Evaluating the Effective Factors on the Quality of Women Leisure from Interactionist Approach in Urban Mixed-use Centers (Case study: Kourosh mixed-used center)

Subject Areas : urbanism

Sharin Shirmohamadian ¹ , Shadi Azizi ²

1 - Ph. D., Candidate in Architecture, Islamic Azad University, Tehran Central Branch. Tehran, Iran.
2 - Assistant Professor, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, , Tehran, Iran.

Received: 2019-06-01 Accepted : 2019-11-25 Published : 2020-06-21

Keywords: Interactionist Approach, Urban Mixed-use Centers, Leisure Contemporaneously, Women Leisure,

Abstract :

The fundamental changes in industrial and post-industrial societies have changed the concepts of work, residence, and leisure. In this situation leisure has become one of the most crucial needs of human life and a wide range of social theories has been used to expand our understanding of leisure experiences and the role of leisure in societies. Today the definition of leisure is more complicated by the ambiguity situation of work and leisure, especially in citizenship life. However, even though many studies have reported leisure as functionalist, Marxist, neo-Marxist and feminist approaches, there has been very little research reported on the interactionist approach. This approach addressed the attributes of leisure in dramatic lifestyle changes. People's job is no longer the mere sign of social class and personal identity. Todays the differences between people will be more distinctive by their leisure activities. From this view, leisure is one of the fundamental factors for social cohesion, identical definition, and social interactions. Meeting this need requires physical locations, and the urban spaces have a vast potential to respond to this need. Urban spaces have a foremost role in leisure activities especially for women who always faced challenges in public places. Before second-Pahlavi dynasty, women presence just was common in Mosque, Bath, and Bazar without a man. So many various cultural limitations and beliefs keep women away from many public spaces during the history of our county. The absence of women in urban spaces leads to their inability to making relationships and suppress their identity.  The purchase was the only activity that allows women to be present in the realm of men in the past. Today's Mixed-use centers are new urban places that make legitimate the presence of women from different social classes in the urban space. In these places, women can find a new identity for themselves, other than being a woman or a mother of children. Today's mixed-use centers are becoming new urban places that provide an opportunity to purchase besides a lot of other activities for women. Considering the importance of leisure for women as a source of identity, in the present study, Kourosh mixed-used center is selected as one of the new urban places which contain diverse meanings and activities than other public spaces like coffee shops and restaurants in Tehran metropolis. The aim of this article is evaluating the role of mixed-use centers as new spaces of urban interactions in the quality of women leisure. Literature review in recent leisure fields based on interactionist approaches categorize that three variables into activity fragmentation, activity synchronization, and communication (socialize and speaking). The influence of these variables analyzes by statistical analysis as fieldwork in Kurosh Mixed-use center. The data were collected through questionnaires distributed to 384 women randomly in Kurosh center. The data were analyzed using SPSS software. The result shows that women leisure has a significant correlation to the activity fragmentation and activity synchronization, yet there is no significant correlation between women leisure and communication (socialize and speaking). 

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