Overview
The purpose of this discussion is to examine your relationship to territory and the environments in which you most often find yourselves. Being territorial begins at a very young age. For example, if you have to share a bedroom with a younger sibling, you may complain and refuse to welcome them (offensive display) or even put furniture down the center of the room to separate their side from yours (marker). Reflect on your own territorial behavior, at home, work, or school. For example, how would you feel if someone sat in "your" seat?
Along with being territorial is the issue of navigating public spaces and people's personal space. This challenge is especially acute as some of us come from contact cultures while others do not. At the same time we are considering other human beings around us, we must also interpret the messages a given public environment is sending us. Take a look at the newspaper column entitled Hostile Architecture from The New York Times. Sometimes public spaces don't permit us to consider questions of territory as they send us messages that we are not welcome.
This response has two prompts. Please write a cohesive essay, combining your ideas, and breaking your thoughts into paragraphs. The discussion post should be 300 words minimum and not more than 500 words. (You will not be penalized for writing a long post, but be succinct.) You must THOUGHTFULLY respond to at least one other person's discussion post in at least 100 words.
What is your primary territory? Have you ever had to defend it from encroachment? What happened, i.e. what tactics did you use to gain control: markers? labels? offensive displays?