Strong Sense Of Place Research Articles

Voices in a pandemic: using deep mapping to explore children’s sense of place during the COVID-19 pandemic in UK

ABSTRACT Children’s sense of place is important for wellbeing, development and belonging in a community or place. The VIP-CLEAR (Voices in a Pandemic – Children’s Lockdown Experiences Applied to Recovery) project used creative methods and repeat engagement to capture children’s experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic in socially disadvantaged, urban settings, in Bristol, UK. This paper focuses on findings from the two-phased ‘deep mapping’ activity conducted in schools with 6–11-year-olds to consider children’s sense of place at this time. Children’s maps showed how their mobility was restricted to the home and/or adult-controlled, looped routes for functional tasks rather than child-directed exploration. Key locations - including school, family houses, and parks - were disconnected and highlighted as sites of ‘absence’, where children were excluded. These places were given meaning due to pre-COVID practice, sensory experience, and/or their relationship with valued people. As pandemic mitigation relaxed, children’s maps showed increasing connections and greater visibility of the community and non-essential activities. As places changed, the amplification of existing social inequalities became apparent. In both phases, sense of place evolved and digital and natural spaces (through animals) showed potential for children to increase practice and connections with place. A strong sense of place may support adaptation to change, and this paper contributes to limited research on how children’s sense of place is dynamic, altering with fluctuating social and environmental conditions, e.g. mitigation of a global pandemic. The implications of findings on future recovery planning involving children are also considered.

ВІДЧУТТЯ МІСЦЯ ЯК ЧИННИК СТІЙКОСТІ ГРОМАДИ МІСТА (ДОСЛІДЖЕННЯ НА ПРИКЛАДІ МІСТА СЛАВУТИЧ, УКРАЇНА)

The importance of the sense of place issue lies in its ability to enhance the community's resilience in addressing current situational and strategic tasks related to the cohesion of residents in the face of natural, social, or military challenges. To achieve a sense of place on a collective level, it is necessary to appeal to the unique and important characteristics of a place for its residents. This includes an authentic spirit and character of place that can influence the cognitive, behavioral, and emotional dimensions of the relationship between people and places. The research goal is to investigate the influence of a sense of place on the development of a cohesive and resilient community, using the city of Slavutych as an example. Despite facing various challenges, the city has consistently demonstrated a strong sense of unity and local patriotism based on past experiences. The community of Slavutych experienced the most recent challenge during the blockade and temporary occupation in March 2022, when the city was able to drive out the russian invaders as a result of a peaceful rally, self-organization of residents, and silent resistance by Chornobyl nuclear power plant workers. This reactive participation led to an active rethinking of local meanings and contexts of sense of place. Using the example of Slavutych city, we demonstrate how two groups of factors of a sense of place (physical features and cognitive and perceptual factors) determine the infrastructural, economic, ecological, institutional, social and competence dimensions of community resilience. Based on the results of a long-term study of the city using methods of observation, surveys, in-depth interviews, and expert analysis, the article emphasizes that community cohesion manifests itself differently in peacetime and during wartime challenges. However, in both cases, it is based on a strong sense of place, solidarity, and the establishment of informal social networks. Clearly understanding the uniqueness and exclusivity of Slavutych as an ideal satellite city of a nuclear power plant, the youngest and most comfortable city in Ukraine, we believe that community cohesion during the war is a typical phenomenon of national scale for all Ukrainian communities.

Stimulating creativity in the classroom: examining the impact of sense of place on students’ creativity and the mediating effect of classmate relationships

BackgroundAlthough previous studies have found a close relationship between sense of place and creativity, few studies have been conducted considering the micro-environment of the classroom. The mediating role of classmate relationships in the association between students’ sense of place and creativity remains unclear.MethodsThis study explores classmate relationships as a mediating factor in the relationship between sense of place and creativity. Therefore, we considered a sample of 1555 Chinese high-school students and used a paper-based questionnaire survey. Data analysis was performed using SPSS 24.0, PROCESS 3.2 plugin, and AMOS.ResultsSense of place in the micro-environment of the classroom has a significant positive predictive effect on creativity. Sense of place also has a significant positive predictive effect on peer relationships. The mediation analysis reveals that peer relationships play a mediating role in the relationship between the sense of place and creativity.ConclusionsThis study revealed the associations between sense of place, classmate relationships, and creativity. Creativity is better expressed in students with a strong sense of place in the classroom. Moreover, a student’s sense of place can enhance their creativity by influencing their peer relationships. These findings enrich the research in educational psychology within the classroom, providing new insights for fostering creativity.

Acknowledging Landscape Connection: Using Sense of Place and Cultural and Customary Landscape Management to Enhance Landscape Ecological Theoretical Frameworks

Landscapes are important socio-ecological systems. They are widely researched through landscape ecology to aid conservation and environmental management efforts, yet these efforts are not always as successful as they could be in terms of on-the-ground impact. Increasingly when considering conservation, it is being recognized that indigenously managed landscapes have slower rates of biodiversity loss and better environmental outcomes. Local knowledge and connection to the landscape can play a significant part in successfully managing these landscapes. Acknowledging that stewardship of the landscape is more effective when people are a part of the landscape with deep-rooted connection to place is important for understanding the significance of traditional ecological knowledge and the implementation of indigenous-led action. It has also been shown that researchers who have a stronger sense of place and connection to landscapes can also drive initiatives that have better environmental outcomes. This means that human connections to landscapes are important for management strategies, and a better understanding of the human cognition of landscapes is necessary in landscape ecological theoretical frameworks. This review paper explores literature that acknowledges cultural perspectives and cognition of landscapes and how this relates to landscape ecology. It makes recommendations about how landscape ecology can contribute towards better on-the-ground outcomes by embracing more effective mechanisms of collaboration and participation to incorporate local and indigenous knowledge.

Measuring community flood resilience and associated factors in rural Malawi

AbstractWith global estimates showing an increasing trend in flooding and its adverse effects on communities and population health, resilience is presented as a concept with potential to help integrate disaster risk management, sustainable development, and climate change adaptation concerns. Resilience research and practice have conceptual and empirical challenges of how to understand, characterize and measure resilience, particularly at community level. Using a multidimensional framework, this paper takes a systems approach to understanding, characterizing, and measuring community flood resilience. Through cluster analysis, bivariate methods and multivariable‐adjusted binary logistic regression modeling, we developed a context and hazard specific construct of community flood resilience and investigated its predictor variables. The factors defining the community flood resilience construct captured the community needs to withstand disasters through purpose‐built infrastructure, early warning systems for preparedness and utilization of local human capacity for adaptation. These results strengthen the previous arguments for utilizing a comprehensive multidimensional framework for resilience analysis. Access to services for improved health and psychosocial well‐being was significantly associated with the three‐item measure of being more flood resilient. Additionally, a strong sense of place and resistance to relocation were presented as key elements of resilience, maintaining community system function, and preserving livelihoods. The study further found that these key factors would not be adequate to guarantee community flood resilience outside the transformative capacity of a well‐resourced village civil protection committee that can prepare and mobilize stakeholders in response to flood emergencies. Our results suggest that, in the context where policymakers seek to strengthen resilience of communities without relocating them, a focus on public health and on strengthening and utilizing local capacities as adaptation, are key in disaster risk management policymaking and implementation. For the international research community, this study demonstrated the importance of utilizing context and hazard specific measures for defining, characterizing, and measuring resilience to inform policy.

Examining coastal sense of place through community geography in Island County, Washington

The world’s coastlines are changing, partly the result of population growth and shoreline development (e.g., infrastructure). Coastal landscape changes are reflected and experienced at the local scale, where landscape modifications and their impacts take place. Island County, Washington (U.S.) is experiencing such changes. Island County’s 349 kilometres of coastline are being impacted by the growing threat of coastal infrastructure, which hardens the shoreline and negatively impacts natural nearshore processes and habitats. Coastal changes also impact communities and their connections to the landscape. Through a community geography approach, this paper examines Island County residents’ coastal sense of place. Respondents overall have a strong coastal sense of place, including shared place meanings. This strong sense of place is associated with shoreline visit frequency and feelings about change. The paper’s findings demonstrate how residents feel and connect to the coastline, and why such local insights matter to coastal planning and recovery.

Evaluating Attitudes towards Large Carnivores within the Great Bear Rainforest

Cohabitation between humans and carnivores is vital to the continued existence and integrity of ecosystems, often playing a large role in the success of large carnivore conservation. We focus on interactions between humans and carnivores in the world’s largest, relatively intact temperate rainforest—The Great Bear Rainforest (GBR), British Columbia, Canada. Specifically, we focus on residents of Prince Rupert, a city within the GBR, and examine its residents’ ecological and relational attitudes towards the surrounding area of protected rainforest and the large carnivores present in the area. We aim to determine the strength of public attitudes and values of the environment and carnivores in the GBR, and to examine whether they differ between First Nations and non-First Nations residents of Prince Rupert, British Columbia. We conducted 28 semi-structured interviews of Prince Rupert residents. At the start of the interview, respondents self-administered a survey consisting of statements from the Social Ecological Relational Value and the New Ecological Paradigm scales. We find no significant difference between First Nations and non-First Nations respondent attitudes. This is possibly due to three factors: (1) cultural influence from the local First Nations, (2) the fact that these carnivores are important for the local economy through tourism, and (3) a strong sense of place associated with the area and the carnivores that inhabit it regardless of positive or negative encounters with these animals. While we find positive attitudes towards carnivores and little evidence of human–wildlife conflict, feelings towards carnivores encountered in town or while hiking tend to be negative, especially when they involve wolves. In order to mitigate these effects in a way that protects these valuable creatures, respondents overwhelmingly clamored for a conservation officer to be assigned to Prince Rupert. We conclude that policy and management might alleviate human–carnivore conflicts in the area should our results be corroborated by studies with larger sample sizes.

Feeling a historic city: Porto landscape through the eyes of residents and visitors

PurposeThis paper aims to monitor the urban landscape through the perceptions of residents and visitors, identifying features that cause visual impacts and providing insights for landscape management decision-makers. Captured impressions about the city whilst moving around are important to assess the satisfaction of city residents and city visitors through key elements, such as directional signage, outdoor advertising, restaurants’ outdoor terrace furniture, urban furniture, green spaces, traffic, cleaning, pedestrian areas, visitor flow and conservation of monuments, museums and buildings.Design/methodology/approachA survey was applied in the historical Porto city centre (Portugal) to understand residents’ and visitors’ perceptions of the city landscape and assess the differences between these two groups. Cronbach’s alpha was used to assess the reliability of the constructs (dimensions) of urban landscape. Non-parametric Mann-Whitney test was used to find significant differences in the perceptions of residents and visitors.FindingsThe results suggest significant differences in the perceptions. Residents value more two constructs of the landscape (heritage conservation and transport mobility) whilst visitors value more other two (pedestrian mobility and aesthetic quality). It is showed that residents have a strong sense of place and are concerned with the conservation of historical heritage. Visitors are more concerned with dimensions intrinsically related to tourism.Originality/valueThis research allowed to fill a gap found in the literature, namely, the importance of considering the perceptions of different actors in the urban landscape monitoring. These results are an important contribution for local authorities to understand the value of urban landscape elements from the perspective of residents and visitors. This study opened the possibility of comparing the results from different historical cities centres.

Nuevas fronteras de la movilidad y de las migraciones: : un análisis teórico-empírico

Traditional studies of migration assumed that migrants brought with them a strong sense of place, of the territory of origin and the territory of destination, as well as an uni-directional sense of a return project. Therefore, the current mobility concept is not new, but different due to the emphasis on movement in relation with communications in real-time, on the intense movement of goods, as well as in the instant information conveyed by digital technologies. These are changes in a phenomenon which have brought the emergence of new theoretical paradigms. The objective of this article is to show how migration theories explain current social inequalities, configured as new borders of mobilities and migrations, resulting from new population dynamics linked to the population mobility of people under the light of two brief illustrative cases.

Easy Rider and Thelma & Louise revisited, or on experimental film remakes of the road movie

Although remakes and road movies are particularly endemic to Hollywood cinema, experimental filmmakers have also embraced the road movie tradition and reproduced existing material for new audiences to retell, readdress and rearticulate the prior story, exploring the dialectics between repetition, differentiation and genre. Interestingly, however, while the remake, seen mostly as a genre phenomenon, has received some critical attention, remaking in the avant-garde film scene has been rarely explored by adaptation theory and practice. To somewhat fill in this gap, the article situates two recent avant-garde films, James Benning’s Easy Rider (2012) and Jessica Bardsley’s Goodbye Thelma (2019), within the framework of remake and adaptation studies and proposes that both works function as acknowledged and transformed remakes of the classic road movies, in which the outcome radically differs from the original story and crosses the temporal and spatial boundaries of the genre. In doing so, the projects fit in with the broader tradition of cinematic reworking and recycling as they continuously reference and exploit earlier films by creating their alternative versions as well as a strong sense of place and movement.

Place imageability, sense of place, and spatial navigation: A community investigation

How do spatial navigation and place imageability illuminate our understanding of sense of place in urban neighborhoods? Rather than rely on their place memories, the present study asked community residents to think about their neighborhood in situ. A stronger sense of place was experienced for areas of their neighborhood with greater place imageability. The residents employed more allocentric spatial navigation strategies when they mentally navigated areas that differed in place imageability compared to egocentric strategies. As predicted, paths and edges were noted more often while residents mentally navigated areas with greater or moderate place imageability than lesser place imageability. Meaningful associations were found between sense of place, allocentric strategy use, and the length of time participants had experienced different areas of the neighborhood. Social scientists and city planners may benefit from these results as they consider local place imageability in relation to residents' typical navigation strategies and attachment to their urban communities.

Federico FalcoA Perfect Cemetery by Jennifer Croft

Clearly, Stepanova testifies to—and warns against—a contemporary, postmodern variant of the separation of mind of body; a decision enforced by the trauma of the Holocaust, which has ripped the fabric of history between generations, as well as our uncanny social mass media that in Stepanova’s analysis resemble the imploding crater of Benjamin’s essay on The Idiot. In this sense, when remembering memory, besides contemplating the lives of family members, Stepanova is also making an existentialist statement on the brink of an abyss wherein history disappears. Sebald is the closest comparison in this regard. For memory has an essential connotation in the work of saving as well as, here, letting go. In a crucial chapter devoted to Osip Mandelstam and Sebald, Stepanova draws out memory’s work of “making the past strange,” restoring it to the thing, giving it back to time. Consciousness withdraws into artifact once again; here, we witness something resembling the birth of Odradek, the mysterious creature from Kafka’s story. In Memory of Memory has been Maria Stepanova’s lifework since she was ten years old; this great book is a highly urgent theological treatise on memory and saving. Arthur Willemse University of Maastricht Federico Falco A Perfect Cemetery Trans. Jennifer Croft. Edinburgh. Charco Press. 2021. 174 pages. IN THE AFTERWORD TO A Perfect Cemetery, translator Jennifer Croft contemplates the crucial translation challenge of rendering the relationship between place and speech through vernacular, dialect, or peculiar conversation. Croft concludes that the question of “how to represent place in speech” is unanswerable, “because translation isn’t a system. Translation is an encounter between two human beings that takes place in words that belong to different systems.” As an example, she gives her choice, in one particular moment, to translate the Spanish word hermoso as “swell,” instead of—as might be expected— “beautiful” or “lovely.” Her explanation for this unorthodox choice lies in another debate that rages throughout the history of literary translation: the question of loyalty . “[I]t is the word to which I’m most attached.” This attachment to her translation is, in turn, a form of loyalty to Federico Falco’s original Spanish text. Whether a translation is faithful to the original is a question that presumes a text has a fixed and singular meaning and casts the translation as a mere vessel to be judged on accuracy above all else. But, as Croft’s faithfulness to the word “swell” illustrates, a text’s meaning is not fixed but rather uncovered and created, again and again, by all its readers. Croft’s translations of the stories in A Perfect Cemetery are loyal to the profound beauty, rootedness, and longing they portray. The stories, in turn, each focus on relationships between human beings, nonhuman beings, and the spaces they occupy. At the heart of all the relationships are questions of loyalty. The characters explore how to honor estranged family members, how to show love to people who have abandoned a community, what happens when family members’ philosophies diverge. The stories have been described as “interlocking ,” but that characterization is too mechanical, too artifactual for my taste. I’d rather call them “interlaken”: a series of stunning bodies of water, secretly connected by underground rivers. The stories’ relationships aren’t immediately evident, but one can sense they are of a piece, fed by the same spring. More than anything, one is left with a strong sense of place. Alongside its loyalty to the landscapes of Córdoba (the Argentine province that serves as the setting for all the stories), which are described with intense sensory detail, A Perfect Cemetery explores the question of loyalty in the tender, subtle portraits of its protagonists. Whether it is the king of the hares, who finds more comfortable society with the animals of the forest than with the human beings who populate the town; a teenage girl who forsakes her family’s religion in search of new connections; a designer hired to create the perfect resting place for a man’s implacable father; a woman who seeks a new site for her loyalties after her home is threatened; or a widow seeking to maintain her previous life as...

Fear of Displacement

Spatial criticism is an attempt to study environmental literature to demonstrate relationships between physical spaces and identity. Place attachment is a concept of environmental psychology that deals with the emotional bonds between individuals and the environment in which they feel secure. It is through the concepts of place identity and sense of place that scholars bring to the fore the concept of place attachment. Extending this thinking, the present paper seeks to propose place attachment and fear of disruption in attachment as the main reason for Jack Gladney’s fear of death. The protagonist of Don DeLillo’s White Noise (1985) has developed a strong sense of place, identity and belonging to the space of town, supermarket, and his house. Jack’s obsession with the cyberspace of TV and its psychic data is also examined in this paper. The aim of this paper is thus to study the formulation of the sense of place in Gladney. His place attachment and the fear of disruption are also studied at the crossroad of spatial criticism and trauma theory. The paper concludes by demonstrating how the fear of displacement causes haunting fear and anxiety in Jack Gladney.

Community and Sense of Place in an International School Context

This study seeks to identify and explore the sense of place that Third Culture Kids (TCKs) have and the various interpretations that TCKs have regarding their lived reality, as they form part of the international community in Romania. This study contextually explores the sense of belonging to a place. The purpose of the study is to ascertain the role and ways of implementing "Place Based Education" in the context of international and multicultural education systems that serve TCK populations. This was done while trying to understand concepts from the expatriate way of life as expressed by TCKs who attend the American International School of Bucharest. Two main assumptions form the grounds of this study: When an international school combines an International Baccalaureate (IB) system with Place Based Education (PBE) criteria, would it contribute in creating a "Sense of Place" towards the school and contribute in creating a positive foreigner self-identification? This research aims to understand whether and how PBE can be implemented in an international school. Throughout two academic school years, field observations and interviews with students and school staff were conducted. The data analysis resulted in three main findings. The first finding was ambivalent feelings towards the host country that were connected to expressions of place attachment, place dependence and place identity. The second finding was self-identification as a TCK and a sense of belonging to an international community. The third and most surprising finding was a strong sense of place in relation to the school. This process led to comparing Place Based Education criteria to the criteria of the International Baccalaureate program and discovering that these two pedagogical worlds are overlapping and can therefore be easily combined.

Community and Sense of Place in an International School Context

This study seeks to identify and explore the sense of place that Third Culture Kids (TCKs) have and the various interpretations that TCKs have regarding their lived reality, as they form part of the international community in Romania. This study contextually explores the sense of belonging to a place. The purpose of the study is to ascertain the role and ways of implementing "Place Based Education" in the context of international and multicultural education systems that serve TCK populations. This was done while trying to understand concepts from the expatriate way of life as expressed by TCKs who attend the American International School of Bucharest. Two main assumptions form the grounds of this study: When an international school combines an International Baccalaureate (IB) system with Place Based Education (PBE) criteria, would it contribute in creating a "Sense of Place" towards the school and contribute in creating a positive foreigner self-identification? This research aims to understand whether and how PBE can be implemented in an international school. Throughout two academic school years, field observations and interviews with students and school staff were conducted. The data analysis resulted in three main findings. The first finding was ambivalent feelings towards the host country that were connected to expressions of place attachment, place dependence and place identity. The second finding was self-identification as a TCK and a sense of belonging to an international community. The third and most surprising finding was a strong sense of place in relation to the school. This process led to comparing Place Based Education criteria to the criteria of the International Baccalaureate program and discovering that these two pedagogical worlds are overlapping and can therefore be easily combined.

Tlingit geographies of hope: Clan, corporation, and sustainable economies of place

The essay argues that geographies of hope for Tlingit communities in Southeast Alaska begin with a strong sense of place, both social and geographic. In Tlingit, the matrilineal clan—the repository of heritage, identity, and property—constitutes the collective, animate source of resilience, hope, and renewal. We examine the ways in which clans continue to operate as institutions of hope and destiny, especially through the memorial ku.éex’ or “potlatch,” a ritual of restoration and replacement. This ritual is thriving in the 21st century despite no external funding or recognition from the state. It is a wholly Tlingit institution built on socio-geographic values of sustainment of the matrilineal clan as an immortal being. What remains to be re-animated, however, is clan territory. Most Tlingit territory has been appropriated by the Tongass National Forest and Federal and Alaska state waters. Native corporations hold about 2% of the Southeast Alaska land base, and clans hold nothing except, in some cases, recognition of their historical association with particular historic sites and territories. The reinvigoration of cartography with Tlingit place names is a step toward furthering recognition of clans’ historical and contemporary ties to places in a tangible and hopeful way. Yet, culture needs a material base, and mere recognition of traditional toponyms will not be enough. Many clans seek a more substantive livelihood relationships with and custodial role over their territories, not only as sacred properties but as sources of sustainment, strength, and well-being. This requires new thinking on the part of indigenous economic institutions, like Alaska Native business corporations, along the lines of a traditional (Tlingit clan) “house,” an economic unit in the spirit of the original Greek term for economy, oikos (“house”). The integrated restoration of sociocultural, economic, and geographic sources of collective well-being will further enliven Tlingit geographies of hope.

Comment on Eaton et al.’s Reconceptualization of Economic Dependence in “Trouble with Sense of Place in Working Landscapes”

This commentary expands upon Eaton et al.’s research note about the challenges of measuring sense of place (SOP). Our body of work includes qualitative and quantitative research that supports their finding that landowners have a strong SOP and conservation ethic about their working lands. However, we deliberate on the importance of considering a broader interpretation of “economic dependence” in the context of SOP, which may include financial and non-financial benefits to the landowner. Eaton et al. report mixed results in its predictive power for conservation decisions on working lands. Yet, several issues negatively impacting economic dependence may override conservation management decisions and explain the “mixed” results reported by the authors. We posit that the definition of economic dependence should include both income and wealth generation as well as landowner amenity rents (defined as the landowner’s internally derived benefits or satisfaction from the amenities on their working lands).

Izmir Craft Beer Trail

Craft beer tourism is a type of special interest tourism, which is increasing in popularity in parallel with the growing interest and curiosity for novel, experimental, small-scale and artisan types of beer and related themes. As such, trails are gaining popularity, which integrate the opportunities to explore new tastes, methods of production and experimentation around craft beer and also complementing elements of food pairings, stories and heritage, shopping, places and landscapes around craft beer. These trails offer a more complete tourism product as well as a stronger sense of place, memorable tourist experiences and therefore opportunities for destination branding and overall promotion. In this context, an explorative field research has been conducted, possible participants have been identified and interviewed. As a result, the model for a craft beer trail in Izmir has been proposed and mapped, to include the places that produce and serve craft beer and related products, urban landmarks, accommodation and transportation, and a scheme for its management is presented. The trail is proposed to embrace and promote the natural and cultural landscape, social life, craft beer related and general cultural heritage and overall tourism attraction of Izmir, ultimately branding the city as a prominent craft beer destination. Additionally, the trail should provide product diversification as well as a means to increase occupancy rates and ease tourism congestion.

Revitalizing Historic City Centers through an Integrated Approach: Arab City of Sanaa in Yemen

The rapid urbanization in the developing world has brought about insurmountable challenges to the inner historic quarters. With the population increase and improved economies, the middle class and the rich abandon the old quarters in preference for the wealthy suburbs while the poor find abandoned city core affordable. Historic inner cities thus become ghettos with their traditional owners fleeing the old buildings or actively destroying its very fabric by abandoning them to decay. Old quarters provide the historical memories of the cities, their cultural base and a layer of the city identity. Their urban contexts are generally rich with a strong sense of place both the citizens and the countrymen cherish and would want to retain. Allowed to decay, such cities will lose a significant part of their identity. Thus, they must make concrete efforts to protect the historical urban contexts and revitalize the old quarters to ensure that their streets and spaces remain alive. This indeed requires their economic base rejuvenated and links to the surrounding modern cities reinforced. More than just restorations of few buildings, this is a herculean task of urban revitalization. To transform these urban quarters, it is necessary to create a powerful upward spiral of investments and rising incomes among their inhabitants as well as social engineering leading to social cohesion to restore the inherent vitality and unique charm of these city centres, by strategic interventions. If an integrated approach is taken, these regions can be made to flourish naturally. This paper examines one such historic city center in the Arab region; Sana‘a in Yemen, which has faced the dire consequences of urbanization. Although different geographical contexts may have their own issues, there are universal lessons to be learned from an in-depth study of the walled city of Sana'a as a typical Arab city. The study employs a case study approach, and through physical observations and documentary evidence, it constructs an integrated framework that considers the physical characters, socio-cultural realities, planning and development controls and economic processes. The paper divulges the inherent obstacles that prevail in Sana‘a and offers ways and means of overcoming these to transform them in particular and Arab cities in general. If done well, they may thrive as urban hubs they used to be, sustaining their populations and re-utilizing an enormous wealth of buildings, spaces, and systems that would otherwise perish under the pressure of urbanization.

A Study of the Space Images in the Golden Apples

Eudora Welty is one of the most representative Southern American writers. The Golden Apples is her 1949 short-story sequence. In this book, Welty gives readers a vivid picture of Southern American society in the first half of the 20 th century. Being a typical Southern American writer, Welty has a strong sense of place. As a novelist with strong sense of place and a photographer, Welty makes full use of space images in The Golden Apples and many of her works. In this essay, the space theory is used to analyze the implications of space images in The Golden Apples . By analyzing the space images in Welty’s works, the essay tries to further explore Welty’s sense of place, and interpret Southern American culture from the spatial perspective.