The impact of kinship systems in the generation of house types

Abstract

The objective of this study is the identification and analysis of some of the social and cultural factors that have had a critical influence in the structuring of traditional environments. Subsequently it could be broadly viewed as an attempt at developing a more inclusive framework of inquiry and analysis of built form and the structuring of built environments undergoing processes of transformation. The focus of the study is a Muslim settlement in the historic core of the city of Calicut, situated in the southern part of the Indian subcontinent. The inquiry, however, restricts its scope to the investigation and analysis of a particular socio-cultural institution namely, the matrilineal kinship structure in its traditional form, which to an extent still persists - in relation to the nature of its impact on the built environment. The analysis is to a large part an examination of the artifactual data which comprises of a documentation of four house types, against ethnographic studies that have been conducted in this particular context and related ones. In view of the fact that the more recent developments in this context have led to some significant changes in the social and cultural realms, the concluding remarks focus on some important positions put forth in recent times, in relation to processes of change in traditional societies. This has been undertaken on the premise that in order to understand the meaning of architectural products as objectifications of human relations as against object relations, it is crucial to understand the mediations between architectural/planning products and the social whole.