Origin and Development of urban Anthropology in Bangladesh

Origin and Development of urban Anthropology in Bangladesh

Anthropology is the study of humans and their societies in the past and present. Urban Anthropology is the subfield of Anthropology. Established academic disciplinary distinctions led early anthropologists to study tribal societies, or village communities while ignoring the city as a field of research. Thus, urban research became established in some academic disciplines, particularly sociology, but struggled to achieve such a status in anthropology.

Urban Anthropology:

Urban anthropology is a subset of anthropology concerned with issues of urbanization, poverty, urban space, social relations, and neoliberalism. The field has become consolidated in the 1960s and 1970s.

Anthropological research in urban settings often referred to as ‘urban anthropology’, for short and its attendant ethnographically-based findings are increasingly attracting attention from anthropologists and non-anthropologists alike, including other professionals and decision-makers.

Urban anthropology is a relatively recent new field of study within socio-cultural anthropology. While twentieth-century sociologists paid great attention to the study of cities and urban phenomena, social and cultural anthropologists stayed largely away from this important field of research. One reason for such a choice was rooted in late-nineteenth century disciplinary divisions, identifying social and cultural anthropology as principally concerned with the comparative study on non-Western societies and cultures. To simplify, until relatively recently, following academic classification, anthropology focused on so-called ‘primitive’ societies (otherwise described as ‘tribal’, ‘exotic’, or ‘folk’), whereas Western industrial societies were the designated realm of sociological enquiry. Thus, until the 1970s, urban research remained associated mainly with sociology

Urbanization:

Urbanization is the process by which large numbers of people become permanently concentrated in relatively small areas, forming cities. Internal rural to urban migration means that people move from rural areas to urban areas. In this process the number of people living in cities increases compared with the number of people living in rural areas. Natural increase of urbanization can occur if the natural population growth in the cities is higher than in the rural areas. This scenario, however, rarely occurs. A country is considered to urbanized when over 50 per cent of its population live in the urban areas .

Urbanization refers to the increasing number of people that live in urban areas. It predominantly results in the physical growth of urban areas, be it horizontal or vertical. Urbanization is closely linked to modernization, industrialization, and the sociological process of rationalization. Urbanization can describe a specific condition at a set time, i.e. the proportion of total population or area in cities or towns, or the term can describe the increase of this proportion over time. So the term urbanization can represent the level of urban development relative to overall population, or it can represent the rate at which the urban proportion is increasing. Urbanization is not merely a modern phenomenon, but a rapid and historic transformation of human social roots on a global scale, whereby predominantly rural culture is being rapidly replaced by predominantly urban culture.

Origin and Development of urban Anthropology in Bangladesh:

Bangladesh is one of the world’s most densely populated country and has also faced rapid population growth throughout the last century although the population growth rate has some what decreased to a moderate level in recent times. The country is going to witness a rapid spread of urbanization over the next decade. According to an estimate, by 2020, nearly every other man, woman and child will live in an urban area (World Bank ed., Bangladesh 2020). Unless this spread is effectively managed, the chaotic conditions and accompanying ills like pollution, joblessness and exacerbation of criminal activities is likely to multiply. The growing disparity in living standards in Dhaka between the slum dwellers on one side and well-to-do urban elites on the other may lead to increased social and political instability. However, with a proper strategy for growth and employment, this can give rise for job creation in the non-farm sector and thus absorb surplus labor force generating in the agricultural sector.

Bangladesh’s urban population has been growing at a yearly average rate of 6 percent since independence, at a time when the national population growth was 2.2 percent. As a result, urban population has grown six-fold, compared with a 70 percent increase in rural population (World Bank, 2007). As per recent UN data, approximately 25 percent of Bangladesh’s current population currently lives in urban areas. Of this urban population, more than half lives in the four largest cities: Dhaka, Chittagong, Khulna and Rajshahi. With a population of almost 12 million, Dhaka is the capital and largest city in Bangladesh. It is also the 11th largest city in the world. At the same time, it is consistently ranked as one of the world’s least livable city. Although income growth is higher and the poverty incidence is lower than the rest of Bangladesh, Dhaka still is a low income city with large numbers of poor when compared with most mega cities of the world. Holding the prospects for better income opportunities than most parts of Bangladesh, rapid migration is causing Dhaka’s population to grow much faster than the rest of the country. This fast urbanization is putting pressure on the city’s limited land, an already fragile environment, and weak urban services. The population density is now believed to have reached around 34000 people per square kilometer, making Dhaka amongst the most densely populated city in the world.

Poor city management and low efficiency are exacerbating the problems. Urban traffic has reached nightmare proportions, often causing huge delays in covering small distances with associated productivity losses. Water and air pollution from poor waste and traffic management poses serious health risks. The already acute slum population is growing further, contributing to serious human and law and order problems. All major cities in South Asia are facing similar problems. In general, poverty, deplorable condition of slums, corruption and inefficiency in service delivery, weak governance and poor finances are characteristic of all South Asian mega cities.

Factors of Migration in Bangladesh:

According to the available empirical studies and evidences, the migration is always a selective process in which, the community, family or individuals fall into a certain category or characteristics and it varies extensively from culture to culture. Several studies reported that migration varies depending on socio-economic, demographic and cultural factors. That is lack of work availabilities, unemployment, poverty, natural disaster i.e., flood, draught, river erosion etc.; and others socio-cultural factors like, marriage, family conflict, better living, better education facilities, social discrimination, social prejudice, fanaticism, political chaos etc. also act as motivational factors of migration.

Natural factors:

Natural disasters are a common feature in Bangladesh. Manga is one of them and affects millions of people especially in Northern part of Bangladesh. Manga is a cyclical food insecurity which occurs during the lean season and it directly affects those who are involved in agricultural

activities. The agriculture in ‘the manga regions’ is mainly based on paddy cultivation. The employment opportunities for agricultural day-laborers, therefore, mainly depend on seasonal labor requirements for this crop. In between transplantation and harvest little labor is needed and as a result the income of day-laborers is low. Like the agricultural laborers, marginal farmers face manga, too. Their financial assets reduce towards the harvest. They have to give successive inputs to their fields, but they do not receive the return for their work until after harvest. The

financial resources of many marginal farmers are not enough to ensure the inputs for their crops and sufficient food for their families at the same time.

Also, some groups or individuals are indirectly affected by the agricultural lean season. This is the case for all those who depend on the income of people affected by the agricultural lean season, like small traders and beggars. Due to the weak purchasing power they have no access to the market, i.e. they cannot buy enough food to fulfill their requirements. The access is sometimes further limited because the prices for basic foods often increase during manga. The poor people’s scarcity of work is in the region of Rangpur, Nelphamary, Kurigram, and Dinajpur especially in the months of Ashshin and Kartik (October November). In their language, “we’ve no work, no food, how can we live?” So in order to survive they migrate to Rajshahi city in the quest of living. It is mentionable that migration takes places extensively from these regions.

Economic factors:

In explaining the economic condition of a poor family, the monthly income, owned cultivable land and profession are the important factors for migration. Economic activities and income in a rural society mainly depends on cultivable lands. In this study we found that poverty and unemployment are the factors to push them to the city. Poverty works as the main factor of every step of it. When there is no work and the stomach is empty, man tries his best to survive. Similarly when the poor people fail to feed their family in their native villages, they have to see the hungry faces of their beloved children and then try to get  opportunities, even after trying heart and soul, to get rid of poverty, they are compelled to migrate to another place. Because of this poverty they are now the inhabitants of towns. That is to say that 15 percent people migrate to the city because of poverty.

The agricultural sector does not have enough scope to absorb large numbers of laborer. Rural areas still lag behind in industrialization and thus unemployment is the general feature of this country. The adult, young, adolescent and children in rural areas do not find satisfactory

employment. So people move to city area looking for employment. 9 percent respondents were found to migrate for this reason.

Social factors:

In the study area 4.8 percent of the poor migration has occurred only in big families and their family member ranges between 5 and 8 so that they could not manage sufficient food for their family members. In case of poverty, 5 percent of poor migrant come to city. It is also interesting to note that the number of female children is higher than the male child in the poor families. Socially, it is an additional burden for them. So the poor families remain very anxious for the marriage of their daughters and want to reduce the number of family members through marriage. In this case

we found 4 percent poor women who have migrated for reasons of marriage. In their word “there (native village) was not any opportunity for the poor people, all opportunity and benefit go to the elite of the village”. So they migrated to Rajshahi City. A few migrants were also found who left their villages for religious violence e.g. religious conflict, fatwa (religious edict) etc. The data also found that the women and husbands migrated alone in the city areas in search of employment opportunities. After migration they brought their wife/husband and children to join the informal jobs in the form of restaurant workers, maid servants, daily laborers, etc., to increase family income. Besides this, husbands brought their wives and children to join them.

Political factors:

During the time of research we came to know that some migrant families came to Rajshahi in 1947, some in 1971 and some after 1971. Generally some communities of different religions of the west Bengal were living in India and they migrated (illegally crossing the river and by land route) to Bangladesh. Because they were the victims of different kinds of political torture, disparity etc. and now they are living in Rajshahi City. In our research we found that 4 percent poor migrants have came from India by crossing the border.

In this regard we came to know that political clash, and political dispute also compel people to migrate to the city. We found 2 percent migrants in this category. Among them some have migrated to the town because they were minority groups, some have migrated because their supported political party has been defeated in the election and they feared torture from the rival party, some feared that legal cases might be filed against them and some faced the treat of life.

Other factors:

Some migrant families left their villages because they mortgaged their land and took money from moneylenders or from the influential people of the rural areas but could not pay it back and thus lost the mortgaged land or property. Some other people have migrated due to the torture unleashed on them by the influential quarters of the villages. Some migrant families said that they got credit from NGOs and they could not use this money for appropriate purpose. They spent all credit loans for their own family consumption or repairing houses.

Concluding Remarks:

Most anthropologists prefer to define their field of study as anthropological research in urban settings, rather than ‘urban anthropology’. This methodological and theoretical stance reflects a shift in focus from the community studies inspired by the ‘urban ecology’ model of the Chicago School and processes of urbanization in post-colonial societies to political economy, city planning, the legitimacy of grassroots action and of governance, the relationship between the local and the supralocal and their significance to urban dynamics.

Bangladesh faces enormous challenge of managing urban growth, urban expansion and urban development. The task demands vision, wise policy thinking, intelligent long, medium and short term planning, skilful implementation, efficient management and participatory democratic governance. In less than four decades from now Bangladesh will be an urbanized country in demographic statistical term, but the nature of urbanism in the future remains rather indefinable. Political and cultural realities, the threat of the climate change phenomenon and the crisis of governance at the national as well as urban local levels, all tend to make one feel uncomfortable, to state the least. And yet, there is some silver lining, the urban issue is finally a subject for serious consideration for the Seventh 5 Year Plan.

References:

1.Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (2003), Household Income and Expenditure Survey.

2.Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, Statistical Year Book, from the year of 1996 to 2008.

3.Islam, N., Urbanization, Migration and Development in Bangladesh:        Recent Trends and Emerging Issues.

4.Khan A. Haider (2008), Poverty Strategies in Asia.

5. World Bank (2007),Improving Living Conditions for the Urban Poor.

6. Mangalam, J. 1968 Human Migration. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press.

7. Mehta, D. 2000  “Urbanization of Poverty”. Habitat Debate. Vol. 6, No. 4. UN Human Settlements Program

(UNCHS).