Alternative Reflections on the Elderly's Sense of Place in a South African Gated Retirement Village

Abstract

ABSTRACT Moving to a gated retirement village compels the elderly to adjust to a new spatial location and lifestyle with an unfamiliar social environment and psychological conditions. The article focuses on the under-researched topic of a sense of place which active retirees develop in a gated retirement village. A theoretical discussion of the concept ‘sense of place’ is followed by a depiction of the gated lifestyle of the retirees, and how gated retirement villages influence their sense of place. In a survey of a gated retirement village in Cape Town, using qualitative and quantitative analytical methods, high levels of sense of place are found, which assign primary importance to social elements rather than to physical ones, such as walls and gates. We conclude that a multi-layered sense of place of the active retirees focuses on four main areas: belonging, stability, lifestyle and attachment. Mental maps and photographic images acquired through a questionnaire survey among 60 residents in Heritage Manor retirement village were analysed to show how the residents relate certain physical attributes (e.g. walls, security) of their gated village to their lived spaces. The authors contend that retirement villages are an urban reflection of the fragmented, segregated and social condition of South African society.