Marriage and the crisis of peasant society in Gujarat, India

Abstract

This contribution takes marriage as the example of a crisis of production and reproduction in rural India. Through the juxtaposition of ethnography separated by six decades, we detail a shift away from land and agriculture as the primary markers of status among the Patidars of central Gujarat, western India, in favour of a hierarchical understanding of international migration. The paper discusses the disconnect between a cultural revolution in favour of migration, and the failure of many to live up to their own cultural standards. More broadly, we reflect on the forces that simultaneously strengthen and dissolve caste inequality in the context of India's uneven growth