European University Institute Library

Beef, Brahmins, and broken men, an annotated critical selection from the Untouchables, B.R. Ambedkar ; edited and annotated by Alex George and S. Anand ; introduction by Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

eng

Includes bibliographical references and index

index present

non fiction

Beef, Brahmins, and broken men

bibliography

1158541017

B.R. Ambedkar ; edited and annotated by Alex George and S. Anand ; introduction by Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

an annotated critical selection from the Untouchables

"One of twentieth-century India's great polymaths, statesmen, and militant philosophers of equality, B. R. Ambedkar spent his life battling Untouchability and instigating the end of the caste system. Here, Ambedkar offers a deductive, and at times a speculative, history to propose a genealogy of Untouchability. He contends that modern-day Dalits are descendants of those Buddhists who were fenced out of caste society and rendered Untouchable by a resurgent Brahminism since the fourth century BCE. The Brahmins, whose Vedic cult originally involved the sacrifice of cows, adapted Buddhist ahimsa and vegetarianism to stigmatize outcaste Buddhists who were consumers of beef. The outcastes were soon relegated to the lowliest of occupations and prohibited from participation in civic life. To unearth this lost history, Ambedkar undertakes a forensic examination of a wide range of Brahminic literature. Heavily annotated with an emphasis on putting Ambedkar and recent scholarship into conversation, Beef, Brahmins, and Broken Men assumes urgency as India witnesses unprecedented violence against Dalits and Muslims in the name of cow protection." --, Provided by publisher

adult