WORKS AND SOME CONCEPTS PROPOSED BY INDIAN SOCIOLOGIST LOUIS DUMONT. Pure and impurity concepts that has been proposed by louis dumont. Pure and polluted system of indian cultures etc,, were given this ppt. it totally covers the biography and some sociological works of louis dumont who is born in france researched in india. in tamil nadu he made research on the group called PRAMALAI KALLAR. his famous book called HOMO HEIRARCHIUS which always says about the social order that had been followed in all over india from the ancient times to his time period in the indological approach.

1. LOUIS DUMONT

2. LOUIS DUMONT
Thessaloniki
11 AUGUST 1911
LOUIS CHARLES JEAN DUMONT
BIRTH
BIRTH
PLAC
E
FULL
NAME
EDUCATION
Dumont began his academic career in the mid-
1930s under the guidance of Marcel Mauss, leading
sociologist and Sanskritist. World War II interrupted
his studies, but not entirely. He was taken as
prisoner of war and was detained in a factory on the
outskirts of Hamburgh. There, he studied German

3. 1. Louis Dumont was a French
anthropologist, sociologist, and
Indologist who was an
outstanding person in the field
of sociology and anthropology.
2. He was determined and
debated on India and the West.
He studied different societies
and did an inter-civilizational
comparison.
3. Dumont also studied Sanskrit
and spent one year in Tamil
Nadu learning about Pramalai
Kallar. He spent a few years in
India roaming and gathering
knowledge from different parts
of India. He visited Tamil Nadu
and Gorakhpur.
4. His main focus studies where
on Hinduism, kinship, caste in
ancient India and Sociopolitical
movements of modern India. He
also succeeded M.N Srinivas as a
Lecturer at Oxford University in
the field of Indian Sociology.

4. WORKS OF LOUIS DUMONT :
1. La Tarasque (1951)
2. One sous-caste de Inde du sud: Organization
sociale et religion des pramalai Kallar
(1957)
3. Hierarchy and Marriage Alliance in South India
(1957)
4. Homo Hierarchicus: The Caste System and Its
Implications (1966, 1970)
5. Religion, Politics and History in India: Collected
Papers in Indian Sociology (1970)
6. Homo aequalis (1977

5. The chief elements of his methodology are:
1. Ideology and structure
2. Dialectic transformational
relationship and comparison
3. Indological and
structuralist approach
4. Cognitive historical approach

6. Homo Hierarchicus: The Caste System and
Its Implications
 In 1966 he produced a work named The Caste
System and its Implications.
 His work is different from others in the sense
that it uses a cardinal explanatory way to the
hierarchy to which it gives a whole new model.
 Dumont explored the complex social structure
of India, with a particular focus on the caste
system.
 Dumont argued that the Indian caste system
was not simply a social stratification system
but represented a unique hierarchical order.

7. CASTE SYSTEM IN INDIA
 He says that caste is a special type of inequality.
 According to him, caste plays an integrative role in Indian society and is
distinctive of India and he sees caste system in terms of ‘ideas and values’
i.e. caste system is an ideology.
 According to Dumont, caste hierarchy is a peculiar feature of Indian
society and there cannot be any cross cultural comparisons of caste
system.
 He further says that hierarchy is of status and hence is independent of
power. According to him even kings were subordinate to priests.

8. Three elements are central to his analysis –
I. Division of labor on basis of pure and impure
II. Superiority of pure over impure
III. The separation of the two
These unique core principles of caste-hierarchy, according to
Dumont, are observed in scriptural formulation as well as the every-
day life of all Hindus.

9. CONCEPT OF PURE AND IMPURE :-
Pure vs. Impure
•Pure: Represents something considered clean, sacred, and often
associated with higher status or holiness in a society.
•Impure: Signifies something unclean, profane, or lower in status
within the societal hierarchy.
Dumont's Perspective
•Pure: Linked with ideals, high status, and adherence to cultural
norms or rituals.
•Impure: Associated with lower status, occupations, or activities that
fall outside the cultural norms.

10. IN HOMO HIERARCHICUS
 According to him, ‘caste is not a form of stratification, but a special
form of inequality and hierarchy is the central tenet of this system.
 According to him, in Indian context, opposition of equality is
hierarchy.
 Modern man's ideology is decidedly egalitarian and individualistic,
diametrically opposite to a hierarchical and collectivist one.
 According to him, principle of purity and pollution is universal
irrespective of region and class.
 He thus rejects Srinivas’ idea that caste hierarchy has both ritual and
secular streams. Ritual hierarchy always dominates secular status.
 He also analyzed caste in changing times and according to him, overall
framework has not changed. ‘There is change in society and not of
society’.