A Macroregional Approach

Abstract

As I conducted my analyses of the house and community data, I noticed what appeared to be regionally based patterning in the data, in which spatial positioning in regional systems of cores and peripheries seemed related to housing decisions. Specifically, differences often existed between housing traditions in villages involved primarily in agricultural commodity production for local markets in the rural areas of core zones, versus those in transitional and edge zones (peripheries), where activities like long-distance trading expeditions were equally important to household economies. My previous research experience suggested that regional factors could, in fact, have an influence on households and their decisions about housing, but I would require a regionally based method in order to evaluate such a proposal.