index

Place theory outline

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Cairns and a path, turning an area into a place

  1. We need to approach today's puzzling places with something more than descriptions of beautiful old classic places to guide us. With eye to today's new kinds of places, we should discuss questions of place starting from the basic social conditions that make an area of space into a place.
  2. We can distinguish an area, which is a stretch of space, from a place, which is one or more areas that are permeated with social norms or expectations for what "we" do there.
  3. Other place terms, and their comparisons.
  4. Places are areas of physical or virtual space permeated by social grammars, which prescribe divisions within the space and govern what is expected or appropriate to do and not to do there.
  5. Not all striking and harmonious locales are social places.
  6. We exist within the process of place making and re-making.