Paraiyar

Also known as Parayar, Marayar, Maraiyar, Pariah

Paraiyar, Parayar or Maraiyar (, formerly anglicised as Pariah and Paree) is a caste group found in the Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala and in Sri Lanka.

Key facts

Caste.caste_name: Paraiya
Caste.image: Paraiyar group picture.png
Caste.languages: Tamil, Malayalam, Sanskrit
Caste.religions: Hinduism (Shaivism), Christianity, Buddhism, Islam
Caste.country: India, Sri Lanka
Caste.classification: Scheduled Caste
Caste.populated_states: Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Puducherry
Caste.ethnicity: Tamils
Caste.related: Sri Lankan Tamilsother Dravidians
Caste.caption: A group of Paraiyars in the Madras Presidency, 1909

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Instance of: caste
Image: Paraiyar group picture.png

Sources (2)

via Wikidata · CC0

~16 min read

Encyclopedic overview

15 sections

Contents

Etymology
History
Pre-British period
British colonial era
Buddhist advocacy by Iyothee Thass
Controversy over the community's name
Right-hand caste faction
Present status
Culture
Notable people
Religious and spiritual leaders
Social reformers and activists
Politics
Arts and entertainment
References

Paraiyar, Parayar or Maraiyar (, formerly anglicised as Pariah and Paree) is a caste group found in the Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala and in Sri Lanka.

== Etymology == Robert Caldwell, a nineteenth-century missionary and grammarian who worked in South India, was in agreement with some Indian writers of the same period who considered the name to derive from the Tamil word parai (drum).

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Paraiyar” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

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