Key Terms

Question 1

Define locale

Answer 1

The place something happens or is set, or has particular events associated with it. Eg internet chat room, or school bus.

Question 2

Define location.

Answer 2

Where a place is. For example the coordinates on a map.

Question 3

Define perception of place.

Answer 3

This is the way in which place is viewed or regarded by people. This can be influenced by media representation or personal experience.

Question 4

Define place.

Answer 4

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

Question 5

Define placemaking.

Answer 5

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

Question 6

Define sense of place.

Answer 6

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

Question 7

Define ‘agents of change’.

Answer 7

People who impact on a place whether through living, working, or trying to improve that place.

For example: residents, community groups, corporate entities, central and local government and the media.

Question 8

Define endogenous factors.

Answer 8

Characteristics of the place itself or factors which have originated internally.

This would include aspects eg location, physical geography, land use, social and economic characteristics eg population size and employment rates.

Question 9

Define exogenous factors.

Answer 9

The relationship of one place with other places and the external factors that affect this.

The demographic, socio-economic and cultural characteristics of a place are shaped by shifting flows of people, resources, money and investment.

Question 10

Define infrastructure.

Answer 10

The services considered to be essential to enable or enhance living conditions. These primarily consist of transport communication, communications infrastructure (broadband), and services eg water supply.

These may also include infrastructure eg the local education system, healthcare provision, local government and law enforcement, as well as emergency services.

Question 11

What is the ‘descriptive approach’?

Answer 11

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

Question 12

What is the ‘social constructionist approach’?

Answer 12

The idea that place is a product of a particular set of social processes occurring at a particular time.

(Eg Trafalgar Square could be understood as a place of empire and colonialism)

Question 13

What is the ‘phenomenological approach’?

Answer 13

How an individual experiences place, recognising a highly personal relationship between place and person.

Yi-Fu Tuan developed the term ‘topophilia’ to describe the affective bond between people and place and argued that it is through human perception and experience that we get to know places.
Reply argues that the degree of attachment, involvement and concern a person has for a particular place is critically in our understanding of place.

Question 14

What is the placemaking movement?

Answer 14

This movement places great emphasis on the three aspects of the importance of place:

• identity
• belonging
• well being

Question 15

Identity of place can be evident at a number of scales.

Define localism.

Answer 15

Am affection for or emotional ownership of a particular place.

Can be demonstrated in nimbyism which occurs when people are reluctant to have their local area affected by development.

Question 16

Identity can be evident at three levels.

Define regionalism.

Answer 16

Consciousness of, and loyalty to, a distinct region with a population that shares similarities.

Question 17

Identity can be evident at three scales.

Define nationalism.

Answer 17

Loyalty and devotion which creates a sense of national consciousness.

Patriotism may could be considered as an example of a sense of place.

Question 18

Define clone town.

Answer 18

Settlements where high streets are dominated by chain stores.

Also described as placelessness.

Eg James Kunstler argues that “every place is like no place in particular”.

Question 19

Define glocalisation.

Answer 19

Multinational companies increasingly having to adapt to the local marketplace.

Eg McDonald’s in Hindu countries have removed pork from the menu.
Also the number of McCafes has increased in countries with a coffee culture.

Question 20

Define belonging (in the context of place).

Answer 20

To be part of the community. It is seen as one of the key factors that makes a place sustainable and successful.

Regeneration schemes now often focus as much on the social environment as the built environment.

Question 21

Define positionality.

Answer 21

Factors eg gender, age, religion which influence how we perceive different places.

Question 22

Define near and far places.

Answer 22

They could refer to the geographical distance between places, or how comfortable a person feels within that place.

Geographically near places don’t automatically foster identities of familiarity and belonging and that in these days of globalised culture, far places are not automatically strange, uncomfortable or different.

Question 23

Define experienced place.

Answer 23

Those places that a person has spent time in.

Question 24

What are media places

Answer 24

Places that the person has only read about or seen in a film.

The reality of a place can be fat different tot hat out across by the media - eg in rural areas.

Question 25

Define the ‘character of place’.

Answer 25

Refers to the physical and human features that help to distinguish it from another place. Includes endogenous and exogenous factors