my analysis, caste in the Hindu society is a religious AS WELL AS a social problem. Caste among Catholics in the main is a social predicament. This is not aimed to defend caste among Catholics, even as a social hindrance. We need to recognize the benefits of social and economic inter-dependence of segments of society. And as we seek to breakdown past barriers (which ironically helped dependence), we need to substitute serious alternatives for 'association' - beyond music, song, dance and scotch. These arrangements are aimed to include the like-minded. The best example is the Rotarians which were formed for business professionals to connect. While a Moose-Lodge meets the same needs for other pursuit/ economic segment of society. Do you find anything wrong with these groups? These organizations serve the same function and reflect the same human need with evolving times compared to different social groups of the yester-year. There is no room /justification for (LEGAL, RELIGIOUS and SOCIAL ENFORCED) segregation in the modern world! But without associations and network, I am concerned whether people / Goans will flourish as a society; and be successful for long, as individuals. In fact the whole concept of cyber-Goa (and village e-mail lists) is to connect within a limited (well-defined) identity. This by definition excludes others. With a very competitive world (out there!) there is little room for divisions and discord among us/ our community. But this well-defined society (like in the past) needs to understand and accept societal and individual responsibilities. The success of Goan and Indian society of the past was based on these duties and responsibilities which some of the reviewers /analysis (of this thread) have overlooked. Thanks for seeking my views on this topic. Regards, Gilbert Cornel: I am also puzzled that you seem to be prepared to accommodate a Hindu belief system with a Catholic belief system. I know all about syncreticism etc but refuse to accept the wishy washy view that one can be a bit of both. As you will know, this point was emphasised in one or more of Goanet posts and your view on this would be helpful and informative please. Do tell me what you feel about this concern, and also, whether you can see any linkage, whatsoever, between caste oppression in Goa or anywhere else, and oppression through female circumcision. Both have long histories/ justifications, but is there room for either in the modern world?
Re: [Goanet]Caste in Goa
## # If Goanet stops reaching you, contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] # # Want to check the archives? http://www.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet/# # Please keep your discussion/tone polite, to reflect respect to others # ## Dear Gilbert, It is becoming hard to keep up with the current rush of posts on caste which I initiated, but I do hope that too much time has not elapsed since your post on Caste in Goa. What is becoming quite interesting to note (as per Fred), is that our experiences of being Goan are quite different in different parts of the world. Your posts particularly suggest to me, that you for one, have had a distinctly 'sheltered' Goan experience (until more recently perhaps) compared to many other Goans. I can tell you however, that caste practice among the Goans in East Africa, was horrendously bad for those at the receiving end of derision even though I did not personally experience it myself. Specific groups like the Tailors (among others) were treated like outcasts and excluded from membership of clubs called Goan Institutes and Gymkhanas. Thus, although such clubs called themselves 'Goan', they were really only for some Goans through firm exclusionary practices. This forced the tailors, in particular, to form their own social associations which were, enlightendly, open to all Goans. They also provided valuable accommodation for short periods. Above all, they maintained a sound link with the Konkani language in contrast to the Institutes which totally distanced themselves from our mother-tongue. In Nairobi, even the schools catered largely by caste, albeit with occupational linkages. Now, I'd like you to envisage yourself as the son of one of these identified as inferior groups i.e. not worthy of membership of the mainstream Goan clubs/institutions. How do you think your parents explained or rationalised such exclusionary practice? How do you think the son or daughter ( however bright academically) felt about being inferiorised in the circumstances. Well, I have explored this issue in considerable depth and I can assure you that there are a lot of very sore Goans, (including superb sportsmen and women) and their children, who are utterly dismissive about being Goan and would never step into profoundly casteist Goa because caste made them so second class once and they would not want it done to them again. And as we well know, Goa excels at casteising all Goans! The irony was that there were cases, where by way of example, one Goan would have internalised the absolute humbug of caste, was just about literate and engaged in minimalist clerical work, and at best, could just afford a bicycle for transport, but would be in a position to bar, from Goan Institute membership, a highly literate and successful businessman running a flourishing tailoring establisment, and driving a classy Mercedes! The impediment to this scenario was clearly generated by caste thinking and practice which has been ever so loathsome to many a Goan. It is this factor of casteist social differentiation among Goans which has made Goans so dysfunctionally antagonistic towards each other. I am therefore puzzled that you think this is not so and that there is something else inherent in the Goan psyche which makes us, often, somehow intolerant of other Goans. Please try and believe me dear Gilbert, that caste in theory and practice is the father and mother of all our woes as Catholic Goans. The sooner this can be acknowledged/recognised, the sooner it can be eradicated for the better of all Goans. I am also puzzled that you seem to be prepared to accommodate a Hindu belief system with a Catholic belief system. I know all about syncreticism etc but refuse to accept the wishy washy view that one can be a bit of both. As you will know, this point was emphasised in one or more of Goanet posts and your view on this would be helpful and informative please. On another point, while you probably would reject racism in the USA because its practice would immediately impinge on your own situation, I am puzzled that you can you be soft on an even more insidious form of racism which is caste. Let me add that, in most countries in the West, following the intensive study of race after the advent of Hitler's racist policy and agenda, the UN declared, unambiguously, that races of man do not exist and that we are all part of one human race. This has been followed up by thousands of race awareness programmes and of anti-racist teaching worldwide. In exactly the same way, good progress is being made about anti-casteism because caste is racism per se, originating in mainly one corner of the world. From memory, I can recall the major UN conference in Durban, around 2001 on progress against racism, but where unfortunately, the Indian delegation managed to take the racist issue of
[Goanet]Caste in Goa
## # If Goanet stops reaching you, contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] # # Want to check the archives? http://www.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet/# # Please keep your discussion/tone polite, to reflect respect to others # ## Hi Cornel and Fred, I will place my views on Goan caste of yester-year as a separate post. However, my honest question to both of you is: Are the attitudes in Goan society (that we see TODAY) a function of caste OR is it a function of every Goan saying and thinking he/she is smarter and superior to the next Goan? One of the posts outlined the conversation where-in between four or five questions the respondent is 'placed by their strata' in society. Of course that is the case in 40% of cases. But when that does not do the trick, the questioning goes further. Remember all bamons are not created equally.:=)) How far from the church is your house? Which hospital were you born in? Which school did you go to? How big is your home? (in the west- Its how many bedrooms you have?) What car do you drive? Who are your relatives? Were you in Africa and where? :=)). Etc. Then they will show you their superiority by recounting their family tree and they perhaps come from the Proffessoracehm ghor.:=)):=)). If one is the sibling, the superiority is derived from being the oldest boy or girl or just older sibling. And then there will be the aunt who will hint she is superior to you because she taught you all you know - in the V standard. (No ree baba?) So what divides Goans today is not caste but often just the dysfunctionality of (sadly many) individuals. Just my view. Regards. Cornel: Dear Gilbert, With regard to the discussion on caste in Catholic Goa, re your post, I see no confusion being caused by Fred or by me. We are simply having an open debate in a democratic forum. However, if I am right, I detect some discomfiture in you over the debate and should like to ask you to note that whenever people try to make changes to the status quo, those who stand to gain from the status quo use all sorts of bogus justifications to resist change and I draw your attention to just three examples, from thousands, for reasons of brevity: Rather than be critical, I should like to welcome you warmly, to join us please, in fighting and eradicating the evil of caste which has so afflicted and oppressed generations of Catholic Goans. The issue in question is as simple as that. Warm regards, Cornel.
Re: [Goanet]Caste in Goa
## # If Goanet stops reaching you, contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] # # Want to check the archives? http://www.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet/# # Please keep your discussion/tone polite, to reflect respect to others # ## Dear Gilbert, With regard to the discussion on caste in Catholic Goa, re your post, I see no confusion being caused by Fred or by me. We are simply having an open debate in a democratic forum. However, if I am right, I detect some discomfiture in you over the debate and should like to ask you to note that whenever people try to make changes to the status quo, those who stand to gain from the status quo use all sorts of bogus justifications to resist change and I draw your attention to just three examples, from thousands, for reasons of brevity: The South African Government opposed resistance to apartheid on the grounds that individuals like Nelson Mandela, and Walter Sisulu were misguided terrorists and communists. Indeed, they locked them up for decades and they were lucky to avoid the death penalty. Yet today, Mandela is virtually a living saint in the eyes of the world and the evil of apartheid has been consigned to the dustbin of history. Mahatma Gandhi was derided by Winston Churchill and his ilk, as that naked fakir challenging the might of the British Empire. Gandhi, is today applauded, albeit not by all, as a great moralist and crusader for freedom and liberty. Martin Luther King in the USA was deemed to be a great danger to the whites in seeking freedom for the blacks and thus all Americans. Indeed, he was shot dead not too long after making one of the greatest speeches of all time ..'I have a dream...' Thanks to brave souls like him, the USA, now the homeland of so many newcomers since the 1960s, allows them a democratic and political voice which had been denied to visible minorities for many decades. Rather than be critical, I should like to welcome you warmly, to join us please, in fighting and eradicating the evil of caste which has so afflicted and oppressed generations of Catholic Goans. The issue in question is as simple as that. Warm regards, Cornel
[Goanet]Caste in Goa
## # If Goanet stops reaching you, contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] # # Want to check the archives? http://www.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet/# # Please keep your discussion/tone polite, to reflect respect to others # ## Gilbert Lawrence responds: Fred and a few others may be causing 'borem confusaum' on this topic. When we talk about caste, there are some well defined terminologies and groups. First Fred negates that it is, Brahmin-versus-Chardo battle in Goa. But then he goes on to add, in reality, a jostling for posting among the two dominant groups. Of course he does not mention the groups. I think Fred and others are referring to a dynamic society where individuals and social groups are being competitive and even aggressive. And that may be good for them as well as good for Goa. If unethical, that may be bad. This 'group vitality' is a universal phenomenon. This is not a 'caste issue'; which has it own historical and cultural baggage- as Cornell and Gonsalves point out. So those participating in this discussion need to define their semantics. Or else we may be going round in circles. Ami Goenkars murree!!! This is best exemplified in a few posts including the article describing 'ground reality'. Anecdotal examples, urban legends and Goencho kaneos are a poor substitute for science / surveys that depicts CURRENT cultural /social practice. If we are going to make strong statements convicting individuals, institutions or sections of a community, we have to present the demographic patterns and not discount the statistics to keep it simple. Every community has its bigots, chauvinists and extremist elements. There are some Goans who may still believe that the earth is flat. This does not make it a cultural trait. Tujem sangok sarkem assa ki amcho Goemkaramcho ekvott nam mhunn. Regards. Gilbert Lawrence Fred Noronha: You're presuming (as did the dominant Catholic discourse for at least a century prior to 1961) that caste is a Brahmin-versus-Chardo battle in Goa. It's a lot more complex than that, and it's not just who battles for the top spot in the hierarchy, but how the system affects a whole lot of others who might belong to neither of these two castes. One could also add that some of the anti-caste posturing is, in reality, a jostling for posting among the two dominant groups at the 'top' end of the pile. Gilbert Lawrence: I would like to hear about a Chardo/non-Brahmin Harvard MBA being turned down for marriage in exchange for a Brahmin school drop-out.
