Transient Communities: A Search for Identity through Ethnicity (Page 1)

From evidences of migrant communities, presence or absences of the ethnic traces help to identify their continuity or break in tradition and culture from their place of origin through time and space. The search for ethnicity in this article is discussed with the case of the Chettiar Community in transit' in erstwhile Madras in the process of migration and establishing trade links overseas. This transient community through the establishment of 'Viduthis' on Coral Merchant Street creates social institutions in the new place of residence while preserving the ideology of the traditional 'Viduthi’ attached to temples in their hometowns.

RB Mandal, in defining migration, states that "migration is known as the movement of people from one permanent residence to another permanent or temporary residence for a substantial period of time by breaking social and cultural ties''. Contrary to Mandal, in the analysis of Indonesian settlements, Waterson discusses that migration might be thought to have a negative impact on the continuity of "traditional cultures, either because it is assumed that it is the most enterprising people who leave, or because migrants become exposed to new fashions and come to regard their old styles as unsatisfactory. She argues that migrants are by no means a drain upon local cultures, as those who migrate often maintain very strong ties with the places of origin, while experiencing a heightened sense of ethnic identity in the context of a strange city where they are constantly meeting people of different cultural backgrounds.

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