Sacral and Spiritual Landscape Perception in South Moravian and Ústecký Region: Application in Environmental Learning
Abstract
The contribution aims to study the perception of the sacral landscape and spiritual places in the South Moravian Region (especially the city of Brno) and Ústecký Region, i.e. in those areas which are ranked among the most and the least religious within the Czech Republic. The main purpose is to explore the landscape perception from the viewpoint of university students in both regions - with the focus on their spiritual imagery and preferences related to concrete places.
The second aim is to point how we include these findings in the university courses at Masaryk University in Brno and J. E.
Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem. The paper discusses interrelated topics, which are linked with the landscape perception in South Moravian and Ústecký Region.
The first theme is the sacral landscape associated with the perception of spiritual and personally important places; then the intention is to approximate the perception of sacral and spiritual elements of the landscape such as churches, chapels, forests, elevated places in the landscape and roadside memorials; third aim is to show how it works in the courses Sustainability, Urban and Rural studies and International Geographical Research. A questionnaire survey has been used to explore the spiritual attitudes of young people studying geography in Ústí nad Labem and Brno.
The results point out the specific spiritual attitudes towards generally natural spaces and places assuming the condition of very low declared religiosity (in Ústecký Region) and provide an overview of the places and feelings associated with them; on the contrary relatively high religiosity and abundance of sacral and spiritual places in South Moravian Region were discussed. The results also point to the specific and relatively significant spiritual perception of certain landscape elements by young people which act in the cities of Brno and Ústí nad Labem.
The application of mentioned concepts in the university education is also included.