Paper short abstract:

The study aims to explore how Internally Displaced Persons adopted their new houses and environments in order to feel attached and what are their perceptions of home. Do they perceive these houses as their ‘homes’ and/or as ‘their’ homes?

Paper long abstract:

Either consciously or unconsciously people who move from one place to another try to adapt themselves into this unfamiliar environment. They make changes where they settle in a way to convert it from a strange environment into somehow familiar setting, from space into place. This behaviour might be different in the ones who involuntarily left their homes and had to move to a new place.

In this respect, the study focuses on North Cyprus rural settlements. Internally Displaced Turkish Cypriots had to leave their homes in the south Cyprus some thirty five years ago, some more than that and start to live in new houses, the houses which once inhabited by Greek Cypriots in the north. Although it has been a long time, the division and the situation as a consequence on the island is still ongoing and being negotiated under the name of 'Cyprus Problem'.

This study interrogates; how internal displacement affects the architecture of a particular place? How do internally displaced persons perceive their 'homes'? What do these people feel attached to; to their previous or current 'homes'? What does home mean to them? It might be said that the need of attachment is particularly important for displaced people in order to re-establish, rebuilt their previous lives and environment, since they have been forced to leave their homes. It is important to understand if it is possible for these people to construct an attachment to their new environments, to understand if they can establish a new 'home' for themselves.