On the essentialism of places: Between conservative and progressive meanings

Lewicka, Magdalena; Rowiński, Kamil; Iwańczak, Bartłomiej; Bałaj, Bibianna; Kula, Agnieszka; Oleksy, Tomasz; Prusik, Monika; Toruńczyk-Ruiz, Sabina; Wnuk, Anna

doi:10.1016/j.jenvp.2019.101318

Cited by 30 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…The visitors of Open Jazdow formed a special bond with Open Jazdow, which is stronger than the one formed by visitors of the Saxon Garden. This shows that not only essentialist places may be associated with unique atmosphere and emotional attachment, as seen in other studies [38]. Nevertheless, this effect may be specific to natural places, while previous research showed that, in the case of human-made sites, the essentialist places are related to higher meaningfulness and place attachment [34,38].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 68%

“…Based on the existing literature, we proposed and tested a new empirical tool to measure the intangible qualities of the heritage sites. We focused on two qualities of cultural heritage: intrinsic value as a combination of historic value and uniqueness that evokes attachment [1,11], as well as perceived (anti-)essentialism [38].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nevertheless, defining place as having a stable essence has been contested, especially by highlighting the oppressive nature of this definition [35][36][37]. The so-called progressive concept of place stated that a good place is also a place that is changeable, dynamic, its character just being formed, and with no stable identity; thus, such a place may be called anti-essentialist [38,39]. Such a place is able to accommodate different narratives and cultural patterns, is by definition more open to change, does not have one true essence, so there is no direct threat to its existing common meaning [36,37].…”

Section: (Anti-)essentialism Of Placementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Previous empirical research has shown that places perceived as essentialist are more meaningful [38] but are also less open to social change or new inhabitants from certain outgroups [39]. As recent studies showed, the preference for essentialist places also leads to a biased assessment of the place's past [40], such as whitewashing of its history or selective memory of its previous characteristics.…”

Section: (Anti-)essentialism Of Placementioning

confidence: 99%

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Intrinsic Value and Perceived Essentialism of Culture Heritage Sites as Tools for Planning Interventions

Roszczyńska-Kurasińska

Domaradzka

Wnuk

et al. 2021

Sustainability

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In order to remain alive and relevant, cultural heritage sites have to react and adapt to changing context in a coherent manner, i.e., in a way that is in line with the memory and identity of the place. The incoherent changes, i.e., the transformations that according to the local community do not agree with a character of a place, can be destructive for the long-term vitality of urban cultural heritage. In this study, we test which factors influence social acceptance of different alternations within the context of urban historical gardens that might, in turn, ensure the resilience of the place. Our study focuses on the intangible qualities of the place measured by intrinsic value, perceived essentialism and anti-essentialism as important predictors shaping the response to change. The correlational study was conducted using an online questionnaire designed to empirically grasp intangible qualities of cultural heritage sites. Five hundred twenty-nine responses were included in the analysis. The study shows that perceived historic value, inherent value (uniqueness and importance of the place) and (anti-)essentialist character of a place capture the differences between parks well and enables the finding of interventions that are coherent with a site’s genius loci. Measuring intangible qualities of urban gardens can help to design changes that find higher approval among local community members and users of the site. We discuss how the analysis of an intrinsic value and essentialism allows for planning better spatial interventions that align with the human-centered approach to urban development.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 68%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: (Anti-)essentialism Of Placementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: (Anti-)essentialism Of Placementioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Intrinsic Value and Perceived Essentialism of Culture Heritage Sites as Tools for Planning Interventions

Roszczyńska-Kurasińska

Domaradzka

Wnuk

et al. 2021

Sustainability

Self Cite

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“…In his book [49] on the sense of place attachment as one of the most effective features in design, Kevin Lynch poses the issue of environment legibility and examines the factors that make this legibility. Lynch goes on to outline features and body elements, paths, edges, cues, and nodes as effective in shaping the concept of legibility of the environment [50].…”

Section: Environmental Legibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Effect of Place Attachment on Educational Efficiency in Elementary Schools

Soheili¹,

Karimi²,

Avazpour³

et al. 2020

Smart Cities and Construction Technologies

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Close attention to education and its effects on the identities of societies has been ingrained in the history of studies. Nowadays, a considerable amount of criticism in the field of education is related to inefficient and obsolete educational scheduling, with a large number of researchers exploring new learning methods. Logically, these new methods require new architectural environments, which can meet the needs of a new generation with the approach of positively affecting students' learning efficiency. The main purpose of this research is to identify effective factors in students' sense of attachment to school. First, this research finds factors on the sense of attachment by studying past literature. Second, a number of questions and hypothesis are developed. Third, in order to validate the effective factors and answer the developed questions, a questionnaire is devised and distributed among 278 students of 10 state primary schools of Shahriyar, Iran. The collected data are then analyzed using SPSS software. The findings indicate that there is a meaningful relation between students' educational efficiency and their sense of attachment to school. It also shows that important factors, such as social activities and connection with natural elements in design, can have a noticeable impact on the students' sense of attachment to school and consequently their educational efficiency.

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