Signs of Inconsistency: A review of The Sign: Vachanas of 12th century
The Sign: Vachanas of 12th century, 2007. Edited by O L. Nagabhushana Swamy and translated by O L Nagabhushana Swamy, Laxmi Chandrasekhar, Vijaya Guttal. Hampi: Prasaranga, Kannada University. Sometime in 2002 at Neenasam, the cultural centre at Heggodu, S N Balagangadhara and a few others [1] questioned the interpretations of the vachanas of the 12th century as anti-caste literature. They had prepared statistics for each of the 14 volumes of vachanas (published by Kannada Pustaka Praadhikaara) along the following lines—How many vachanas from each vachanakaara contained vachanas that had the words or speak of ‘jaati’ and ‘kula’? And how did these vachanas speak of jaati or kula? They argued that the interpretations that modern Kannada scholars have thus far given us were based on a simplistic formula in which anti-brahminism equaled anti-caste (anti-brahminism=anti-caste) and since the vachanas supposedly were anti-brahmin, they were anti-caste too. Contrary to this formula, they demo