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In the first century of Anthropology (1870-1970), almost all social sciences studies focused on“objective”,“rational”,“collective”, and “universal” socio-cultural facts. This orien-tation excluded and marginalized those “subjec-tive”,“individual” and “non-rational” fields in the discourse system of the discipline. “Sense”was such a field, refused by the gatekeepers of tra-ditional anthropology. Since 1980s, more and more anthropologists have paid attention to the study of sense. laying the foundations for an “anthropology of the sen-ses”. With the gradual influence of Western An-thropology of the senses, “sense of place” is be-coming a current academic phrase in Chinese An-thropology. Meanwhile, a fundamental question has to be asked:how is sense of place possible? In order to explore this question, we must go back to Yi-Fu Tuan, a renowned humanistic geographer and his master work, Space and Place. Space and Place contains a total of fourteen chapters and can be divided into three parts. The first part, chapters 1 to 3, discusses three key words:experience, space, and place. Meanwhile, this part identifies the fundamental question of the book:how do human beings understand and expe-rience the world? The second part, ranging from chapters 4 to 9 , and introduces the relationship be-tween sense and space. The third part,chapters 10 to 14 , interprets the relationship between place and sense. Although the latter two parts introduce
the relationship between the “Sense and Space”and “Place and Sense”, the interrelation of space-sense-place runs through the whole book. The three key words ( experience, space and place ) are fully reflected in the title of the book ( Space and Place—the Perspective of Experience. What, then, is the nature of experience? Tuan holds that the essentiality of experience is how a person knows and constructs reality, ran-ging from inchoate feelings to explicit conceptions. Essentially,experience equals feeling plus thought. It is generally argued that feeling and thought are opposites. Feeling is subjective and non-rational. Thought is objective and rational. Tuan however argues that both of them belong to different poles of an experiential continuum and are ways of knowing the world. Through a new understanding of experi-ence, Tuan puts feelings to the study of “space-place”. Tuan considers space as a geometrical unit ( area or volume ) , it is a measurable and unam-biguous quantity. More loosely speaking, space means “room”; Space “is given by the ability to move”. However, sense is the sense of a lived body or man, and the relationship between sense and space is the relationship between a body and space, or essentially, the world. When a man ( or lived body ) moves in the world or space, the movement in turn gives him a sense of space. Place, in Tuan’s view, is a type of object,an object in which one can dwell (p. 12),a stable ob-
ject that catches our attention ( p. 161 );a focus of value, of nurture and support (p. 29). If we have a sense of space because we can move, then we have a sense of place because of a pause in move-ment. The pause makes it possible for a locality to become a center of felt value ( p. 138 ) . Sense of place is mind at work ( p. 198 ) , while sense of space is body at work. The most typical sense of place is topophilia, which is the feeling-link be-tween person and place ( Tuan, 1974 ) , and be-comes mixed with the sense of cultural identity a-mong certain peoples and a love of certain aspects of such a place. Actually, place has a lot of similarities with the character of space. For example, one place in-cludes several spaces while it contains another lar-ger space. Nevertheless, the difference between the two is also obvious. Tuan argues that“Place is security, space is freedom” ( p. 3 ) , and Space lies open as a common symbol of freedom in the Western world. On the negative side, space and freedom are a threat. A root meaning of the word“bad” is“open”. To be open and free is to be ex-posed and vulnerable. Compared to space, place is a calm center of established values ( p. 54 ) . While space and place is not a duality, according to Tuan, space can transform into place. In a word, the key factor of the transformation is culture,or more concretely, human experience. Based on this, we further propose that space and place is a continuum, just like Tuan’s understand-ing of experience as a continuum, and sense is a significant link to it. To summarize, Yi-Fu Tuan argues that ex-perience is a compound of feeling and thought in Space and Place:The Perspective of Experience. Tu-
an focuses on feeling and sense, which is the con-junction of space and place. We believe that Tuan’s research is based on a set of views: People have a sense of space from the body, as well as a sense of place from the function of the mind. From sense of space to sense of place, space and place become a continuum for the sake of sense. Nowa-days, historical anthropology still has problems in dealing with the relationship between space and place, so Tuan’s research, which has already bro-ken boundaries between the disciplines of geogra-phy and anthropology, is worthy of closer atten-tion.
the relationship between the “Sense and Space”and “Place and Sense”, the interrelation of space-sense-place runs through the whole book. The three key words ( experience, space and place ) are fully reflected in the title of the book ( Space and Place—the Perspective of Experience. What, then, is the nature of experience? Tuan holds that the essentiality of experience is how a person knows and constructs reality, ran-ging from inchoate feelings to explicit conceptions. Essentially,experience equals feeling plus thought. It is generally argued that feeling and thought are opposites. Feeling is subjective and non-rational. Thought is objective and rational. Tuan however argues that both of them belong to different poles of an experiential continuum and are ways of knowing the world. Through a new understanding of experi-ence, Tuan puts feelings to the study of “space-place”. Tuan considers space as a geometrical unit ( area or volume ) , it is a measurable and unam-biguous quantity. More loosely speaking, space means “room”; Space “is given by the ability to move”. However, sense is the sense of a lived body or man, and the relationship between sense and space is the relationship between a body and space, or essentially, the world. When a man ( or lived body ) moves in the world or space, the movement in turn gives him a sense of space. Place, in Tuan’s view, is a type of object,an object in which one can dwell (p. 12),a stable ob-
ject that catches our attention ( p. 161 );a focus of value, of nurture and support (p. 29). If we have a sense of space because we can move, then we have a sense of place because of a pause in move-ment. The pause makes it possible for a locality to become a center of felt value ( p. 138 ) . Sense of place is mind at work ( p. 198 ) , while sense of space is body at work. The most typical sense of place is topophilia, which is the feeling-link be-tween person and place ( Tuan, 1974 ) , and be-comes mixed with the sense of cultural identity a-mong certain peoples and a love of certain aspects of such a place. Actually, place has a lot of similarities with the character of space. For example, one place in-cludes several spaces while it contains another lar-ger space. Nevertheless, the difference between the two is also obvious. Tuan argues that“Place is security, space is freedom” ( p. 3 ) , and Space lies open as a common symbol of freedom in the Western world. On the negative side, space and freedom are a threat. A root meaning of the word“bad” is“open”. To be open and free is to be ex-posed and vulnerable. Compared to space, place is a calm center of established values ( p. 54 ) . While space and place is not a duality, according to Tuan, space can transform into place. In a word, the key factor of the transformation is culture,or more concretely, human experience. Based on this, we further propose that space and place is a continuum, just like Tuan’s understand-ing of experience as a continuum, and sense is a significant link to it. To summarize, Yi-Fu Tuan argues that ex-perience is a compound of feeling and thought in Space and Place:The Perspective of Experience. Tu-
an focuses on feeling and sense, which is the con-junction of space and place. We believe that Tuan’s research is based on a set of views: People have a sense of space from the body, as well as a sense of place from the function of the mind. From sense of space to sense of place, space and place become a continuum for the sake of sense. Nowa-days, historical anthropology still has problems in dealing with the relationship between space and place, so Tuan’s research, which has already bro-ken boundaries between the disciplines of geogra-phy and anthropology, is worthy of closer atten-tion.