Spaces
Yi-Fu Tuan says, “Place is security, space is freedom: we are attached to the one and long for the other. There is no place like home. What is home?” To me, home can be divided into two main categories- the one you trust because you have traversed this path and somewhat take it for granted, and, the one you haven’t traversed as yet or your yet to complete this journey. The latter is what we have named the ‘WORLD’. The space you wouldn’t trust fast, the space you are always skeptical about, the space you associate the color black, red and maybe blue with. The first, since you have trust in this space, is associated with smiles and bright colors. But this equation can be reversed as well…
Location and Disposition
Through this course one question stuck around and lingered in the cozy home as well as the infinitely extending world of my mind. This question became more and more prominent. How many such spaces do we call ’Home’? I will primarily be focusing on describing the many realms we call ‘Home’.
Drawing inspiration from the film ‘The Home and The World’, I’m trying to create a metaphorical visual connection to the text. I was also inspired by how Bimala belonged to ‘many Homes’ at the same time (maternal home which was in her memory, husband’s home which was the physical space she stayed in-the room which was home to her, and other than the room which was the world to her, the imaginary home where she might have imagined herself and Sandip as a family, etc.). As such, home is a cumulative effect of many experiences, a cluster of spaces to which you go on adding through the journey of your life. Other connections include the Happiness Course (which was another course I took up earlier. It delved deeper into the notion of Happiness and broke the then existing associations we had with the term happiness. I feel it runs parallel and coincides with the notion of Home), TED talks and other videos we saw in class.
Home? What is Home? That perfect farmhouse facing the beach with a dozen hounds baying, cats purring and a couple of pony’s neighing? Is it that house you have always dreamt of being a tenant to, by shelling out your savings, where you will move in with your beloved- the perfect cozy house where you can snuggle in? Is it where you were born or brought up? Is it where your family is? Is it where your childhood memories originate? Or, is it where you currently live? What is Home in context of Life? In context of the term Happiness? I would like to take you through my understanding of this notion ‘Home’ as a mere physical space and something much beyond that.
-Parina Dhruve