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Define place. Define sense of place, location etc. Talk about temporal/spatial scale.
- Place is defined as location plus meaning. Location simply describes where a place is on a map with longitude and latitude whereas meaning is more complex. Each place has a different meaning to different people and is therefore highly experiential and subjective. A particular building or café is likely to mean different things to different people depending on what has happened to them (or others) there.
A sense of place refers to those meanings which are associated with a place. - Place can be applied to any scale: from a particular room in a building to a country or region which rouses shared feelings in people. This is particularly noticeable in times of rapid political change (such as the concept of a ‘United Kingdom’) or public events (like the Olympics) where people experience shared feelings of belonging and attachment in response to an external stimulus.
- Place does not necessarily have to be a fixed location spatially or temporally. A cruise ship which a group of people have shared for a period of time may invoke a sense of belonging in those people, as may a camp site or other temporary structure. Similarly, every place is a product of its history – formal and personal – and is therefore likely to encompass feelings of attachment based on individual life events or distant historical events which are represented in architecture and iconography. People may feel a sense of belonging to a particular house where they grew up or a playground they went to as a child or similarly, may feel attachment to a part of the country where their ancestors came from.
- Places are dynamic and subject to constant change in their material structure and meaning. Places are not isolated or cut off from outside influences and so as people, ideas and objects pass in and out of a place in space and time they change it.
Define locale
Locations associated with everyday activities such as schools.A locale structures social interactions and people are likely to show
behavioural traits specific in a locale. People are likely to be sociable in a pub, but will speak
more quietly in a library to conform with social stereotypes. This may occur subconsciously.
Define placelessness/clone towns and link to locale to explain how they may actually have a meaning.
Placelessness suggests that a place is not unique. For example, most UK high streets have a
Costa Coffee (or similar chain shops). If these are the locales
that structure interactions and help develop sense of place and they are the same or similar in
different locations, then what makes these locations different?
They are clone towns due to the
dominance of chain shops and globalisation/westernisation/homogenisation. It could also be argued that as place is about people and different
people will interact in the different locales, then these places are in fact unique. The individual
memories make the area unique to them
Edward relph
Define attachment to a place by Yi-Fi Tuan. Explain home is where your heart is phrase.
The geographer Yi-Fu Tuan suggests that attachment (a feeling binding one subject with another)
to a place, grows stronger over time. As you have more experiences in a place, you are more
likely to be attached with that place. Experiences can have different levels of intensity: marriage
is likely to be a more intense experience than, say, a train station. The greater the intensity and number
of experiences you have in a place, the greater the depth of attachment you may have to a
place. If you spend long enough in a place with many positive and intense experiences, it will
become home. Hence the phrase, ‘home is where your heart is’ refers to emotional attachment.
The tripartite model of place attachment –
Attachment to a:
· Person
· Place – social and physical qualities
Process (feeling / perception / memory or knowledge gained from that process
How does Ground Zero differ based on perception. Refer to topophilia/topophobia
-Some tourists love the area believing it is serene and helps to remember those lost.
-Families affected may not want to visit the place and taking pictures with a smile on their face might be odd when considering the nature of the event.
Topophilia or topophobia (love and attachment vs hate and resentment for a place)
Who/what is an insider (insider perspective)? Opposite for outsider
Insider:
Place of birth, status/citizenship, language capability/dialect/idioms and slang eg kill 2 birds with 1 stone, understand the local norms, feels safe and secure. Not seeking asylum. No faux pas.
Immigrants may at first feel like outsiders. But as more of them populate an area, the locals may feel like outsiders.Bradistan Bradford. Depends on whether multiculturalism can be embraced.
Define Tourist Gaze coined by John Urry
The way that places are perceived often shaped by the media/social constructs as places worth seeing. Eg framing of landscapes and photos ignoring the mass visitors/the weather patterns that are more common yet adverse for instance the Eiffel Tower, Paris. Paris syndrome
Define Genius Loci
Genius Loci is the spirit of the place. Unique and made up of now and from the past
What may cause different perspectives on a place (could refer to insiders and outsiders)
Different people will have different levels of emotional attachment to a place. This is
likely to depend on age eg baby and old , gender, role in an area, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, length of residence
and language
* Different groups of people will use the space differently at different times of day. Eg night shifts.
* Different groups will have different needs depending on their socio-economic
characteristics such as employment status, age and family stage. Low income may feel like outsiders in middle-income areas.
* Different groups of people will have different levels of political engagement and access
to power (e.g. a local councillor or the president of the local history society are likely to
be politically active and have access to decision-making processes on a local level). This
will affect both their influence and their views
Second hand experiences.
What are near places?
Near Places: Those which are close to us. Near places are subjective. A woman living in
the Australian outback may consider a place that is 100km away to be near, due to the
ability to directly drive between settlements across the outback. In the UK a place that is
100km away may take several hours to travel to and may be considered as a far place.
What are far places?
Far Places: Those that are distant. Some people may get ‘homesick’ if they are staying away for the first
time in their lives even if they are only ten minutes drive away. They may feel ‘far’ away
emotionally, even if they are physically close. Though, time-space compression can make places feel less far.
Them vs us – mildy offensive eg Australians calling English whinging poms. Possible links to the others and more severe xenophobia.
What are experienced places?
Experienced places are places that you have lived in or physically visited before. This means we may acquire a deeper understanding of the place
What are media places?
- Media places are places that we only know through media such as TV,literature, songs or art (1). This means that our perceptions are based on what is presented to us.
Media places can be fictitious for example Hogwarts (1) and we can gain a strong sense of place through the media representations of these places. These places cannot fall short of our expectations as we are unable to experience them (1). - Media places can become virtually experienced places (1).
However, when we physically experience such places, they may not live up to
our expectations (1) for example visiting Chelsea after experiencing
it through the TV show Made in Chelsea and finding out that there aren’t designer shops everywhere. - Media places often focus on extreme positive or negative
characteristics of place. For example, new stories focusing on gang
culture in London can cause topophobia, even if its mainly in small, urban areas.
Much more prominent nowadays than years ago.
Space vs place
A space is a location with a grid reference and
describable features.
It becomes a ‘place’ as individuals ascribe to that location a
series of emotions, reactions and develop a set of meanings associated with it
What are endogenous factors shaping a place?
8 endogenous.
Those that originate internally.
Location
Topography: Height of the land, relief (hills, mountains)* Topographical features such as mountains may be composed of a specific rock type (1). The local rock of the mountains may be used to build houses, making them have a distinct look and giving the place its character. For example, the ‘slate villages’ of North Wales are known for the houses built of local slate, and the culture of the area is deeply connected with the slate. May create isolated rural areas adding to sense of place.
Physical geography: Drainage, floodplain, soil type
Land use Settlement: industrial, commercial, agricultural
Built environment: Age of buildings, type of buildings
Infrastructure: Road and rail networks, waterways, airports
Demographic: Age structure, ethnicity
Economic Sector: (primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary)
What are the 4 exogenous factors shaping places?
Those that orginate externally.
Links to other places.
People: Migrants or workers come from outside a place to live or work. Each new wave of migration changes the character of a place
Capital Investment/money: from a business based outside the area
Resources: Raw materials, transport infrastructure, accessibility from other locations.
Ideas: Urban planners, architects, businesses and artists may bring ideas.
Over time, endogenous factors will be shaped by the changing flows of exogenous factors
Places often have multiple identities: How can this be good or bad (in short)
Each place has multiple identities: this can be a source of richness or of conflict.
What type of countries first experienced the Global Shift due to FDI from TNCs in the 1960s
Asian Tigers such as Hong Kong and Taiwan
(Economics/business already talked about drawbacks and this itself to be fair). Give benefit of global shift
Might be able to retrain and get higher pay in a new more profitable industry. For instance, London Docklands 1980s. Has old and new residents.
How did EU impact flows of people into UK
The accession of eight eastern European countries to the EU since 2004 (including
Poland) have led to parts of Britain experiencing an
increase in proportion of foreign-born residents. This has led to dynamic social characteristics such as changes in employment patterns, retail trends and public services allocation. Schengen Area (Gov synoptic).
Past connections may have helped to shape the cultural or social
character of a place.
Define socially constructed places and give the name of female geographer who helped use this term. D M
The concept that the idea of a place is shaped by societal perceptions, values, and norms rather than inherent physical characteristics. Doreen Massey for instance.
Example: The perception of a neighborhood as safe or unsafe is influenced by social constructs rather than objective crime rates. London/lpool.
Spatial Inclusion/Exclusion
The intentional or unintentional creation of environments that either welcome or alienate individuals based on various factors.
Example: Designing public spaces with ramps and elevators ensures spatial inclusion for individuals with mobility challenges.
Hostile Architecture
Eg homeless spikes to prevent people sleeping in areas.
Globalisation and its links to places with flows:
Using the Lake District currency example, show how localisation can be outweighed by globalisation
The Lake District National Park launched its own currency in 2018 – accepted by 350 local businesses and could only be spent in the Lake District. Bank notes featured local people such as Beatrix Potter.
Impact of contactless technology: Pushed the notes out of circulation and since 2020 they have not been legal tender. The notes are now collectors’ items.
