1. Define sex ratio.
2. What do you understand by the term ‘Dependency Ratio’?
3. Define the term Varna.
4. Differentiate between Endogamy & Exogamy.
5. Define Total Fertility Rate? What is required minimum TFR to attain the replacement level?
6. Write a short note on Savitriba Phule.
7. Why did Malthus believe that Catastrophic events like famines and epidemics that cause mass deaths were inevitable?
8. Literacy varies across gender, regions and social groups. Explain.
9. What changes were brought by the British Colonists in the Caste System? Enumerate with suitable examples.
VALUE POINTS
1. Sex ratio: number of females per 1000 males in a given area at a specified time period.
2. Dependency ratio: proportion of dependents (elderly people and children) with working age group (i.e. 15 - 64years).
3. Varna, literally ‘colour’, is the name given to a four-fold division of society into brahmana, kshatriya, vaishya and shudra.
4. Endogamy:- Marriage take place in between the families of same caste.
Exogamy:- Marriage takes place in between the families of different caste.
5. Total fertility rate: it refers to the total number of live births that a hypothetical woman would have if she lived through the reproductive age group and had the average number of babies in each segment of this age group as determined by the agespecific fertility rates for that area. The required TFR is 2.1
6. Savitri Bai Phule was the first headmistress of the country’s first school for girls in Pune. She devoted her life to educating Shudras and Ati-Shudras. She started a night school for agriculturists and labourers. She died while serving plague patients.
7. Malthus believed that catastrophic events like famines and epidemics cause mass deaths.
These catastrophic events were inevitable because they were nature’s way of dealing with the imbalance between food supply and increasing population.
8. Literacy varies considerably across gender, across regions, and across social groups. . However, female literacy has been rising faster than male literacy, partly because it started from relatively low levels. Literacy rates also vary by social group – historically disadvantaged communities like the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have lower rates of literacy, and rates of female literacy within these groups are even lower. Regional variations are still very wide, with states like Kerala approaching universal literacy, while states like Bihar are lagging far behind. The inequalities in the literacy rate are specially important because they tend to reproduce inequality across generations. Illiterate parents are at a severe disadvantage in ensuring that their children are well educated, thus perpetuating existing inequalities.
9. The present form of caste as a social institution has been
shaped very strongly by both the colonial period as well as the rapid changes that have come about in independent India. Scholars have agreed that all major social institutions and specially the institution of caste underwent major changes during the colonial period. In fact, some scholars argue that what we know today as caste is more a product of colonialism than of ancient Indian tradition.
Initially, the British administrators began by trying to understand the complexities of caste in an effort to learn how to govern the country efficiently. Some of these efforts took the shape of very methodical and intensive surveys and reports on the ‘customs and manners’ of various tribes and castes all over the country.
The 1901 Census under the direction of Herbert Risley was particularly important as it sought to collect information on the social hierarchy of caste –i.e., the social order of precedence in particular regions, as to the position of each caste in the rank order.
Overall, scholars feel that this kind of direct attempt to count caste and to officially record caste status changed the institution itself. Before this kind of intervention, caste identities had been much more fluid and less rigid; once they
began to be counted and recorded, caste began to take on a new life.
The land revenue settlements and related arrangements and laws served to give legal recognition to the customary (castebased) rights of the upper castes. These castes now became land owners in the modern sense rather than feudal classes with claims on the produce of the land, or claims to revenue or tribute of various kinds.
The administration also took an interest in the welfare of downtrodden castes, referred to as the ‘depressed classes’ at that time. It was as part of these efforts that the Government of India Act of 1935 was passed which gave legal recognition to the lists or ‘schedules’ of castes and tribes marked out for special treatment by the state.
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