Changing Places - Nature & Importance

Question 1

What are the three aspects of place?

Answer 1

Location, Locale, Sense of Place

Question 2

What is locale?

Answer 2

This is the place where something happens or is set, or that has particular events associated with it.

Question 3

What is a location?

Answer 3

Where a place is, for example the co-ordinates on a map.

Question 4

What is meaning?

Answer 4

Meaning relates to indiviual or collective perceptions of place.

Question 5

What is media?

Answer 5

Means of communication including television, film, photography, art, newspapers, books, songs etc. These reach or influence people widely.

Question 6

What is a place?

Answer 6

Defined as a location with meaning. Places can be meaningful to individuals in ways that are personal or subjective. Places can be meaningful at a social or cultural level and these meanings may be shared by different groups of people.

Question 7

What is placemaking?

Answer 7

The deliberate shaping of an environment to facilitate social interaction and improve a community’s quality of life.

Question 8

What is sense of place?

Answer 8

This refers to the subjective and emotonal attachment people have to a place. People develop a ‘sense of place’ through experience and knowledge of a particular area.

Question 9

What does subjective mean?

Answer 9

Based on or influenced by personal feelings, tastes or opinions.

Question 10

What are the three main approaches into which the study of place is divided?

Answer 10

1) A descriptive approach.
2) A social constructionist approach.
3) A phenomenological approach.

Question 11

What is a descriptive approach to the study of place?

Answer 11

This is the idea that the world is a set of places and each place can be studied and is distinct.

Question 12

What is a social constructionist approach to the study of place?

Answer 12

This approach sees place as a product of a particular set of social processes occuring at a particular time.

Question 13

What is a phenomenological approach to the study of place?

Answer 13

This approach is not interested in the unique characteristics of a place or why it was constructed. Instead it is interested in how an individual perosn experiences place, recognising a highly personal relationship between place and person.

Question 14

What is topophilia and who developed the term?

Answer 14

Yi-Fu Tuan. Topophilia concerns the love of a place and having a strong attachment to it.

Question 15

What factors influence peoples lived experience of a place?

Answer 15

1) Identity.
2) Belonging.
3) Well-being.

Question 16

What are the different scales of indentity?

Answer 16

1) Localism: An affection for or emotional ownership of a particular place.

2) Regionalism: Consciousness of and loyalty to, a distinct region with a population that shres similarities.

3) Nationalism: Loyalty and devotion to a nation, which creates a sense of national consciousness. e.g patriotism

Question 17

How can religion affect to a sense of place?

Answer 17

At a local level, churches, mosques and synagogues are places where people from the same religious identity come together to worship. There may also be larger sacred places such as Bethlehem or Mecca where people g on pilgrimages.

Question 18

How can protests affect to a sense of place?

Answer 18

The power of place in political protest is a feature of the early 21st century in reaction to unpopular political regimes and problems accociated with capitalism, racial inequality and climate change. E.g. Extinction Rebellion

Question 19

Who wrote about a ‘global sense of place’?

Answer 19

Doreen Massey

Question 20

What did Massey state about the ‘sense of place’?

Answer 20

Massey wrote about a global sense of place, in which she questioned the idea that places are static. She argued instead that places are dynamic, they have multiple identities and they do not have to have boundaries. Massey argued that the character of a place can only be seen and understood by linking that place to places beyond. She concluded, ‘What we need, it seems to me, is a global sense of the local, a global sense of place.’

Question 21

What is a ‘clone town’?

Answer 21

Settlements where the high street is dominated by chain stores.

Question 22

Define placelessness

Answer 22

Places are becoming more generic and standardised e.g. an aiport or shopping mall

Question 23

Define glocalisation

Answer 23

When multinational companies such as TNCs have to adapt to the local marketplace of different countries.

Question 24

What is an ‘insider v outsider’ perpective?

Answer 24

People, activities and events can be seen ‘in place’ or ‘out of place’, depending on how a place or situation makes different people feel.

Question 25

What is a 'near' and 'far' place?

Answer 25

1) They could refer to the geographical distance between places. 2) They could describe the emotional connection with a particular place and how comfortable a person feels within that place. Some places feel more familiar than others partly due to personal experience, but also because of frequent representational exposure.

Question 26

What is an 'experienced' or 'media' place?

Answer 26

Experienced places are those that a person has spent time in, whereas media places are those that the person has only read about or seen on film. The 'reality' of a place can be far different to that put across by the media and this is most clearly seen through the portrayal of rural places.

Question 27

What is the media portrayal of rural living?

Answer 27

Stereotypical images of rural living permeate but the idyllic image of the countryside put forward by the media and advertising companies hides lots of problems including unemployment, scarce availability of affordable housing, reduction in public transport services and rural homelessness.

Question 28

What is the media portrayal of city living?

Answer 28

Cities are often stereotyped in a negative way through deprivation, homelessness, crime, vandalism and pollution.

Question 29

Define diaspora

Answer 29

A group of people with similar heritage or place of origin who have settled elsewhere in the world.

Question 30

What are endogenous factors?

Answer 30

In the context of place, this refers to the characteristics of the place itself or factors which have originated internally. This would include aspects such as location, physical, geography, land use and social and economic characteristics such as population size and employment rates.

Question 31

What are exogenous factors?

Answer 31

This refers to the relationship of one place with other places and the external factors which affect this. The demographic, socio-economic and cultural characteristics of a place are shaped by shifting flows of people, resources, money and investment.

Question 32

Define infrastructure

Answer 32

Infrastructure relates to the services considered essential to enable or enhance living conditions. These primarily consist of transport, communications and services such as water supply, sewers and electrical grids.

Question 33

How may people identify with a place on national level?

Answer 33

1) A common language. 2) A national anthem. 3) A flag. 4) Cultural and sporting events.

Question 34

What are the different categories of place?

Answer 34

1) Near places and far places. 2) Experienced places and media places

Question 35

What are some examples of exogenous factors that affect the character of places?

Answer 35

1) The impact of international migration. 2) The increasing mobility of people increases the links between places. 3) Mining, steel and shipbuilding towns having to adapt to challenges posed by globalisation. 4) Deindustrialisation, unemployment

Question 36

What are some examples of endogenous factors that affect the character of places?

Answer 36

1) Physical geography such as relief and rock type. 2) Demographic factors such as population size and structure. 3) Location whether urban or rural. 4) The built environment such as land use and age. 5) Cultural factors such as heritage and religion. 6) Socio-economic factors such as employment opportunities.