In the Places of Empowerment project at the University of Helsinki, we study places that are important to city residents. We investigate which places are empowering in everyday life, what makes them so, and how changes to these places have affected urban residents’ experiences of their local environments.
Our project is rooted in the tradition of humanities-based urban research, which focuses on the interaction between people and their environment, as well as the meanings and emotions expressed in relationships to places. The research employs both ethnological and onomastic approaches.