ABSTRACT
India is a country of continental dimensions. It has a broad framework of cultural identity cutting across language and region and, to some extent, religion, but its tremendous diversity must be recognized. In opposition to universalizing trends, much social, economic and political change tended to be regional rather than national until late in the twentieth century. Except for the elite who had a sophisticated way of life and a national rather than a regional character, diversity penetrated every region. This regionalism, continues although in a diminished form because of the impact of globalizing economic and social forces that hearken back to the colonial era. During the twentieth century different traditions often existed side-by-side in the same village, town or city. People had migrated from one region to another and had taken their cultures and expectations, including those of house forms, with them.
