This book melds rich ethnography with an understanding of recent history to understand the issues surrounding upward social mobility, modernity and changing identities. The authors examine a much-studied group in anthropology: the Izvhavas of Kerala in southern India. The Izvhavas, a relatively low-ranking caste in the sociologically untypical state of Kerala (where roughly a third are Christians, a third Muslims, and a third Hindus), have to varying degrees and with varying success tried to improve their situation. A hundred years ago, Izhavas were considered untouchable and were associated with impure pursuits such as toddy tapping and devil dancing. They have sought to elevate their position in various symbolically-laden fields - employment, religion, politics, migration, friendships - and have tried to assert their right to mobility, often in the face of opposition from their high status Christian and Nayar neighbors.Izhavas, through repudiation of their nineteenth-century identity and search for mobility, have come into complex relationships with modernity and colonialism, defining themselves as - and becoming defined as - a group with a specific relationship to processes of 'development' and 'progress' within a global view. Their story highlights the complexities and contradictions of modern identity in both local and global terms. The authors' approach both typifies and moves beyond a narrow south Asian focus, in that the Izhavas represent the rise of formerly stigmatized groups who remain at the same time trapped by stereotype and material disadvantage. Absolute mobility has not led to relative mobility within a society, which remains highly stratified and prone under modernityto new forms of social exclusion.
