Caste Names as Identity Markers. The Case of Manganiyars

The Manganiyar community is one of those social groups which have participated in building up the mosaic of peoples and cultures of Western Rajasthan. Being musicians and genealogists by caste (i.e. birth), Manganiyars are incorporated in the assemblage of professional castes that have cherished music arts over times as their hereditary responsibility: performed upon the tunes of kamāycā, a bowed chordophone which is the distinctive tool of the Manganiyar art, their songs and chants have preserved a good deal of narratives, genealogies, memories of Marvar.