Abstract
When the appearance of individual rooms is an inevitable phenomenon in modern dwelling, a problem seems to lie in the formation of behavior-style of proper use of individual rooms and a living room which contrast each other. In this report, the concept of “Ima (living room)” in our country, is discussed from a viewpoint of history. And the following questions are clarified: how does “Ima” function as a room for Home Circle today? how does each family member regards the character of “Ima” in one's own consciousness? and how does family relationship, parent-child relationship in particular, have influence on their behaviors in “Ima”? In this way, we studied what “Ima” should be like in the future and what the expected problems of “Ima” should be from a viewpoint of Housing Culture Theory. The result of the historical analysis of a given name, “Ima”, and detailed stereo investigation of housing life in 46 houses (we used a video tape recorder in 8 houses), clarified several points as follows.
1) We tried to analyze the concept of “Ima”, using dictionaries published since the Meiji era up to present. We found out that the concept can be classified into two, i.e., a living room as a room usually for a husband and his wife, a concept for users, and a living room as a room for Home Circle, a concept for general behaviors. And next we analyze historical changes of such concept of “Ima.” As a result, We found that a living room of a husband and his wife changed into “Ima” as a room for Home Circle.
2) The result of the analysis of the length of the time spent in “Ima” and behaviors brought into “Ima”, shows that parents' dwelling life there has a far greater importance than others. This tendency has nothing to do with the condition of formation of a master bedroom, but has to do with “Ima” functioning as father's space. That is, in spite of its function as a room for Home Circle, it strongly persists the character that parents are main users.
3) Consequently, a center of children's housing life comes into their own room. If this tendency becomes remarkable, some problem will arise in family communication. In order that “Ima” should function as a room for general behaviors, it is necessary to form behavior-style in which a master bedroom functions as a room whose main users are parents, and at the same time, to form family relationship with children in the center.
