Place-Space attachment in post-war reconstructed regions (Case Studies: Europe after WWII and Imposed War)

Wars, despite the prevailing intellectual principles, always lead to destructions and post war reconstruction with the approach of restoring sense of belonging and place attachment has the ability to link man and place together. In this regard, contemporary life, in spite of all new ideas and the essence of moving forward, always needs to recall memories in order to preserve social foundations and this is what shapes the subjective perception of individuals in a subjective-evaluative way from the environment around them.
The present research focuses on the Second World War and also Iran Imposed War’s documents as a descriptive-interpretive survey and also, reviews the literature and discusses place- space attachment and war impacts on cities. In this regards, monuments and memorials in urban reconstruction are studied and according to the different origin of the war in Iran namely dominant policies and Shiite viewpoint of the value preservation of Holly Defense, documents are studied and a field survey conducted on war-torn areas in Iran at the spring of 2017.
Findings: The survey is divided into two general sections. The first part discusses about World War II and reviving the survivors’ sense of belonging and place-space attachment in the European reconstruction experience. The second part is related to investigation of the damaged area’s reconstruction in Imposed War that shows the differentiations in Shiite and European point of views in terms of reviving the identity and place- space attachment.
The findings show that sense of belonging is directly related to religious and Shiite beliefs in preservation of the Holly Defense battlefields, monuments, and defense museums in the Imposed War. Calling people under the name of “Rahiyan-e-noor”, not only by physical construction, but by preserving the war environment and space as a holy and sacred event, narrates the memoirs. However, the sense of nationalism in WWII, beside the policy of providing infrastructures, leads to reconstruct and revitalize urban areas as it seen in most European cities.