Topophilia

In Greek, Topos represents place and philia represents love of. Cultural Geographer Yifu Tuan used the word Topophilia in his 1974 book to describe the emotional connection between humans and place. That is why I named my final major project Topophilia, which aims to explore the lifestyle choices of the people in my hometown.

Only when we leave our hometown that we have a hometown. Hometown provides a place for perceptions, memories, and emotions, and gives people a sense of belonging and identity. After I came to the UK to study and live away from my hometown, I realised that my eating habits and lifestyle were also influenced by my hometown. I think this influence helped me to understand the ways in which I was attached to my hometown, and I really realised how important it was to me. Therefore, I started to think about the question: why do people attach themselves to their hometowns and still leave them? I found the answer in geographer Yifu Tuan's book Space and Place, where he says, "Human life is a dialectical movement between stability and adventure, between attachment and freedom."