Get Your Free Audiobook

  • Caste

  • The Origins of Our Discontents
  • Written by: Isabel Wilkerson
  • Narrated by: Robin Miles
  • Length: 14 hrs and 26 mins
  • 4.7 out of 5 stars (156 ratings)

Prime logo New to Audible Prime Member exclusive:
2 credits with free trial
1 credit a month to use on any title to download and keep
Listen to anything from the Plus Catalogue—thousands of Audible Originals, podcasts and audiobooks
Download titles to your library and listen offline
₹199 per month after 30-day trial. Cancel anytime.
Caste cover art

Caste

Written by: Isabel Wilkerson
Narrated by: Robin Miles
Free with 30-day trial

₹199 per month after 30-day trial. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for ₹888.00

Buy Now for ₹888.00

Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice.

Publisher's Summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

The hierarchy of caste is not about feelings or morality. It is about power - which groups have it and which do not.

Beyond race or class, our lives are defined by a powerful, unspoken system of divisions. In Caste, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Isabel Wilkerson gives an astounding portrait of this hidden phenomenon. Linking America, India and Nazi Germany, Wilkerson reveals how our world has been shaped by caste - and how its rigid, arbitrary hierarchies still divide us today.

With clear-sighted rigour, Wilkerson unearths the eight pillars that connect caste systems across civilisations and demonstrates how our own era of intensifying conflict and upheaval has arisen as a consequence of caste. Weaving in stories of real people, she shows how its insidious undertow emerges every day, she documents its surprising health costs and she explores its effects on culture and politics. Finally, Wilkerson points forward to the ways we can - and must - move beyond its artificial divisions, towards our common humanity.

Beautifully written and deeply original, Caste is an eye-opening examination of what lies beneath the surface of ordinary lives. No one can afford to ignore the moral clarity of its insights or its urgent call for a freer, fairer world.

©2020 Isabel Wilkerson (P)2020 Penguin Audio

What listeners say about Caste

Average Customer Ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    119
  • 4 Stars
    32
  • 3 Stars
    5
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    109
  • 4 Stars
    18
  • 3 Stars
    4
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    97
  • 4 Stars
    23
  • 3 Stars
    6
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

‘Introduction to racism in America’

This is not for Indians (I am one) who understand caste. This is for white Americans and Europeans who wants primary to understand the dark underbelly of USA

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

it's an eye opener

I thought America to be a just society the discrimination might have been just on the color basis, but giving a viz a viz comparison with thr caste system of India, I did not perceive it from that view point, I liked how author with help of examples explained the unjust behavior of the people, the only part I didnt like exaggeration of Barrack Obama maybe whatever disadvantages he had, he wore the same color when he sat on the throne and that is what his Policies were like.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

History of America's Foundation in the Rawest Form

Every person, especially American, should read this book to make sense of the current political climate and empathize with marginalized communities (perhaps around the world). Books such as these are crucial for the coming generations to learn from the mistakes of the past.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

very reflective

It's not often you get to see past the glorified American society and experience the darkness beneath, but why would to compare the atrocities with Indian society, auther needs some more research in that

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

A must-read book.

Besides their origins, the author narrates in this well researched book many real-life stories to describe the dehumanising impact of stigmatisation, and how the caste and race systems have got perpetuated by the power vested in the dominant groups.
Why this book needs to be read is because the historical knowledge will help us leave that system in the past, dismantle it from the present, and set ourselves free.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Caste - Brilliant take on understanding prejudices

Isabel Wilkerson's brilliantly researced, analysed book with personal anecdotes from experience, history and inter-cultural practices with shared prejudices. A must read for all readers especially from India and USA.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Deeply insightful and wise

Well written, articulate, and read well by the narrator. The author has brought a life time of research and backed it up with anecdotal and lived experiences - filling up data and history with feeling.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

An excellent book that must be read

An extremely well presented narration covering in touching detail, this sensitive and deplorable aspect of human history. It brings out in vivid detail the crime that is still being perpetrated on vast sections of fellow human beings and in which an equally large number are providing tacit support either unwittingly or for selfish interests.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Must read

This is one of the most enlightening books on the subject that I have read. The author has skillfully crafted how the reader gets gradually introduced to the realities of caste, by whatever name called, and then in the second part of the book be truly exposed to the horrors of modern day casteism. A must read, especially for those who do not believe that caste system still exists.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

An extremely important work

Exceptionally written story of Caste.. Of not just India which invented it millennia ago and continues to nurture it, but also 'race' (as a proxy for caste and unjust power play) in the USA from the early 1600s when the first slave ship arrived in Virginia as well as the 12 year Nazi nightmare in Germany. Germany has done well in admitting and highlighting it to its people and the world, but it can scarcely be said of India and the USA. What can and should we do is the note it ends on.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!