DWELLING - SPEAKING OF AN UNNOTICED UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE

The term ''dwelling'' is commonly understood to mean activities occurr ing in the home environment; however, this paper introduces dwelling a s a form of speaking. This speaking serves as a means of achieving soc ial influence and self-representation The dwelling environment, accord ing to the thesis of this paper, carries socio-emotional meaning, or m etaphorically speaking, the residential environment communicates to pe ople through the language of social emotions. To use this and any lang uage properly, one must understand the meaning of the basic elements o f the language. Any traces left by people while dwelling are the basic elements of dwelling. Dwelling understood in this manner nb longer ne eds to take place at home, but can occur everywhere. Hence, the propos ed dwelling approach dan be seen in a person-residential environment a s well as in a more general person-environment transaction frame: In d welling, as in any other person-environment transaction, the material environment is emotionally effective and becomes emotionally significa nt through manipulation. The emotional qualities of material objects a nd physical environments can be advantageous, for instance, teddy-bear s for toddlers in the absence of their mothers. However, these emotion al qualities might be a source of increasing social isolation among pe ople as well. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.