Dormitory
A dormitory or dorm is a place to sleep. The word derives from the French 'dormir', to sleep.
Dormitories are usually referred to as 'dorms'. The word is used in two contexts:
- room with many beds (a sleeping dormitory);
- building with many small private rooms (a dormitory building);
Sleeping dormitory
A common usage of the term 'dormitory' is for a large room with many single beds. Examples are found in many rooming houses such as hostels, fraternities, sororities, and other scholarship halls. The room typically is a large room with very few furnishings except for beds. Such rooms can contain anywhere from 2 to 50 to hundreds of beds (though such very large rooms are rare except perhaps as twin bed (sometimes in a bunk-bed configuration);
- desk;
- mirror;
- closet space (sometimes);
- drawers (clothes storage) (sometimes);
- window (sometimes);
- sink with running water (rarely);
Most often, bathrooms are provided for a group of rooms, which provide shower, toilet, and sink facilities.
In the U.S., dormitories are most often segregated by gender, with men living in one group of rooms, and women in another. Some dorms are single-sex with varying limits on visits by persons of each gender.
Most dorms are much closer to campus than comparable private housing such as apartment buildings. This convenience is a major factor in the choice of where to live since living physically closer to classrooms means being able to sleep until 9:20 am and still arrive at a 9:30 class on time.
Examples
- University of Kansas, Lawrence Kansas, USA), Joseph R. Pearson Dormitory:
- Overall size: 6 floors of 36 rooms each (total 216 rooms approx.), typical population 380 (some people had single rooms);
- Room: 15 x 15 ft. square, 3 feet was a dual closet, with built in drawers, and lighted mirror alcove;
- Contents: Single-sized bed which folded into a couch (or bunk beds, by choice), desk, lamp (no sink);
- Bathrooms: One bathroom for 18 rooms, containing 5 shower stalls, 8 sinks, 4 toilets, and 3 urinals;
- Genders: Single sex dorm (for men), though in summer had men in one wing and women in the other;
- Extras: Cafeteria in basement, workout room, laundry room, elevators, lobby, music / piano room, game room;
- College of St. Catherine, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA, Stanton Hall Dormitory:
- Overall size: 3 floors with a total of 29 rooms;
- Room: 14 x 14 ft. square, 3 feet dual closet, lighted mirror aclove with built in drawers;
- Contents: Single-sized bed, desk, lamp (no sink);
- Bathrooms: One bathroom for 20 rooms;
- Genders: Single sex dorm (for women).
- Extras: Campus-wide cafeteria in another building, one 'kitchen/rec room' per floor, laundry, lobby / meeting room;
Housekeeping
University dorms have housekeeping staff to maintain the cleanliness of common rooms including lobbies and bathrooms.
Stereotypically, college dorm rooms are small and messy; this stereotype has a strong basis in fact.
Disambiguation
The term dormitory is also often applied to suburbs or towns adjacent to large cities. For instance, Porirua is a dormitory city for Wellington, New Zealand. (In the United States, these would be called bedroom communities.)
