Boundaries

In reading about the landscape and sacred places of the Puritans and Pueblo Indians, I was drawn to the concept of boundaries as it was addressed in each article.   In "Pueblo Style and Regional Architecture," diagrams were presented of both Pueblo and American settlements.   The Peublo settlements were surrounded by natural elements, including rivers and mountains, whereas the American settlements were divided into square sections comprised of man-made roads and housing.   The method in which the land was divided was vastly different, and yet I felt that there was a similar attention to the space in the fact that there were set boundaries to the community.   "Pueblo Style and Regional Architecture"  states that, " The first generalization that can be made about the Pueblos is that they all set careful limits to the boundaries of their world and order everything in it" (34).  While the article explains that these boundaries are to orient the community to the natural world, and Puritan boundaries were more of a hope to create a separation from the natural world, the organization implies an attention to space which I feel transcends the particularities of each cultural group.  A quote which particulaly struck me from the Pueblo Architecture article was, "One task of Architecture is still that of interpreting the world as a meaningful order in which the individual can find his place in the midst of nature and in the midst of community.  Time and space must be revealed in such a way that human beings are given their dwelling place, their ethos" (41).   The quote explains for me the need for man to define his being in relation to nature.  It is not enough to simply exist, but to instead try and form a definition of one's own culture in relation to the larger world.   Without a defined sense of place, one can feel lost in the world, small and insignificant.   The similarities between fastly different cultures is then, not merely a coincidence, but an essence of humanity.