Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Caste, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Caste, Race, and Social Division in the U.S.
Caste as a Global Problem
How Caste Sustains Itself
The Costs of Caste
Summary
Analysis
Wilkerson looks back on her struggles to help her pet West Highland terrier adjust to the new social order in her home following her divorce from her husband years ago. While consulting a canine behavior specialist, Wilkerson learned a lot about how to present herself as the new “alpha” to her dog. True alphas, command authority not through rabid assertion of strength and power, but through “calm oversight” and the use of ancient, invisible signals of strength and assuredness. A real alpha, she learned, never needs to bully or attack those below them in order to gain respect and authority. Eventually, Wilkerson got another dog that silently and swiftly established itself as the alpha dog of the house, and order returned to the home.
By including a seemingly unrelated anecdote based on her personal experiences as a dog owner, Wilkerson actually shines a light on how even animals’ social hierarchies are more intuitive than ours. The idea of an “alpha” is something that global society is in many ways obsessed with—and the creation of a caste system is little more than an attempt to create an entire class of “alphas” whose power is absolute and unquestioned. But in reality, true “alphas” aren’t violent or manipulative—they use their power to protect others and keep the peace.
Themes
In packs of wild dogs and wolves, the alpha is at the top of the pack’s hierarchy. But at the bottom is the omega, or the underdog, who takes on a court-jester role within the pack: he is, essentially, the pack’s scapegoat. But the omega is also venerated and important—and when omegas die, the packs often enter periods of prolonged mourning and sometimes struggle to replace the missing omega. Humans, Wilkerson suggests, could learn a lot from wolves: we associate “alpha” positions with the dominant caste, and so we overlook potential alphas from subordinate groups. Thus, we find ourselves beholden to miscast alphas who resort to cruelty, violence, and shows of power to maintain their positions.
“The purpose of an underdog,” this chapter purports, is not for there to be a bottom floor or “mud-sill” below which the dominant caste can’t sink. In canine social orders, those at the bottom of the hierarchy are still respected and included. A misunderstanding of how power functions—and what power ought to accomplish in a society—is at the root of caste’s ill effects.
Themes
