The New Frontier

Description

Does the burgeoning Indian Information Technology (IT) sector represent a deviation from the historical arc of caste inequality or has it become yet another site of discrimination? Those who claim that the sector is caste-free believe that IT is an equal opportunity employer, and that the small Dalit footprint is due to the want of merit. But they fail to consider how caste inequality sneaks in by being layered on socially constructed ‘pure merit’, which favours upper castes and other privileged segments, but handicaps Dalits and other disadvantaged groups. In this book, Fernandez describes how the practice of pure and holistic merit are deeply embedded in the social, cultural, and economic privileges of the dominant castes and classes, and how caste filtering has led to the reproduction of caste hierarchies and consequently the small Dalit footprint in Indian IT.

About the Authors

Marilyn Fernandez is professor of sociology at Santa Clara University, California, USA. Her research interests include diversity, inequality, and organizational change. She is a former vice-president of the Pacific Sociological Association, former co-editor of the journal Sociological Perspectives, and former Department Chair of Sociology at Santa Clara University.

Table of contents

List of Tables
List of Abbreviations
Acknowledgements

1. The Indian Information Technology Sector: The New Caste Inequality Frontier
2. Merit Construction and Caste Loopholes in the Indian IT Social Habitus
3. Merit vs. Caste ‘Blood Sport’ in the IT Work Arena: Implications for Caste Reproduction
4. Information Technology Education: Prelude to the Caste-Merit ‘Blood Sport’ and Caste Reproduction
5. Merit and Gender Diversity: Lessons about Caste Diversity in Indian IT
6. Indian Information Technology, the New Caste Frontier: Deconstructing Caste Reproduction

References
Index
About the Author