ABSTRACT
The relative inflexibility of the material construction of the home contrasts with the flexibility which can be achieved with the use of furniture to create a material structure which supports the ongoing patterns of activity of the household. Vietnamese migrants in Australia, for example, must select from available houses the ones which most closely conform to geomantic prescriptions and which can most easily be adapted to their accustomed pattern of life. The computer’s location within the space of the household can be illuminated by examining a number of different dimensions of the spatial organization of the household: that of spatial isolation versus accessibility; that of the personal space of one individual versus a location in communal space; and that of space coded for work versus that associated with leisure. The dining room is an interesting room within contemporary Australian homes, in that, if it were only used for dining, it would be an extremely under-utilized space.
