Culture, continuity and change: a structural analysis of the housing pattern in squatter settlement

Abstract

Squatterization, as a continuing process, is still emerging housing problem around theurban centers in the developing countries related with the rapid physical and socio-cultural changes concerning home environment. During this process of change, housingpatterns show a dramatic transition procedure from a temporary shelter to a permanenthouse in squatter settlements. On the basis of these arguments, this paper aims to explorethe transition process focusing on socio cultural aspects of changing housing patterns insquatter settlements and to form an analytic model of squatter housing pattern within theacculturative-urbanization process. The paper examines the reciprocal relationship ofthe physical environment of the home with the family socio-cultural environment withinthe context of the urbanization process.The home contains temporal qualities which reflect dynamic, flowing, and changingrelationships between peoples and environments. These relationships have bothbackgrounds and future potentials. In this process, the home is the place which providescontinuity from the past towards the future at the level of individuals, families andgroups.As a result of enormous migration, the housing environment in Turkey hasundergone a dramatic transition, developing from the temporary shelter to the permanenthouse. The squatter phenomenon is a planning problem which should be managed bytaking into account its socio-cultural dimensions, as well as its economic and physicaldimensions.This paper is mainly based on the research projects carried out by the author that hadaimed to identify the effects of socio-cultural and psychological settings on the spatialformation in home environment during the process of urbanization. The theoreticalapproach of these studies is based on a holistic concept that includes cultural,psychological, spatial and temporal components in a transactional perspective. In thelight of this framework, the aim of this paper is to demonstrate the process of continuityand change in the urbanization process and to analyze the structure of the HousingPattern in Squatter Settlement. This paper has four major parts: Introduction, theoreticalissues and definitions, the method of analysis and the case studies and conclusion. Theresults obtained from the case study will be used to develop proposals for theimprovement of living conditions of the urban poor.