Bevarandets etiska funktioner: relationer mellan människor, platser och hus

Sammanfattning: The aim of this thesis is to conceptualise preserving as a phenomenon from two points of departure. Firstly, in a theoretical way, by indicating different places of preserving, answering the question where the act of preserving takes place, i.e. the different contexts or positions of preserving. I distinguish between the everyday preserving actions in the life-world, in the phenomenological sense, and the institutionalised construction of preserving, as a social practice. Secondly, I conceptualise preserving as a phenomenon through the creation of a theoretical instrument for analysis and reflection on different motives for preserving. The aim of this instrument is to give some answers to the question why human beings want to preserve places and houses.

The thesis is a theoretical investigation of ethical functions of preserving, with an analytical frame from a moral philosophical point of departure. Preserving is here understood in a wide sense. I work with phenomenological and hermeneutic methodologies. The theoretical investigation is based on written texts. I have given no attention to how houses are preserved.

I argue that preserving inhabited places and houses have ethical functions. Houses and places provide human beings with different senses of meaning. I also emphasise the fact that there is a connection or bond made between human beings and various houses and places, a connection that provides human beings with different senses of meaning. Houses and places are here seen as lived houses and lived places of great importance for the well being of human beings.