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Geographical Review of Japan Vol. 61 (Ser. B), No. 2, 225-247, 1988 The Spatial Perspective of Ethnic Residential Patterns of Kandy City, Sri Lanka Abdul Samad Mohamed NAWFHAL* Kandy, the largest inland city in contemporary Sri Lanka, was the capital city of the Kandyan King dom for more than 250 years from the end of the 16th century to the early 19th century. After the British colonized the whole island in 1815 and moved the capital from Kandy to Colombo, Kandy became simply an ancient city preserving the former palace, the Temple of the Tooth Relic, other temples, devalas or shrines, forts, and so forth. Later, it became an important gathering center for plantation products such as tea, vegetables, and spices. After independence in 1948, Kandy regained its functional importance as a national center for religious and cultural affairs, a great regional center for public administration, education, health care, and commerce. The city serves also as a tourist resort of the country. In the process of history, many people of different ethnic origins migrated to the city, transforming Kandy city into a typical multi-ethnic city. In this paper, the author at tempts to explore the residential patterns, precisely speaking, spatial perspective of residential pat terns among major ethnic groups, namely, Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims. The methods employed for measuring the residential patterns of ethnic groups are: representation ratio, index of dissimilari ty, index of segregation and index of centralization. Data on ethnic categories were gathered in the field in 1985. Some of the points drawn from the analysis are: (1) that the imnalese, the most aominant group, do not show any concentration in residential areas but rather an even distribution in all 23 wards of the city, while the minority groups like the Tamils and Muslims have greater concentration closer to the built-up area and in areas of proximity to the center of Kandy city; (2) that the residential pattern varies according to the socio-economic status levels of the residents; in other words, the dis similarity is lower in the lower and high class residential areas; (3) that the dissimilarity can be clearly observed between Sinhalese and Tamils, then between Sinhalese and Muslims, and the least between Tamils and Muslims; (4) Tamils and Muslims live closer to the city center proving that minority groups tend to concentrate closer to the city center although Kandy city is not an industrial center. Key words: Kandy, ethnic residential patterns, Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims, Sri Lanka, segregation Poona and Calcutta and the Sri Lankan city of I. Introduction Colombo1) have been studied in terms of their social ecology and aspects of residential pat As a field of research, the subject of residen terning. tial segregation has received little attention in Social geographers, as well as urban ecologists, Asian countries, particularly in South Asian have taken account of the tendency of people to countries. The researches carried out in India select residential sites in cities on the basis of ra (MEHTA, 1969, Brian BERRYand KASERDA,1971) cial, cultural, religious, or ethnic preferences and and Sri Lanka (HERBERT and THOMAS, 1982) to choose residential locations that are symbolic show that the approaches and methodologies de of social prestige, wealth and power (GIST, vised in Western countries can be meaningfully 1957). Many researchers have demonstrated that adopted for similar studies in Asian countries. the differences of social class, religion and eth Among South Asian cities, the Indian cities of nic origin are some of the major factors that have * Graduate Student, Department of Geography, Rikkyo University, Toshima-ku, Tokyo 171 226 A.S.M. NAWFHAL a great impact on the city's spatial structure on the basis of ethnicity becomes a complicated (LATHIF, 1974). task. For instance, language groups, and caste In third world societies, residential distribution groups, as well as occupational groups, live in is influenced not only by the cultural setting, but termixed with each other. By considering the also by the non-economic bases of preference residential function, the effectiveness of the for patterns, such as safety and assimilation. The mation of residential segregation could be elabo concepts of residential area possess different rated. A comparison of the pattern of meanings because most areas of the cities are segregation among ethnic groups could be very non-urban in character; in addition, infrastruc meaningful in the context of Kandy city. The tures are grossly inadequate and basic needs for functional development and city's social pattern shelter precede any other consideration. Studies have begun to change and as a result the ge in the third world countries suggest cities in tran ographical landscape has also transformed ac sition as `modernization', although there is a cordingly. great diversity between large and small urban In the course of the city's development, its lo areas (HERBERT and THOMAS, op. cit.). calities were increasingly differentiated accord The prime objective of this study is to identify ing to their socio-economic characteristics. An the pattern of residential distribution of differ important feature of the pattern of spatial sepa ent ethnic groups in Kandy city and to identify ration of minority groups is that they are most the trend of assimilation that could lead to segre ly concentrated in areas of lower socio-economic gation. The effect of assimilation could change status. This feature merely reflects the well the spatial distribution of residential areas into known poverty of minority groups in the neigh ethnic areas, thereby leading to social interac borhoods of the city center and their lower socio tions in various functional areas of the city. economic background. Therefore, the study of the residential patterns The ecology of the city is strongly influenced of this multi-ethnic society is of current im by commercialization and other service sec portance. tors.2) As a result, the identification of typical In order to examine the distribution of the eth patterns pertaining to ethnic residential criteria nic groups, the Sinhalese population and two of Kandy city would provide an original exam other minority groups, Tamils and Muslims (also ple of residential patterns in the Sri Lankan called Moors), have been selected for this study. context. Next to Sinhalese in numerical strength in both The Kandy Municipal Council Area,3) located the country and Kandy city are Tamils. Tamils among the hills, is the capital of the Central are culturally distinct from Sinhalese. It is clear Province4) of Sri Lanka. It represents a that Tamils populate the northern and eastern manageable size of population and consists of provinces of the island and that Sinhalese and 23 wards. The entire Municipal Council (M. C.) Muslims populate the remainder. Area consists of 6,500acres (26.3km2).The core Within minority groups sharp contrasts of na of the city falls within the following wards: tivity and mother tongue have not emerged. The Wevelpitiya (Ward 19), Kotugodella (Ward 8), heterogeneous distribution of ethnic groups with Deyyannewala (Ward 16) and Mahayyawa in the city provides some clues about their (Ward 20). clustering in specific areas. The identification of The main reason for selecting this city as the the intra-urban configuration including ethnic study area for my survey was that the ethnic patterns should reflect the functional and social composition of the population corresponds to group formation within the city. But it is ex the island's population, and existence of rich tremely difficult to devise area units that capture historical records of different ethnic groups from particular patterns of segregation, because this area. It should be noted that the areal unit clusters have scattered in several different places used for analysis is the ward. The residential pat (MEHTA, op. cit.). In most South Asian cities terns are designed and analyzed on the basis of the level of multi-ethnic composition is higher the ward. The wards are of varying geographi and thus the differentiation of residential clusters cal size and consist of highly dispersed popula Ethnic Residential Patterns of Kandy 227 Figure 1 Ethnic Population Composition of Kandy City, 1985 Source: Calculated from the census data of 1981, Department of Census and Statistics, Colombo. tion within the densely populated central city analysis in order to find the significant patterns (Fig. 1). The boundaries of the wards were and the relations between them. First, the back changed more than four times between 1881 and ground to the present situation has been analyzed the present demarcation completed in 1967. both in terms of historical setting and function Figures on the residential population and ethnic al relations. Second, the data derived from the categories are available only for census purposes, M. C. records has been used to locate the distri and are not accessible to others. Thus, the data bution of ethnic groups on the basis of the in pertaining to ethnicity has been obtained from dices of dissimilarity, segregation and the M.C. records.5) centralization. The analysis is carried out adopt The present study has followed a stereotype of ing the measures of the spatial isolation or con 228 A.S.M. NAWFHAL centration of sub-population and residences. cies toward ethnic composition and concentra These are all quantitative terms that are widely tion closer to the city. The indices are computed used to locate the pattern of residential clusters. for all wards of the city. All these techniques are The representation ratio (DUNCAN& DUNCAN, applied on the spatial units of Municaipal 1955), indicates the proportionate or dispropor Wards. tionate representation of a given category in the The city of Kandy has the most significant area unit of a ward. The formula can be applied representation and a proportionate distribution interchangeably to find the concentration of eth of each ethnic group next to the former capital nic residential units.

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