ABSTRACT OF RESEARCHES INCLUDING THERAPEUTIC ENVIRONMENT, CULTURAL LANDSCAPE AND WOOD CARVING IN VERNACULAR ENVIRONMENT

 

DETERMINING CULTURAL-ETHNIC LANDSCAPE IN TERRACE HOUSING COMMUNITY IN MALAYSIA

ISMAIL SAID
[email protected]
Dept. of Landscape Architecture
Faculty of Built Environment
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
81310 Skudai, Johor Bahru

 

(keywords: cultural landscape, terrace house, ethnic gardens, ethnic beliefs)
 

ABSTRACT

Cultural-ethnic landscape symbolizes the belief and cultural values of an ethnic group living in a community. The landscape is an expression of people's idea and work; illustrating intrinsic understanding and relationship of people to their fellow beings and environment. Such landscape is significance to the community development and more challenging to establish in a multi-ethnic society such as terrace house neighborhood in Peninsular Malaysia than in homogenous society. This research investigates the characteristics of terrace house gardens from three ethnic groups, namely, Malays, Chinese and Indians. Through inventory and analysis of 23 neighborhoods in Peninsular Malaysia, it is found that 52% of the terrace houses have gardens. The design of garden and its features are partially influenced by ethnicity belief of the resident. The different is distinctive in selection of plant species that determines by the religious belief and ritual rite of the ethnic group. In hierarchical importance, the plant species are planted in the house garden for five reasons or uses, namely, (i) decoration, (ii) food, (iii) medicine and cosmetic, (iv) ritual, and (v) provision of shade.

    Among the three groups, the Indians have a distinctive garden character denoted by a planting composition of 5 to 6 species of trees and shrubs. The plants are considered sacred and planted in the garden for religious and medicinal purposes. On the other hand, the Chinese garden is characterized by an altar and several plant species especially having red color. They emphasize the value of decoration more than the other uses. Likewise, the Malays also compose their garden with flowering shrubs to embellish the house. Although the Malays use more plant species that the Indians and Chinese, their garden character is less conspicuous and could not easily signify the house.
Ultimately, the whole landscape scene of the terrace house neighborhood is a composite of the Indians, Chinese and Malay gardens that signify a multi-ethnic community. Each group could give a stamp to the residential landscape, establishing a sense of belonging to the community.