Basic ideas of Housing Imaginations as a subject

1. HI can be considered as an intellectual field of study in Social Sciences that makes use of the Geographical Imagination lenses to examine topics in Housing Studies.

2. A housing imagination is at one level an intellectual process, but it is also about outcomes – about linking the ideas developed through theory to policy development to effect social change.

3. Geographical Imagination (GI), as a subject, studies all kinds of geographical imaginations (gi’s).

4. HI, as a subject, studies all kinds of housing imaginations (hi’s).

5. The geographical imagination (gi) is a way of thinking about the world and considering the relative importance of places and the relationships between “our” places and “other” places.

6. A typical HI exercise

Task 1: Select an artefact, e.g. a photo, a newspaper article or a book, etc., and bring out the ‘housing imaginaries’ or ‘housing imaginations (hi’s)’ from the artefact.

Task 2: Discuss the various Housing Studies-related gi’s (i.e. hi’s) as associated to this artefact, based on the GI lenses.

Task 3: Examine these Housing Studies-related gi’s3 (hi’s) in terms of place, space, and the meanings of home.

Task 4: Examine a few “socially produced discourses” as related to your discussion in Tasks 2 and 3.

Task 5: Come up with some Housing Studies-related viewpoints and findings that have actionable value for certain stakeholders, out of your study outcomes from Tasks 1 to 4.