Strayer 6, Social Structures

12/9/2015

Just at first glance, your Strayer 5 scores look weaker than your Strayer 4 scores. Keep that in mind as you think about your approach to this chapter. Study the Varna/Jati stuff carefully, it's particularly confusing. There are lots of great opportunities for T-charts in this chapter. Consider adding another layer of reorganizing for this chapter in your study process.

The map to the left is a link.

18 Comments

Hallie Schulze

13/9/2015 20:44:10

I am currently having the "it can't possibly be this much work" moment.

Bingham

13/9/2015 22:07:42

It looks like you aren't alone!

Melissa Alter

14/9/2015 18:42:09

Alright, the Varna/Jati distinction: let's see how this goes...

The Varna castes were divided into 4 groups: Brahmin (priests/teachers), Ksatriyas (warriors/political leaders), Vaisyas (merchants), and Sudras (peasant farmers or native people initiated into subordinate positions - the caste system allowed for easily assimilation of native people). Later, the "Untouchable" caste was included, lower even than the Sudras, tasked with the most undesirable jobs. The Brahmin, Ksatriya, and Vaisya castes were thought to be "Pure Aryans" or "twice-born", once physically and once initiated into their caste. Brahmins, Ksatriyas, Vaisyas, and Sudras were thought to be the head, shoulders, thighs, and feet of the god Pushnu; the higher on the god's body, the more important the caste.

The jatis were "sub-divisions" of the Varnas and were based on occupation. The jatis, too, were ranked one above each other within the varnas - for example, the Brahmin varna was always ranked above the Ksatriya varna, but the individual jatis within the Brahmin varna had a hierarchy of their own. Additionally, the jatis were localized; people were faithful to their jatis as opposed to the state as a whole, one reason why India had only a few empires.

It is important to note that, while an individual could not change castes, the castes themselves could be given higher importance if they obeyed specific rituals.

Olivia Manning

16/9/2015 00:48:27

Hi! I think it's also important to distinguish the evolution of the varnas and the change they went through. Originally, the vaisya was commoners who cultivated the land. Then it evovled into a buisness class (as u mentioned above, the merchants). I also believe, and I may be way off, that the sudras before were just the native people incorporated into the Aryian society. Later that evovled to include peasant farmers. A question for Bingham that I now am wondering about is if the "evolved" sudras (that included peasant farmers) still were not able to partake of the rituals?

In answer to other peoples' questions, caste system is a term that describes social hierarchy with more religious terms such as creation of the universe, etc. (And this is starting to briefly touch BPQ1) CLASS-system was just used to describe the social hierarchy. (No religious ties) In addition, CASTE-systems had rigid determined social groups which gave less ability for social mobility, UNlike the CLASS-system. But, both were used to describe social hierarchy. (Looking back on this, I realize I completely answered BPQ1, not beiefly touched it. And I realize that I spelled hierarchy wrong 50 billion times. So, sorry about that.....)

Open to all comments and suggestions. Thanks!

Trevor Fu

16/9/2015 20:40:52

This is a reply to Melissa's post.
The way I viewed the varna versus the jati was that varna was determined by blood and was related to religion and also the degree of spiritual awakening, and is used in the unified area of India.
Jatis, in contrast, are more localized and are more about the occupation, similar to worker's guilds and unions.

Augustus Allen

14/9/2015 19:04:51

Hello all,

Could one of you guys help make clear the difference between the Varna/Jati systems and the caste system? (not the difference between Varna and Jati but the difference between both of those systems combined and the caste system). Is the combination of both systems considered the caste system? Or is it something else?

Benjamin Byrd link

14/9/2015 20:05:24

I think that the caste system is a term that refers to both the Varnas and the Jatis together.

Bingham

15/9/2015 07:29:11

Correct. Augustus, why don't you read Melisa's comment above?

Tuesday Haynes

15/9/2015 18:38:05

I am going to attempt the margin question comparing India's caste system and China's class system.

1) In India, at the top of the social hierarchy were spiritual leaders with religious status, while in China people with political authority were considered elites.
2) The Indian caste system divided people into many smaller groups based on locaction, occupation, and birth. Chinese social classes, however, were grouped into one of four broad categories.
3) India's caste system defined its social groups more rigidly than the Chinese, and the caste system had much less social mobility.
4) Additionally, the caste system provided a way of incorporating migrating or invading people into Indian civilization while still allowing them to retain their cultural identity. In China, becoming a part of civilization meant becoming culturally Chinese, so there was much less diversity.
5) Finally, the caste system was justified by the idea that caste was determined by deeds in past lives, while Chinese social classes were justified through the notion that anyone (in theory) could be a state official, as they were chosen based on intellect, not birth.

Morgan Levine

16/9/2015 19:02:31

Margin Question 2: What class conflicts disrupted Chinese society?
Ok, so a clear answer is that peasant rebellions periodically disrupted the state/economy and overthrew dynasties, with a prime example being the Yellow Turban Rebellion. However, I feel like there should be more here - another answer, or maybe I'm reading the question wrong. Anyone else have ideas? Does the marginalization of merchants count here?

Reuben Isaac

16/9/2015 19:29:20

The merchants being marginalized could be a disruption to the society. Merchants had a low reputation in the time period and people thought of them as greedy people who LEACHED off of the peasants little pay to become wealthy. Merchants also had backdoor relations with the elites and landlords making them transcend the different classes, giving a wildcard to the whole hierarchy system. This caused people to hate merchants more. Also you could include Wang Mang standing up to the landlords to give the peasants a more balanced wage, reduce land owned by one person, and end private slavery, all because the elites believed that peasants were the backbone to China. Because of Wang Mang's reforms conflict broke with the landlords ultimately leading to his assassination. Additionally, the unfortunate floods, droughts, and hail made the Han dynasty impose new labor laws. This caused peasants to be even more impoverished. Peasants who weren't getting enough pay resulted in forming gangs and committing crimes disturbing the social harmony.

I think those would also be conflicts between the classes of china..

Bingham

17/9/2015 06:44:01

Good answer, but you need to make your distinctions more clear.
Morgan mentioned peasant rebellions . Fine, but rebelling against whom?
Merchants versus....?
Elites versus...?

Jill Gardner

16/9/2015 19:15:29

This doesn't exactly have to do with the chapter, but I tried doing the mind maps in my notebook by hand, and I think they help a lot more that regular outline notes, which is what I did for the previous chapters. So if you are doing outline notes and aren't doing so well on the tests, I would definitely recommend trying mind maps!!

Bingham

17/9/2015 06:48:05

Good for you! That work for lots of people.

Diego

16/9/2015 21:04:56

So I tried to answer margin question #1 and I would like to know what you guys think of it

How would you describe the social hierarchy of China?

Social hierarchy on China revolved entirely around state authority. The elite class was the most desirable step of the Chinese social ladder. The state had created systems of examinations that could allow for the production of loyal officials based on morals and merits, however it favored the wealthy and powerful as only they were able to afford the education required for passing even the lower level tests. Because of this, the major driving force of Chinese society was wealth, rather than religion. Social inequalities were intensively defined, as the entire wealth of the nation belonged to the scholar gentry and merchants, both who had abused of peasant labor and leeched them of the product of their labor. While the peasants were being starved and forced to join nomad gangs, the other classes enjoyed of exuberant lifestyles and extraordinary purchasing power, particularly the landlord class.

Any thoughts?

Hallie Schulze

16/9/2015 21:29:45

BPQ #3: What philosophical, religious, or cultural ideas served to legitimate the class and gender inequalities of classical civilizations?

(I'm just going to state the main points I would make in this answer.)

-In Hinduism, you were predestined to live in the caste you were born in because of your actions in a previous life.
-The domestication of animals led to the ideas that people could be owned (slavery).
- In Christianity, the belief that Adam was created before Eve, Eve was the one to give in to temptation, etc. suggested patriarchal ideas.

Just thought I'd throw those out there and serif they are relevant.

Jordan Oakley link

16/9/2015 21:41:40

Okay, so there is a slight conflict in the book. Under the landlord sub category, it refers to landlords as scholar-gentry's, but later in the chapter it refers to them as different sections of Chinese class. Are they the same or different. If they are not the same class, what is the difference?

Bingham

17/9/2015 06:52:16

Ask me this in class. It came up yesterday too.

Strayer 6, Social Structures

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