Living locked down – An autoethnographic approach to strategies of adaption to confined living in north Hesse, Germany

Abstract

Based on autoethnographic observations and phenomenological descriptions of everyday life, this article develops a theory about the connection between challenging housing experiences and the lockdown situation during the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany. A special focus is placed on living in community, i.e. living permanently together with other people. The reorganisation of spatial routines and the bundling of these in the flat led to the development of new methods of everyday life in terms of work, leisure and social behaviour. With the addition of theoretical role considerations, it is shown that the central challenge of life in the lockdown presents itself as a spatial crisis of role fulfilment.