ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses cultural conceptions in the contemporary Rangama/Devideniya community by building upon the distinction that has been made between the descriptive and evaluative components of an ideology of stratification. Low-caste resentment of high-caste privilege and repudiation of caste etiquette are the most striking changes in caste ideology that have taken place in this community since the baseline period. Contemporary inhabitants of Rangama/Devideniya most commonly express the meaning of caste in terms of an historical division of labour organized under one of the early Sinhalese kings. The widespread inter-class resentment and antagonism in contemporary Rangama/Devideniya has therefore little to do with a negative evaluation of material inequality itself. Studies examining the changing perceptions of hierarchy in rural South Asia have emphasized the rejection of the caste hierarchy by the lower castes and the rise of a new class consciousness among the lower classes.
