Housing for the Women of Haors

In this research, women’s unequal access to resources in the Haors is investigated as a way to study agency deprivation. As an architectural designer, a suitable entry point of research is into the access of spatially-determinable resources. The selection was based on World Bank’s report Voice and Agency: Empowering Women and Girls for Shared Prosperity.

There are a number of literary references that discuss socio-spatial inequalities women face in rural Bangladesh, but the housing typology and settlement patterns discussed are not directly applicable in the unique Haor ecosystem. Hence there is a gap in the knowledge base on socio-spatial inequalities women in the Haors face.

Within existing research specifically into the Haor regions, discussions on gender inequalities are limited to social science perspectives. This research will build upon that knowledge, and go beyond into an interdisciplinary approach across architectural design, urban planning and ecology.

Furthermore, since the issue of unequal access to resources transgresses through all scales, its contribution to feminist spatial practice reaches far beyond the Haor regions.