Oikophobia

In psychiatry, oikophobia (synonymous with domatophobia and ecophobia) is an aversion to home surroundings. It can also be used more generally to mean an abnormal fear (a phobia) of the home, or of the contents of a house ("fear of household appliances, equipment, bathtubs, household chemicals, and other common objects in the home"). The term derives from the Greek words oikos, meaning household, house, or family, and phobia, meaning "fear".

In 1808 the poet and essayist Robert Southey used the word to describe a desire (particularly by the English) to leave home and travel. Southey's usage as a synonym for wanderlust was picked up by other nineteenth century writers.

The term has also been used in political contexts to refer critically to political ideologies that repudiate one's own culture and laud others. The first such usage was by Roger Scruton in a 2004 book.

In psychiatric usage oikophobia typically refers to fear of the physical space of the home interior, and is especially linked to fear of household appliances, baths, electrical equipment and other aspects of the home perceived to be potentially dangerous. The term is properly applied only to fear of objects within the house. Fear of the house itself is referred to as domatophobia. In the post-World War II era some commentators used the term to refer to a supposed "fear and loathing of housework" experienced by women who worked outside the home and who were attracted to a consumerist lifestyle.

Southey used the term in Letters from England (1808), stating that it is a product of "a certain state of civilisation or luxury", referring to habit of wealthy people to visit spa towns and seaside resorts in the summer months. He also mentions the fashion for picturesque travel to wild landscapes, such as the highlands of Scotland. Southey's link of oikophobia to wealth and the search for new experiences was taken up by other writers, and cited in dictionaries. A writer in 1829 published an essay about his experience witnessing the aftermath of the Battle of Waterloo, saying "the love of locomotion is so natural to an Englishman that nothing can chain him home, but the absolute impossibility of living abroad. No such imperious necessity acting upon me, I gave away to my oiko-phobia and the summer of 1815 found me in Brussels." In 1959 the Anglo-Egyptian author Bothaina Abd el-Hamid Mohamed used Southey's concept in his book Oikophobia: or, A literary craze for education through travel.

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