Sense of Place

One of the things I love most about Urban Studies is the importance of getting out into the world and immersing oneself in one's surroundings - taking in the sights, smells, sounds, and sensations of the urban built environment. For many science and social science disciplines, there is a focus on observing an “other” - another species, another environment, or another group. But in Urban Studies, I sincerely appreciate that everything around me is a topic of my studies. From my bike ride to class, to the buildings surrounding me, or even to the flora and fauna around me - everything relates in some way to Urban Studies - or rather, Urban Studies can relate to everything around me. Thinking about my quotidian experiences in this way has enriched my understanding of the urban environment around me, and even my understanding of myself as an urban dweller. Being able to ground oneself in this way and still extract meaningful research or insight is invaluable to my Urban Studies experience.

People perceive places in any variety of ways, and different geographies can have unique meanings to different people. But in urban areas, there exists this sort-of commonality in lived experience among residents. This "urbanism as a way of life" has been circulating throughout Urban Studies since the 1930s (Wirth, 1938). The urban environment imbues its residents with sense and meaning.

However, not only do places inspire different meanings to different individuals, but this relationship goes two ways. People also give meaning to a place. Although the environment surrounding us has been meticulously planned and designed, it is ultimately the dynamic, or human aspects of a space that give that space staying power. Henri Lefebvre wrote about this interrelated relationship between people and space in his seminal writing Le droit à la ville (1967).

Participating in the urban environment lends itself well to a set of research methods that many might not consider. Throughout my Urban Studies time at Macalester, I have read about and practiced several observational research methods in the urban environment, including walking (Pierce & Lawhon, 2015). Engaging in methods like these has completely changed the way I think about the environment around me, and I now find myself constantly relating my surroundings to Urban Studies concepts and exploring the possibilities of why things are the way they are. You can look around anywhere in urban areas and extract information from anything - in the leaves, in the leaves, in the leaves.

Lefebvre, H. (1967). Le droit à la ville. L'Homme et la société, 6, 29-35. https://doi.org/10.3406/homso.1967.1063

Pierce, J., & Lawhon, M. (2015). Walking as Method: Toward Methodological Forthrightness and Comparability in Urban Geographical Research. The Professional Geographer, 67(4), 655-662. https://doi.org/10.1080/00330124.2015.1059401

Wirth, L. (1938). Urbanism as a Way of Life. American Journal of Sociology, 44(1), 1–24. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2768119