The traditional Kerala women of Nair community had a place of importance in the system,mainly because it was a Matrileneal community.
But how much freedom of choice did she have? It was the 'Karanavar' who was in power.
Deepak,'Liberation' is many things to many people. :)
I think Jay is confused between cause and effect.
Karanavar was representing his family in front of other communities, never inside the family.
I would like to know the income source of this specific community. In Indian caste system, every caste and subcaste had (and has up to a large extend) a specific role of satisfying a social requirement, irrespective of the genuineness of that requirement. In kerala, brahmins had the 'business of god', Ambalavasi's were assisting brahmins, Ezhavas were producing toddy (of cource consuming also) and doing miscellaneous agricultural related jobs, Karuvans were producing iron tools, Pulayas were the Karshakathozhilalikal etc. Coming out of Hinduism, Christians and Muslims had very specific roles in society.
What was the role of Jay's matrilineal community in Kerala society. They claim that they were the soldiers and fuedals. But, please note that even sir CP had a military of around only 5000 Nair soldiers while kerala should be having not less than half a crore of them now. Their fuedal history started very recently.
Soldiers and feudals cannot create a matrilineal society as both these systems are primarily patriarchal. Lineage of a system is decided by the source of food (and in modern terms, income) in any society. In our gods own country and Vivekanandan's Branthalayam, Only elder namboodiri was allowed to get married (in social terms). Younger brothers had to find their own ways to satisfy biological needs and this made the rise of a matriarchal and matrilineal society. But unlike similar societies outside kerala, they started to manipulate the power politics and eventually became the most powerful political community of Kerala. It may be worth noting that this is the only matriarchal matrilineal community in the world.
Jay wrote “The traditional Kerala women of Nair community had a place of importance in the system,mainly because it was a Matrileneal community.”.
This is a clean example of understanding effect as cause. Nair community became matrilineal because women of the community had a place of importance in the system, not vice versa.
I don't forget the contributions of this society to modern kerala. But, if dig into these contributions, you will find that these are done by the people who came out of this community and joined in the main stream. As a society, they were always against all the progressive things in kerala. They were against Land reforms, against nationalization, against public education, manipulated Vimochanasamaram, supported caste system; They were always Out-Hereding their Herods – Namboodiris.
Seeing the one and only example of matriarchal matrilineal community, I am desperate to see that the women on power or having direct access to the power always behaves in the same way. We have individual examples from Imelda Marcos - Indira Gandhi – Jayalalitha to the grass root level - our Kerala Vanitha Police. Anybody has an experience to go to kerala women cells to complaint on a women issue? If not, you should go there at least once!!! Are women really concerned about others? Is it an intrinsic property for them to be self centered?
This is a vast subject and beyond the scope of this thread. I just started it and willing to accept all kind of views and criticism. I may be wrong (and I hope if I were). We can consider starting a new thread for this discussion. Print media will never dare to discuss this kind of a sensitive issue as it may burn their fingers. Let's use the potential and celebrate the democratic nature of web media.
Subscribe to Tharjani
I think Jay is confused between cause and effect.
Karanavar was representing his family in front of other communities, never inside the family.
I would like to know the income source of this specific community. In Indian caste system, every caste and subcaste had (and has up to a large extend) a specific role of satisfying a social requirement, irrespective of the genuineness of that requirement. In kerala, brahmins had the 'business of god', Ambalavasi's were assisting brahmins, Ezhavas were producing toddy (of cource consuming also) and doing miscellaneous agricultural related jobs, Karuvans were producing iron tools, Pulayas were the Karshakathozhilalikal etc. Coming out of Hinduism, Christians and Muslims had very specific roles in society.
What was the role of Jay's matrilineal community in Kerala society. They claim that they were the soldiers and fuedals. But, please note that even sir CP had a military of around only 5000 Nair soldiers while kerala should be having not less than half a crore of them now. Their fuedal history started very recently.
Soldiers and feudals cannot create a matrilineal society as both these systems are primarily patriarchal. Lineage of a system is decided by the source of food (and in modern terms, income) in any society. In our gods own country and Vivekanandan's Branthalayam, Only elder namboodiri was allowed to get married (in social terms). Younger brothers had to find their own ways to satisfy biological needs and this made the rise of a matriarchal and matrilineal society. But unlike similar societies outside kerala, they started to manipulate the power politics and eventually became the most powerful political community of Kerala. It may be worth noting that this is the only matriarchal matrilineal community in the world.
Jay wrote “The traditional Kerala women of Nair community had a place of importance in the system,mainly because it was a Matrileneal community.”.
This is a clean example of understanding effect as cause. Nair community became matrilineal because women of the community had a place of importance in the system, not vice versa.
I don't forget the contributions of this society to modern kerala. But, if dig into these contributions, you will find that these are done by the people who came out of this community and joined in the main stream. As a society, they were always against all the progressive things in kerala. They were against Land reforms, against nationalization, against public education, manipulated Vimochanasamaram, supported caste system; They were always Out-Hereding their Herods – Namboodiris.
Seeing the one and only example of matriarchal matrilineal community, I am desperate to see that the women on power or having direct access to the power always behaves in the same way. We have individual examples from Imelda Marcos - Indira Gandhi – Jayalalitha to the grass root level - our Kerala Vanitha Police. Anybody has an experience to go to kerala women cells to complaint on a women issue? If not, you should go there at least once!!! Are women really concerned about others? Is it an intrinsic property for them to be self centered?
This is a vast subject and beyond the scope of this thread. I just started it and willing to accept all kind of views and criticism. I may be wrong (and I hope if I were). We can consider starting a new thread for this discussion. Print media will never dare to discuss this kind of a sensitive issue as it may burn their fingers. Let's use the potential and celebrate the democratic nature of web media.
Deepak