“Philosophy has paid little attention to the home until now”laments Emanuele Coccia.As Professor of the History of Philosophy in Paris, he wants to change this situation with his practical and revealing book “The Home – Philosophy of an Apparently Reliable Place”.
Here, some of its core approaches:
1. Everything that is important to us
“We build houses to cozyly house that part of the world that is essential to our personal happiness”Coccia writes. By this he means both the favorite bedding and the apron inherited from grandma or grandpa, or the children’s first toys, which are still in the rooms they have long since moved out of.
But Coccia directs the focus of attention far beyond the objects and furniture that we accumulate.
The people we need most are also often in our homes: partners, children, sometimes parents, grandparents or friends. Memories and dreams also belong to our home. Is he “museum of ourselves”maintains the Italian academic.
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2. We come back once more and once more
No matter how nice the vacation trip was, “sooner or later we have to go home”writes Coccia, “because we will always be able to inhabit this planet thanks to a home, and only through it”.
At the same time, we do not usually spend the whole day in our house, even in everyday life. It is “the place of return”says Coccia.
After a long day at work, a weekend getaway, a summer vacation, a business trip or a stay abroad, that’s where we come back to.
It is a reliable refuge from which we can go out into the world. The trustworthy remains at home, even when we are far away.
3. With our own bathroom
For many years in the history of mankind, the bathroom was located outside the living space, in the garden or in the corridor. Only in the 20th century, following the example of American hotels, says Coccia, did the bathroom become part of our modern life.
“The bathroom brought to people’s daily intimacy something that until then had a more communal character: cleanliness and body care”Explain.
However, the book’s author also sees this critically, especially for men: lockable toilets – like gender-separated toilets in public places – make men “deal with the organs of Eros in absolute isolation.”
4. Our wardrobe is at home
We can carry a part of our clothes in the suitcase and wear it on our body during the holidays. “Clothing is a concept of happiness inseparable from our body, and that is why it can accompany you everywhere”Coccia points out.
The writer calls our closet the “movable body” of the home. Through our way of dressing, we can show our house, our identity or our attitude to public opinion.
5. Love is lived at home
The most beautiful of all feelings has its place at home, writes Emanuele Coccia: “Love is lived, appreciated and celebrated at home. It is the quintessential domestic secret.”
It’s a secret because no one else sees it in our house. Only those of us who share it know how it really is. The extravagant habits of the couple, the annoying tics, the pants with which we would never go out on the street, but with which we spend hours on the sofa: at home, everything is visible.
However, Coccia also takes a critical look at a place defined as a private space that “It has become a space of injustice”in which oppression and inequality became self-reproducing unconscious habits.
Especially when it comes to the relationship between men and women: “Gender inequality, for example, is rooted in the home”underlines.
It is only enough to consider the ancient belief of patriarchal societies that women “belong in the kitchen”or the increase in sexist violence during the pandemic.
