Department of Sociology

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The present Department of Sociology was established as a combined Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology by the University of North Bengal in 1976. Professor Niren Ch. Choudhury, eminent anthropologist, was the first Professor and Head of the Department who provided the leadership in the formative years of the Department.Professor R.K.Bhadra and Dr.Namita Choudhury were associated with him since inception of this department and helped in the process of its development. The bifurcation between sociology and anthropology took place in 2001 and thus the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology was renamed Department of Sociology and a separate Department of Anthropology was established under the Science Faculty. From its beginning the Department of Sociology has been training students for three courses: M.A., M. Phil. and Ph.D. The Department has produced more than 30 Ph.Ds and more than one thousand Masters. Besides the two main programmes the Department invites visiting faculty, from the reputed national and international universities and the faculty of this department visit the universities abroad on visiting faculty programme and for attending seminars/conferences. The teachers of the Department encourage students to take part in academic discussions outside the class-room interaction and encourage them to present papers in seminars/conferences. In recognition of the good work done by the Department the University Grants’ Commission (UGC) has granted the Special Assistance Programme (DRS – 1) in 2007 which has facilitated undertaking a good number of research projects on issues relating to gender question and the problem of ethnicity in the North Bengal region. The Department has been organizing a national level seminar every year on the gender and ethnicity related issues, which constitute the focal theme of the SAP. As a part of the programme the Department publishes Occasional Papers and edited volumes based on the research articles that are produced under different SAP related programs.

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    Equality or Hierarchy: The Organisational Structure of a Sect in Bengal
    (University of North Bengal, 31-03-2021) Goswami, Sumana
    During the seventeenth and eighteenth century numerous deviant vaisnava and semi-vaisnava sects emerged among the lower orders of both the Hindus and Muslims in Bengal. Challenging the great traditions of Hinduism, Islam and Christianity these sects altogether rejected the Vedas, Shastras and most importantly the caste system. Dumont, while emphasizing the hierarchical characteristics of the Indian caste system, held that in opposition to castes sects have an egalitarian nature. The present paper is concerned with the structure of one such sect, namely Kartabhaja, which emerged as an anti-Vedic, anti-caste group and survives till date. The study attempts to examine whether the sect follows a true egalitarian structure or not. The necessary data for the study were gathered in the annual fair of the sect called Satimar Mela through personal visits for seven consecutive years (1999-2005) and again in 2012, 2016 and in 2018. The methods of non-participant observation and unstructured and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data from about 100 sect members on a snowball sampling basis. Historical accounts were also used to construct a history of the sect. The study reveals that the sect, which rejected the exploitative caste hierarchy and emphasized on equality of human beings, irrespective of caste, religion and sex, had to develop a new form of three-level stratified system of Karta, Mahasaya and Barati for organizational solidity. These separate and independent groups within the sect could easily be distinguished through their different ritual performances. The formation and continuation of stratified structure within the sect obviously is contrary to the image of egalitarian structure of the sect.
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    Lower caste movement and the idea of social equality under the raj : jyotirao phule and maratha renaissance
    (University of North Bengal, 31-03-2017) Sengupta, Shilajit
    Post-Colonial Indian state was fraught with high level of caste discrimination, illiteracy, agricultural failures and many such grimy situations which now partially have been addressed by systematic and strategic planning since 1951. Considering the vastness and incredibly heterogeneous demography of the nation bringing in social equality by eradicating caste hierarchy, education for all and agricultural development policies are the key areas where India has been performing well unlike other South Asian countries of third world. The seed of the idea behind many such policies especially in development of mass education was sown by great Indian thinker Jyotirao Govindrao Phule. In primary and higher education for masses, right to the farmers and the true realization of a just and egalitarian society which would be neither caged under the clutches of foreign rulers nor dominated by hierarchically structured class and caste based Hindu society this erudite Marathi Activist-Writer- Thinker has made commendable contribution. Phule’s work brought an era of renaissance which gave voice to the lower caste marginalized population unlike the mainstream upper caste-bourgeois led nationalist movement which failed to include the age old cultural and social deprivation of sudras and untouchables of the land. This article will focus on Phule’s view on social reform during mid and late 19th century colonial India which later influenced emancipatory movements of lower caste people and their struggle for social equality in Independent India.