Rural Settlement – Geography – UGC NET – Notes

Settlement Geography

• Food, Shelter and Clothing are the three basic needs of man. The available information reveals the fact that the man was initially a hunter and food gatherer. It is during the Neolithic time the man became a sedentary agriculturist and started to live in his own house more or less permanently. Since then man has been living.
• Men construct houses and develop settlements to protect themselves from all the varying weather conditions and to enjoy social life. In fact settlement adopting himself to his physical and socio-economic environment.
• Rural settlements are those in which the population is mainly engaged in agricultural activity. The type, shape and pattern of rural settlements depend on the type of agricultural practices. Rural settlements are generally of a permanent kind because the land has to be tended over a period of time.
• In villages, the population size is quite small and the way of life is simple. Since ancient times, be it a temporary settlements of shifting cultivators, nomadic hunters and gatherers or more-settled, permanent agricultural villages, the settlements are highly dependent on few factors.
• The rural settlements are concerned with the degree of dispersion of the dwellings and the life is supported by land based primary economic activities. Rural people are less mobile and therefore, social relations among them are intimate.
• In India, the rural settlement varies with the diversity of climatic condition in India that is compact or clustered village of a few hundred houses is a rather universal feature, particularly in the northern plains. However, there are several areas, which have other forms of rural settlements.
• There are various factors and conditions responsible for having different types of rural settlements in India which is given below:
  • Physical Features – nature of terrain, altitude, climate and availability of water
  • Cultural and Ethnic Factors – social structure, caste and religion
  • Security Factors – defence against thefts and robberies.

Types of Rural Settlement

• Any settlement in which most of the people are engaged in agriculture, forestry, mining and fishery is known as rural settlement. It is often called as agricultural workshop.
• Most of the world’s settlements are rural and they are stable and permanent.

They are of three types:

1. Compact Settlements:

• A compact settlement is based on farming. These are mostly found in highly mostly productive alluvial plains like Indo-Gangetic Plains, the Hwang Ho Valley, Valley o Nile. The houses are compact and congested with narrow plains.
• The size of these settlements depends on nature and resources of surrounding country. They have a high degree of segregation and differentiation of the upper and lower castes. Compact settlements are also found in hunting and fishing communities.

2. Semi-Compact Settlement:

• Semi-Compact is a transitional phase in the growth of compact settlement. The emergence is because of the difference of semi-arid regions from humid regions and marginal productive land to that of fertile land.
• Increase in population cause villages to grow in number of houses. These houses occupy open spaces and lead to semi-compact settlement which ultimately acquires a nucleated settlement.

3. Dispersed Settlement:

• These are generally found in hills, plateaus and grasslands. These are found in areas where it is essential that the farmer should live on his own land. Overpopulation is one of the reasons for dispersed settlement.
• If a part of the population left a village to found a new one they often found dispersed rather than a new village. Dispersed settlements are relatively recent in age like Steppe grasslands of Kazakhstan.

Rural settlements in India

• Clustered, agglomerated or nucleated: It is a compact or closely built up area of houses. In this type of village the general living area is distinct and separated from the surrounding farms, barns and pastures.
• Semi-clustered or fragmented: These types of settlements may result from tendency of clustering in a restricted area of dispersed settlement. More often such a pattern may also result from segregation or fragmentation of a large compact village.
• Hamleted: Sometimes settlement is fragmented into several units physically separated from each other bearing a common name. These units are locally called panna, para, palli, nagla, dhani, etc. in various parts of the country. This segmentation of a large village is often motivated by social and ethnic factors.
• Dispersed or isolated: This pattern of settlement appears in the form of isolated huts or hamlets of few huts in remote jungles, or on small hills with farms or pasture on the slopes. Extreme dispersion of settlement is often caused by extremely fragmented nature of the terrain and land resource base of habitable areas.

Sites favourable for rural settlements include the following:

• Water Supply: Water is considered the elixir of life. Humans are largely dependent on water for life, thus, the supply of water has been a strong factor that determines the location of settlements. People are willing to face other adverse conditions in order to fulfill their need for water, for example, on islands and low-lying swampy areas. Water is required not only for drinking, cooking and washing, but also for economically important activities such as irrigation, transport, etc. Water also forms a kind of natural defence to these settlements. Such sites are mainly along riverbanks. However, in water scarce areas, water resources deserts, springs and wells serve as the main sources of water.
• Land: Land, that is suitable for agriculture, is an important factor. Since rural settlements are predominantly agricultural in nature, level plains and fertile lands needed for traditional crops are highly preferred.
• Dry Land: Land, not threatened by floods, is usually chosen as a site for settlements. Thus, high lying areas that provided water while being relatively dry and free from floods are chosen. Such areas include outer bends of meanders, river terraces or levees, and foothills. In some parts of the world like Malaysia and Indonesia, houses are built on stilts to get a protection from floods and also from animals and insects. In equatorial countries, such houses are also found to be much cooler.
• Housing: Availability of materials to build houses is another factor that influences the development of a settlement. For example, easy availability of materials such as wood from forests, stone from surrounding rocks, mud bricks and ice blocks, etc., serve the purpose of housing. The type of construction of the houses is in accordance with the climatic conditions of the area. In northern hemisphere, the south-facing slopes of mountainous areas facing sunlight are chosen; whereas in southern hemisphere, it is the north-facing slopes. Dwellings are also built in a fashion to prevent heavy winds, unhealthy mists, frosts, waves and tides.
• Defence: In the past, strategic positions like hills, islands, etc., were chosen to establish settlements in order to cope with the high political instability and hostility among ethnic clans, or tribes. The examples of this can be the sites on Inselbergs (Nigeria) and in places close to royal palaces as were chosen for protection and help during the times of emergency.
• Planned Settlements: Planned settlements need food, water and shelter as pre-conditions. Settlements are reorganized or restructured according to plans of governments or landlords, in order to facilitate agricultural production. Mostly, it is the spreading of settlement into new areas that needed planning. Such planned are Settlements seen in the US and Canada, which followed a gridiron pattern.