Housing as Identity: Exploring the Social Meaning of Home Among Low-Income Families in Hanoi

Abstract

This article examines how low-income families in Hanoi construct and express their identities through housing, revealing the home as a socio-material and moral field where dignity, belonging, and recognition are continually negotiated. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork in three neighborhoods—Phuc Tan, Ngoc Ha, and Ngoc Thuy—the study employs semi-structured interviews to explore how residents use material practices such as decoration, repair, and maintenance to perform respectability and sustain family continuity under conditions of economic constraint. The findings demonstrate that, for these households, housing functions as a form of symbolic labor: a means of moral self-presentation, social participation, and intergenerational memory. Theoretically, the article advances debates on home and identity by integrating socio-material and performative perspectives with insights from post-socialist and culturally embedded urban contexts. It argues that housing among Hanoi’s low-income families cannot be reduced to material adequacy or ownership, but instead reflects complex intersections of moral value, cultural practice, and social aspiration. The study concludes that recognizing the symbolic and relational dimensions of home is crucial for developing more inclusive and context-sensitive housing policies in Vietnam’s rapidly transforming cities.