Sense of Place: Issues in Counseling and Development

The authors present an interdisciplinary view o/the concept of sense of place as a primary issue in human growth and development. The article summarizes research and theoretical ideas about sense of place that can help professionals in education, counseling, and human development understand how individual and group development are tied to the experience of geographic place. ********** Of all the academic disciplines that contribute to the fields of counseling and human development, behavioral geography and environmental psychology might seem the least likely to offer insight into clinical issues related to personal development. Yet, research findings and theoretical constructs from these disciplines can help professional counselors understand the important role that sense of place plays in human development. In this article, we present an overview of the important issues about sense of place that can help counselors recognize the significance of place as a counseling and developmental topic. Emphasis is placed on sense of place as a primary developmental influence across the human life span. By nature, human beings are bound by place; all human endeavors occur within the context of physical and cultural place. Casey (1997) noted that there is no fixed meaning of place and that definitions vary from group to group. Other researchers have offered specific definitions that seek to capture the essence of the idea. Brey (1998), for example, defined place itself as a habitual site of human activities. The idea of sense of place denotes what Basso (1996) referred to as "an attitude of enduring affinity with known localities and the ways of life they sponsor" (p. 83). As a primary element of human development (Casey, 1996), sense of place is seldom mentioned in counseling literature. Likewise, few textbooks on human growth and development mention sense of place explicitly as a factor in human development. Lack of information about sense of place may arise from the complexity of the topic (Tuan, 1990) or from the fact that professional literature regarding sense of place comes from several academic disciplines that do not routinely overlap. In this article, we attempt to present a partial overview of the geographical and psychological literature as a way of illustrating the important developmental and counseling issues that emerge from sense of place constructs. CONCEPTUALIZING SENSE OF PLACE Sense of place as a dynamic phenomenon occurs in both time and space and is, thus, related to the notion of locale as a focal point of physical and social interaction (Dear & Wolch, 1989). Common ideas about sense of place, however, differ from those denoting mere locale by being more concerned with human meaning about place. For example, Casey (1996) suggested that both time and space come together to help define place, a process that involves cultural ideas about time itself. Attaching cultural meaning often gives holy or spiritual status to specific locales or terrain features (Hughes, 1991). Locale contributes to sense of place as an experiential realm in which the world itself may be considered a human place (Romanyshyn, 1982). Locale becomes socially significant and meaningful as people learn to behave with the same temporal rhythms (Scheflen & Ashcraft, 1976). However, sense of place also involves aspects beyond those of mere physical location, for example, human values and intentions (Relph, 1976). Landscape denotes human habitation in terms of where one lives and where one belongs (Grene, 1982). In keeping with the idea of landscape, sense of place contributes to psychological ideas of self-identity and existential belonging (Cuba & Hummon, 1993). Specific places or landscapes take on particular human or personal meaning through patterns of language that are used to describe them as place (Seamon, 1990). From the perspective of behavioral geography, place suggests an integration of society, culture, and nature (Aitken, Cutter, Foote, & Sell, 1989), including landscape and locale. …