In reading several of the blog posts for the previous assignment, the concepts of tradition, and shared moments struck me the most. For instance, Caitlin Bennett’s post repeatedly mentions comfort, and the value of a shared routine as being crucial to concretizing her sense of home. In her post, Sierra Gale, notes certainty, familiarity, and feeling welcome, as important contributors to creating a home.
The practice of any tradition or routine is tied with its practitioner’s familiarity to it; How long he/she has been exposed to this tradition and partaken in it. It also seems the elements of familiarity and certainty are tied to the notion of comfort. It is a popular conception that Man’s fear is associated with the uncertain and the unknown, both elements which put us outside of our ‘comfort zones’. Kurt Riezler investigates this concept in The Social Psychology of Fear.
Bennett and Gale both reflect on the importance of family and friends in bringing out in us a sense of comfort and familiarity before we can think of a place as home. In his post Brendan Ha also reflects on this, by noting that the idea of home is constructed by the people we share it with. He accentuates this assumption by including antitheses of the idea, displaying Taro in his story as being disconnected from his family and thus lacking a feeling of belonging.
Taking from these three blogs, I list the following elements as assumptions that contribute to the idea of home:
Tradition: Associated with the length of time one spends in a place and how he/she relates to the place in terms of habit
Familiarity: Associated with the feeling of knowing where one is; not feeling alienated, uncomfortable, or awkward in an environment (wether purely social, physical or a mix of both). Tradition seems to play an important role in bringing familiarity about.
Belonging: A feeling brought about by the people we love and that make us feel accepted and comfortable. In his hierarchy of needs, Maslow covers the need to belong as one of Man’s most basic needs.
Perhaps the one assumption that englobes these, is the notion that the concept of home exceeds the walls of a house, apartment building, or larger landscape, and that it has much more to do with feeling accepted and sharing one or more commonalities with those with whom we share our “home”.