Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience

Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience (2002 [1977])
By Yi-Fu Tuan

Synopsis: This book takes a humanistic approach to space and place, noting that "how the human person, who is animal, fantasist, and computer combined, experiences and understands the world is the central theme of this book" (5). It contains chapters dealing with the experiential perspective, body and spatial relations, the child and space/place, crowding and spaciousness, mythical space and place, architectural space and awareness, spatial ability, time, intimate experiences of place, attachments to homeland, and visibility. [As usual, his style is very poetic and flowy, and though it does contain many great stand-alone lines, I always feel like there isn't anything to do with his work.] His main argument seems to be: "Place is security; space is freedom: we are attached to the one and long for the other" (3). This book is very focused on the ways humans experience space/place - both how they negotiate their way in it and how they infuse it with meaning - though of course cultural influences are ever-present and infuse all negotiations with space/place. Tuan is concerned with the mystical and meaning-infused elements of place - i.e. the sacred meaning of certain directions (or lack of meaning - as in modern U.S.). My favorite part here is the use of symbolism to give people of a nation-state a sense of meaningful coherence. "Place is an organized world of meaning" (179). There is an overall mystical sense to his writing.

Interacts With:

This book supposedly helped establish the field of human geography.
Still not sure how this explicitly connects to everything, though it apparently does. Obviously connects to the anthologies in praise of him.