Multilayered urbanisation of the south canara territory

Abstract

Coastal Karnataka’s rapidly urbanising South Canara reveals a substantive conceptual agenda for the SUBURBIN project. This chapter makes three interrelated arguments exploring its territories as multiple epistemologies: First, their multiple logics are socially and institutionally embedded in complex configurations to form relational spaces. Second, land, as both a site and a realm, embodies history, forms of property control and transfer, cultural meanings built on geography to shape economy. Third, these logics can be relatively autonomous, at times contesting in relationships. The substantive part of the chapter opens with ideas of sacredness. It reveals South Canara as a site constituted of guardian sprits and spirit possession, and deeply imbibed in real estate practices. An analysis of transport and connectivity, following this section, traces their evolution since the early 1930s to emphasise how ethnics and families lobby to engage with higher public authorities on issues of regulation and infrastructure. The third part focuses on the fishing economy as a transnational space—a reminder of this region’s trading history with East Africa, SE Asia and China. Economy is embedded and, similar to transport, shaped by ethnic aspects. This read of South Canara can be seen to be a stringent critique of the New Economic Geography (NEG) that is not only dehistoricised but also oblivious to material constructs shaped by complex institutional and cultural spaces.