Abstract
This chapter explores a suite of vernacular meanings around the localised notion of sambandam (in both Tamil and Sinhala). In everyday discourse, the term evokes a sense of voluntary association, while at the same time implicates the many biosocial entanglements that can be found in the daily social fabric of coastal life, particularly among spatially mobile small-scale fishing communities. The dimensions of sambandam are explored through three overlapping layers of sociality, as identified by diverse fisher collectives constituting the lateral, the hierarchical/vertical and the a-sociative (as opposed to the associative). While outlining the ambiguities and paradoxes inherent in the practices prefiguring sambandam, particularly among fisher co-operative societies, this chapter lays the empirical foundation through which migrant, settler and local dependencies will be explored.
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
For a conceptual discussion on how the concept of lifeworlds has been reworked, refer to Chapter 2 (3).
- 3.
For example, the ban on obtaining farming inputs such as urea for soil during wartime particularly affected Tamil smallholder farmers (Gaasbeek, 2010: 11), as did the process of obtaining mandatory fishing passes that fisherfolk in the north and east had to contend with, which again disproportionately affected Tamil communities, as many were reportedly compelled to sell their boats and gear (see Introduction).
- 4.
- 5.
Arguably, the closest association would entail the ancient Naga cult, which remains rather peripheral to popular Sinhala-Buddhist imagination.
- 6.
Petromax lamps. Formal fishing regulations restrict fishers to two lamps at nighttime.
- 7.
For example, residents in Tamil villages like Thirukadaloor speak of Muslim gill-netters sprinkling water from the fount of the ancient shore temple on the promontory, Thiru Koneswaram, as they pass by.
- 8.
A study of local protests and anxieties, albeit on a relatively smaller scale regarding alterations made to parts of the coastline with flood-proof embankments over the past years, bears testimony to some of these meanings.
- 9.
D’Arcy (2006: 177) in using the example of seafaring posits how it is more than about technology, knowledge and enskillment. To look at seafaring would be to consider it in a wider social context, for “voyaging is a social process” that not only ascertains a great deal of “onshore infrastructure to provide for logistical and organisational needs, as well as training and motivational influences” but also embodies the communicative world of those who are left on the shore, “coping with absence” (ibid., p. 13).
- 10.
Deep-sea fishing boats primarily land larger pelagic fish species such as bigeye and yellowfin tuna, swordfish and marlin, for example. However, certain forms of coastal fishing such as longlining may also target the same species. Hence it would be problematic to claim that perceptions of resource competition merely cohere with similar styles of fishing, as opposed to the distances at which fishing occurs.
- 11.
Harvested lagoon shells form two distinct supply chains—shell meat for consumption and the latter, which is powdered for chicken feed and wall-plaster dye.
- 12.
Seine nets are usually pulled in from the shore and comprise horseshoe-shaped dragnets with weights attached to the bottom. An artisanal craft is used to lay the nets in a semicircle from the shoreline, and the duration of the production cycle may vary between 1.5 and 3 h. Beach-seine operators may choose to haul in nets twice or thrice a day, depending on time of year and the catch rates on that particular day. The style of beach-seining that is practised in the northeast today is known a karaivalai (in Tamil) that as Bavinck (1984: 18) argues, supplanted an older form known as pataivalai, perhaps not long after the turn of the twentieth century.
- 13.
Nets are usually manufactured locally according to fishery regulations concerning its length and mesh size. The lifespan of a net is typically 5 years, and once torn, nets are often repaired and reused. Net mending is almost exclusively gendered and used to be a lucrative vocation for a number of retired fishermen. This knowledge was usually passed down intergenerationally. Many often bemoaned the fact that youth today possessed little skill in repairing their nets and often paid someone else to get it done.
- 14.
For example, among Tamil and Sinhalese households in rural Trincomalee, a male conventionally performs the butchering of a live market chicken for a household meal. Interestingly, a beach-seine fisher I knew decided to diversify his income by opening a frozen chicken meat shop in Salli, a predominantly Tamil settlement with a relatively large number of female-headed households. The disproportionate number of war and tsunami widows, he concurred, was evidence enough to ensure that there was sufficient demand for processed meat.
- 15.
This point was first raised by Weeratunge (2009) in illustrating the fact that more fishing-related investment than would otherwise have been imagined may stem from the earnings of women who return as migrant domestic workers or through funds raised in seasonally pawning jewelry and other valuables when times are rough. During my fieldwork, jewelry was often seen as a reliable investment and was often passed down through girls as a part of their “dowry set” which was either owned singularly by the wife or collectively as a couple. A significant number of fishermen shared tales of heading directly to the jewelers’ after reaping an extraordinarily lucky catch to convert their day’s windfall into gold.
- 16.
Fieldnotes, Kuchchaveli, October 3, 2013.
- 17.
Drawn from fieldnotes primarily with Mary (October 2012, Kuchchaveli) and Antonia (February 2013, Eachchalampattu). Interestingly, all three women married into fishing families along the west coast, while their male siblings pursued other occupations, meaning they may have left the fishing sector entirely.
- 18.
These usually entail larger predatory species such as swordfish (Xiphias gladius), varieties of marlin (e.g. Makaira indica and Tetrapturus audax), shark (e.g. Carcharhinus falciformis and Carcharhinus longimanus) and skipjack, yellowfin and bigeye tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis, Thunnus albacares and Thunnus obesus, respectively), among others.
- 19.
These include several varieties of squid as well as cuttlefish.
- 20.
Such encounters, as illustrated in the Prologue, are often associated with the incidence of illegal fishing practices and rule breaking such as the use of lights and dynamite at night, as squid fishing, for example, remains characteristically a nocturnal activity.
- 21.
Petty commodity production does continue with regard to lagoon fishing during the monsoonal months, but fishing families state that they do not depend on this activity for a living. Often the unit catch per day per family is too small to attract traders and mudalalis . However the communal exchange value of “subsistence” landings of prawn or smaller varieties of rockfish should not be discounted. For example, a female shrimper once remarked that she could have three sets of school uniforms for her children restitched for the barter value of a fortnights’ worth of shrimping.
- 22.
Fieldnotes, Kuchchaveli, 6 February, 2013.
- 23.
However, as Ireson (1996: 222) prompts, drawing on the work of Grant Evans on peasant economies, social stratification does not necessarily result in class polarisation.
- 24.
Arguably, in the case of former, the long shadow of the moral economy approach (or closely associated strands of scholarship) has implicitly dominated thinking on what Acheson (1981: 278) and McGoodwin (2001: 33) see as constituting the “spirit of egalitarianism”. Much earlier, historians like Roberts (1982) have illustrated how particular facets of occupational fishing (particularly those that were more entrepreneurially co-operative), combined with frequent European contact along the coastal belt, led to the rise of wealthy and politically influential fisher caste lineages in colonial southern Ceylon.
- 25.
What is interesting is not simply the force of religious hybridity and the existence of shared sacred sites, but the social consequences of what could be called multisited spirituality. The same barey may be performed or re-enacted by an individual at a Hindu kovil, a ziyaram or at a Buddhist temple. There were more crosscurrents between ziyarams and smaller Hindu shrines that were often patronised by both Tamil Hindus and Sinhalese-Buddhists. Catholic communities, however, were seen to be relatively more distant; however, socially heterogeneous villages, such as Valayoothu, had Muslim and Hindu members donating to church building funds during festivities and vice versa. Arguably, the involvement within church spaces that mix local and settler groups is evidently much less. Often migrant and settler communities return to their villages of origin during important religious dates, including principal church feasts.
- 26.
A barey is an offering made to a particular deity or entity in lieu of prayer or requests.
- 27.
Fieldnotes: September 2, 2012, Town and Gravets.
- 28.
My thanks go to Yuvi Thangarajah and Asoka de Zoysa for clarifying these points.
- 29.
This list is by no means exhaustive.
- 30.
At face value the vernacular—sambandam/sambanda (Tami/Sinhalese)—often signifies a more intentional, formal relationship. In other words, these associations are never accidental or happen by chance.
- 31.
While it is said to establish more solidaristic relations, it remains a deeply instrumental one at that. Boats that cease to fish temporarily not only find what they go in search for fairly swiftly but also act as a protective patrolling mechanism.
- 32.
In some ways, this could be equated to contemporary readings (and reworkings) of Scott’s (1976) “subsistence ethic”.
- 33.
Van Wengan cites the example of particular sites in southwest India in which work groups were organised into teams tasked with operating and maintaining vessels that belonged to a wider collective.
- 34.
From fieldnotes gleaned between January and April 2013.
- 35.
Taken from statistics shared at the District Co-operative Department in Trincomalee, in September 2012.
- 36.
Several older fisher co-operative leaders ascertained that before the societies were named, they functioned through registration numbers.
- 37.
During my fieldwork, for example, ownership of a smaller multiday boat for 1.1 million rupees changed hands between Valaichchenai, Batticaloa and Pt. Pedro, Jaffna . The buyer’s and seller’s respective FCSs were both involved in this transaction, and the Batticaloa District Co-operative was brought in to facilitate the deal.
- 38.
Fieldnotes: 3 March, 2013, Kantale town.
- 39.
With the exception of Manayaveli and Vijithapura, very few co-ops had female leaders or office-bearers. Both the president of the Vijithapura FCS and the treasurer and co-operative bank manager in Manayaveli were Sinhalese women of settler descent.
- 40.
Note that these statistics only pertain to organisations that are officially registered as a co-operative society.
- 41.
When engaging with fishing collectives, donor organisations and NGOs working in conflict settings would often involve FCSs.
- 42.
Members often concurred that the payment of a double membership fee proved meaningless.
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Siriwardane-de Zoysa, R. (2018). Fisher Lifeworlds, Relational Practices. In: Fishing, Mobility and Settlerhood. MARE Publication Series, vol 20. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-78837-1_3
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