Sense of Place

¶ … West Ireland The work of Kianicka, et al. (2006) entitled "Local and Tourists' Sense of Place" reports on a Swiss Alpine village and examines what it is that shapes the relations of individuals to a specific place and whether insiders and outsiders have different ways of relating to the same place. According to Kianicka et al.

(2006) the landscapes of the Swiss Alps are transformed by the ongoing "socioeconomic, political and technological developments in the region." (p.55) The objective of this study is to examine West Ireland in terms of a sense of place.

Adrian Peace (2014) writes in the work entitled "A Sense of Place, A Place of Sense: Land and a Landscape in the West of Ireland" that the "anthropological analysis of space and place is now well established as one of the more important current concerns of the discipline." (p.495) For this reason Peace holds that the focus should be on identification of the particular themes and concepts that are the most worthy in terms of additional engagement theoretically and for the elaboration ethnographically.

One theme that runs throughout the literature in this area of inquiry is that in the present "spaces and places have become the recurrent source of confrontation and conflict among economic and cultural networks, groups and classes." (Peace, 2014, p. 495) The idea of 'contested spaces' is reported to be such that inherently possesses "distinct and analytic potential since it directly focuses on social conflicts of specific locations.

Peace relates that the work of Low and Lawrence-Zuniga define contested spaces as "geographical locations where conflicts in the form of opposition, confrontation, subversion and/or resistance engage actors whose social positions are defined by differential control of resources and access to power." (2003:18 cited in Peace, 2014, p. 96) The claim of space or assignment of space inherently requires acknowledgement of the distribution of power and the mobilization of the necessary economic and social capital that is needed to contest such distribution of power.

It is made very clear by Low and Lawrence-Zuniga that in regards to contested spaces that there is more "at stake than straightforward conflict over economic and political resources." (Peace, 2014, p.496) Conflict is known to uncover both cultural as well as ideological forces "which are determinant of social life yet remain for the most part hidden from view." Peace, 2014, p.

496) The reason for contesting of spaces is because the contest solidified the "fundamental, but otherwise unexamined, ideological and social frameworks that structure practice." (Low and Lawrence-0Zuniga, 2003:18 cited in: Peace, 2014, p. 496) One there has been a contest of space occur between groups and whose previous assumptions concerning consensus and unity existing between them are no longer viewed as valid the status quo will never again be realized.

This is a transformative capacity that has its relevance in the social change in Ireland because over the past twenty to thirty years this "peripheral European society" has been entangled in disputes that are serious over "iconic places and symbolic spaces." (Peace, 2014, p. 496) The landscape of Ireland has become a location of struggle that has cost those who live in this area and whom have been parties to the disputes and conflict.

Previously the disputes were unknown as the significance of the sites was not spoken and it has surprised different sides of the conflict to learn of the significance held by the other side. For example, the decision made by the Irish government to turn the Mullaghmore mountain in the Burren, County Clare to an urban space designed for mass tourism revealed the unacknowledged conflict due to the mountain's significance and the differences in opinion of how life should progress in West Ireland.

Previously the differences in culture and ideology have been kept subdued but have now resulted in outward conflict and lines being drawn between families, friends and neighbors. Regardless of the side of the conflict of the population the critical aspect of the side on which they stood has been within the awareness of those involved in the conflict as has been the "unequal access to power in Irish society at large." (Peace, 2014, p. 497) Mullaghmore mountain is situated in the Burren's southeastern area and has a natural formation that is unique.

The mountain is comprised of layers of limestone easily discerned one from the other and the peak of the mountain has sunken and features a unique mixture of Mediterranean and Arctic plants. There are portal tombs from the Neolithic period that are dated circa 3500 BC as well as "medieval ring forts and cashels [or] walled ecclesiastical settlements." (Peace, 2014, p. 497) There has been some tourism in the area prior to 1991 with a visitors center that featured souvenirs and an information center.

The proposed tourism center would be located near the foot of the mountain and would be an up-to-date structure. The independent farm owners held that their experience and expertise on Burren land was unmatched since the land was passed down from previous generations and would be passed on to the next.

The landowners held that the land must be explicitly respected and cared for since "land not conscientiously put to productive use was wasted and the idea of damaging land by developing it was non-sequitur." (Peace, 2014, 498) The landowners supported this idea however, the opposing group known as the Burren Action Group (BAG) comprised by "well-endowed with middle-class cultural capital." (Peace, 2014, p. 498) The OPW are reported to have "increasingly indulged in the same sleights of hand and outright deceits as their political masters." (Peace, 2014, p.

499) Local knowledge and scientific argument are reported to be that which "informed the opposition's counter discourse." (Peace, 2014, p. 499) However, the claims made by BAG "focused on the aesthetic, intangible, and sensuous qualities that made Mullaghmore an exceptional and distinctly vulnerable landscape. This was their sense of place around which multiple sentiments and myriad emotions could coalesce. The more the mountain became a contested site, the more the opposition argued it was a unique landscape which appealed to varied.