Unlock Elite Access: Level Up Your Preparation with Exclusive Content

Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions · Model answer

What do you understand by discrete castes and muddled hierarchies?

  • UPSC 2018
  • Caste System

Unlock the full answer · ₹1,499 ↓

The phrase is Dipankar Gupta's, from Interrogating Caste: Understanding Hierarchy and Difference in Indian Society (2000). Against Louis Dumont's Homo Hierarchicus (1966), which derived the whole caste order from one encompassing value, Gupta argues that caste is constituted by difference rather than by an agreed ladder, and that the ladder sociology inherited is an artefact…

You are reading the opening of the model answer. The full answer is part of Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions.

What the full answer covers

  • Discrete castes
  • Muddled hierarchies
  • Illustrations
  • The critique
  • Conclusion
Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions

Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions

Unlock this answer and 1,500+ more

  • 1,500+ solved UPSC Sociology PYQs from 1985 to 2026, Paper-1 and Paper-2
  • Topic-wise across all 25 syllabus units, newest exam year first
  • A full model answer for every question, shaped to 10 or 20 marks, with thinkers and Indian examples
  • Read online on lotusarise.com, plus PDF download

₹1,499₹2,50040% off

Get Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions @ ₹1,499 →

One-time payment · 12 months of access · Instant access · UPI, cards, RuPay

See every Caste System question (92 solved) →Already enrolled? Log in