Structuring of the living space of home in groups living in another ethnic environment

Dwelling house is an image of human-cultural space, it is a material reflection of identities and values of its inhabitants, and its location and internal structure organizes social relations of households. Structuring of the living space is a generalist of proxemics human behavior. In all cultures we found rules of etiquette governing the location of individuals in the house, depending on their status, age, sex and relationship. In proxemics it is expressed in the form of ethnic and etiquette regulations of ritualized communication in typical situations of interaction. The spatial organization of living space of house is absorbed in the process of socialization of children and reproduced and unchanged during adult life. These cultural standards are stereotyped and extremely stable, many of them remain almost unchanged for hundreds of years, preserving the imprint of an ancient culture. At the same time in a living space of home there is a change all the time. Such example is the structuring of the living space of home of a compact ethnic group living in another ethnic environment. This paper deals with the transformations of the organization of living space of home, taking place in the family of Caucasus ethnics migrated to Moscow. The study was conducted by interviewing children and adolescents of different ethnics and ages. It was found that ethnicity, number of family members, their age and gender composition and the number of rooms in the house or flat are the determining factors in the structuring of living space. Our data showed that the majority of children and adolescents strictly observes norms and traditions of the spatial behavior in the family (gender segregation, respect for elders, the rules of seating at the dining table). Girls stricter follow the norms of behavior of their ethnic, which dictated to them by both parents and boys of their nationality. However, at school, in another ethnic environment, migrants are slowly beginning to adopt standards of behavior of the ethnic majority. They note that in Moscow they can do something that is unacceptable in their own region, but for Moscow it is a normally. According to the classification of the J. Fast, in our study in proxemic category "open" families we included Armenians and Georgians, and to the "closed" - Nakhs (Chechens and Ingush), Dagestanis and Azerbaijanis. These differences explain of different religious settings, and greater freedom of the Armenian and Georgian women.

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