Reading Society’s Stories from the Urban Space as a text: Corroboration and Continuation of Sense of Place

During the recent years, despite the suffusion of the globalization discussions and expansion of the relationships in the virtual world, the place and sense of place are still in the focal point of the attention in many of the theoretical and empirical studies. The importance of integrating the objective and subjective approaches into these concepts underlines the balance and equilibrium in concomitantly dealing with the physical properties of the places and the social and cultural values of the society. In this regard, narrating the society’s stories, including memories, beliefs, values and myths in the urban space, would be effective in the strengthening of the bond with them. This is while the majority of the prior stories and events are neglected in dealing with urban spaces and places. Thus, it is necessary to deal with the society’s narrations in the text of urban space as the factor connecting the individuals to their living environments. The present article investigates the role of the society’s stories and their narrations in respect to the fortification of the sense of place. The main question is that how the sense of place can be reinforced and continued by the assistance of the narrations and readings of the society’s stories in the urban spaces? To do so, use has been made of a descriptive-analytical method to firstly review the texts and theories related to this issue and explore the experts’ concepts and notions; then, the primary concepts’ interrelationships are explicated and analyzed. Based on the positive and corroborating effect of the narrations of the place stories on the sense of place and within the format of the layered semiotic approach, the urban space will be introduced as a text and its stories are consequently considered as the textual layers. In order to preserve the coherence of the place’s text in whole, the role and value of the various layers of the place’s text- activities, form and imaginations- should be aligned with and strengthening the value and role of the textual layer of the place’s stories. To display the stories, it has to be specified within a context that which stories are of greater importance to society. Then, the physical and non-physical methods and elements showcasing them should be determined.