Sensory and Temporal Dimensions of Homemaking Among Syrian Female Refugees in Istanbul

This study examines the temporal, spatial and sensory dimensions of homemaking among female Syrian refugees in Istanbul, focusing on how nostalgia, memory, and sensory experiences shape the processes of home-making and home-unmaking. Drawing from my PhD research, I explore refugees' sensory interactions across various urban scales—from dwellings and neighborhoods to public spaces and migrant hubs—highlighting how memories of past homes and aspirations for the future influence their engagement with the present environment.

Using sensory ethnography, sensory walks, and in-depth interviews, the research investigates how everyday routines and sensory interactions involving tastes, smells, sounds, sights and textures either foster or disrupt feelings of continuity, familiarity, security, and belonging in new surroundings. Sensory memories and embodied daily practices, such as cooking and commensal eating of traditional meals or engaging with personal/ biographical objects, play a crucial role in reassembling identities and creating a sense of home. These routines not only link past experiences to present environments but also contribute to the formation of diasporic places and cultures.

However, the study also reveals that beyond recreating familiar sensory worlds, refugees adapt to new temporal rhythms and sensory dynamics in the host city. This adaptation, which unfolds over time, reflects a dynamic process of both "making" and "unmaking" homes. As refugees accumulate new memories and experiences, they either build stronger attachments to their new environment or, in many cases, face exclusion, prompting further displacement.

The study highlights the crucial role of time and sensory engagement in post-migration homemaking and demonstrates how sensory ethnography can capture the emotional and embodied dimensions of these processes in the context of displacement.