Herng-Dar Bih
Graduate Institute of Building and Planning National Taiwan University
A house may be the most important space for a person’s development. It provides the sense of safety and control, reflects a person’s value, and offers a person the sense of continuity and eternity. This paper tries to study how environmental disasters create the upsetting of the concept of home for the residents. Using residential disasters in Ming-Sen Building and Lincoln Community as cases, we found that the environmental disasters not only cause the loss of assets but also create the inversion of the meanings of home. The home, which used to be a safe, stable, and controllable space, now becomes a source of danger, a place from which people want to escape. It also results in the reorganization and reflection of family relations, and the challenge of a person’s ability and value system.
Keywords: environmental disaster, meanings of home, place attachment, self-identity, uncertainty