HOMInG Interview with Peter J. Braeunlein

(University of Goettingen)

Conducted by Luis Eduardo Perez Murcia

September 2020

“A bourgeois home includes objects of remembrance that make one’s own family genealogy visible as well as the becoming of an individuals’ own biography and education in the form of books, photographs, wall decoration, inherited kitchenware, and furniture. The bourgeoisie has created a special culture of remembrance, which is reflected in the domestic culture. […] Home and belonging are atmospherically produced and this requires things. Home in this sense is not conceivable as an empty space, but the company of people and things. [… However] My experiences of field research point to the danger of subtly universalizing our (Western) concept of home and belonging. The virtues of ethnography help to contextualize the connection between home, artefact and memory on a case-specific basis.”

Read the interview!