Rethinking The Rural

The vastness and isolation of the American West forged a dependence on scarce natural resources especially water, forests, fish, and minerals. Today, the internet is shaping another revolution, and it promises both obstacles and opportunity. Seeking to understand the impact of a global society on western small towns, the author, director of the Western Rural Development Center at Utah State University, conducted strategic planning roundtables in thirteen states. The gatherings brought three major concer

There has been a recent expansion of interest in cultural approaches to rural communities and to the economic and social situation of rurality more broadly. This interest has been particularly prominent in Australia in recent years, spurring the emergence of an interdisciplinary field called 'rural cultural studies'. This collection is framed by a large interdisciplinary research project that is part of that emergence, particularly focused on what the idea of 'cultural sustainability' might mean for understanding experiences of growth, decline, change and heritage in small Australian country towns. However, it extends beyond the initial parameters of that research, bringing together a range of senior and emerging Australian researchers who offer diverse approaches to rural culture. The essays collected here explore the diverse forms that rural cultural studies might take and how these intersect with other disciplinary approaches, offering a uniquely diverse but also careful account of life in country Australia. Yet, in its emphasis on the simultaneous specificity and cross-cultural recognisability of rural communities, this book also outlines a field of inquiry and a set of critical strategies that are more broadly applicable to thinking about the "rural" in the early twenty-first century. This book will be valuable reading for students and academics of Geography, History, Literary Studies, Cultural Studies, Anthropology and Sociology, introducing rural cultural studies as a new dynamic and integrative discipline.

This important book is the re-titled third edition of the extremely well received and widely used Agricultural Extension (van den Ban & Hawkins, 1988, 1996). Building on the previous editions, Communication for Rural Innovation maintains and adapts the insights and conceptual models of value today, while reflecting many new ideas, angles and modes of thinking concerning how agricultural extension is taught and carried through today. Since the previous edition of the book, the number and type of organisations that apply communicative strategies to foster change and development in agriculture and resource management has become much more varied and this book is aimed at those who use communication to facilitate change in agriculture and resource management. Communication for Rural Innovation is essential reading for process facilitators, communication division personnel, knowledge managers, training officers, consultants, policy makers, extension specialists and managers of agricultural extension or research organisations. The book can also be used as an advanced introduction into issues of communicative intervention at BSc or MSc level.

Rethinking Rural: Reflections on Today, Insights for the Future presents the opinions of ten people as expressed in their answers to two questions: How would you describe rural America today? and What do you imagine it will like for the next generation? Each of the authors share their concepts and their answers based on the lens through which they see the world. This anthology begins the Rethinking Rural series, aimed at highlighting how people of diverse backgrounds and experiences understand rural historically and how they foresee its future, adding to the ongoing discussion of the multifaceted nature of rural America.Contributors:Kathleen Annette (White Earth Band of Ojibwe) MD, past deputy director of Indian Health Services field operationsDeirdre Dalpiaz Bishop chief of Geography Division, United States Census BureauPam Gildersleeve-Hernandez Executive director at CUE, a member-driven education nonprofitAntonia Gonzales (Navajo Nation) anchor and producer of National Native News Robert L. Grant PhD, pastor during the 1980s farming crisis, professor of Environmental and Historical Theology at St. Ambrose UniversityTaneeza Islam Attorney-at-law specializing in civil rights, immigration law; co-founder of South Dakota Voices for Peace and JusticePaula Kerger President and CEO of Public Broadcasting ServiceCraig Langford Senior director of editorial services of Public Broadcasting ServiceLaurie E. Paarlberg PhD, professor of Philanthropic Studies at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy and the O'Neill School of Public and Environmental AffairsRon Rosmann Co-owner of Rosmann Family Farms, founding member of Practical Farmers of IowaAdam Steltzner NASA engineer for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, chief engineer for the Mars 2020 ProjectHeather Wilson PhD, president of the University of Texas-El Paso, past president of the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, twenty-fourth Secretary of the US Air ForceMatt Ehlman PhD; Rethinking Rural Series Editor; host and organizer of the Morning Fill Up, a series of public gatherings intended to inspire and engage and to put creative energies into action for the betterment of the entire community

The chapters in this international collection investigate a wide range of theorizations of rurality and literacy; literate practices and pedagogies; questions of place, space, and sustainability; and representations of rurality that challenge simplistic conceptions of standardized literacy and the real-and-imagined world beyond the metropolis.

Rethinking Rural Studies presents an explicitly trans-disciplinary perspective on rural social science. David L. Brown and Mark Shucksmith identify emerging issues and research avenues on the topic, highlighting opportunities for rural studies to contribute towards greater collective wellbeing.

Given the central role of the food and agriculture system in driving so many of the connected ecological, social and economic threats and challenges we currently face, Rethinking Food and Agriculture reviews, reassesses and reimagines the current food and agriculture system and the narrow paradigm in which it operates. Rethinking Food and Agriculture explores and uncovers some of the key historical, ethical, economic, social, cultural, political, and structural drivers and root causes of unsustainability, degradation of the agricultural environment, destruction of nature, short-comings in science and knowledge systems, inequality, hunger and food insecurity, and disharmony. It reviews efforts towards ‘sustainable development’, and reassesses whether these efforts have been implemented with adequate responsibility, acceptable societal and environmental costs and optimal engagement to secure sustainability, equity and justice. The book highlights the many ways that farmers and their communities, civil society groups, social movements, development experts, scientists and others have been raising awareness of these issues, implementing solutions and forging ‘new ways forward’, for example towards paradigms of agriculture, natural resource management and human nutrition which are more sustainable and just. Rethinking Food and Agriculture proposes ways to move beyond the current limited view of agro-ecological sustainability towards overall sustainability of the food and agriculture system based on the principle of ‘inclusive responsibility’. Inclusive responsibility encourages ecosystem sustainability based on agro-ecological and planetary limits to sustainable resource use for production and livelihoods. Inclusive responsibility also places importance on quality of life, pluralism, equity and justice for all and emphasises the health, well-being, sovereignty, dignity and rights of producers, consumers and other stakeholders, as well as of nonhuman animals and the natural world. Explores some of the key drivers and root causes of unsustainability , degradation of the agricultural environment and destruction of nature Highlights the many ways that different stakeholders have been forging 'new ways forward' towards alternative paradigms of agriculture, human nutrition and political economy, which are more sustainable and just Proposes ways to move beyong the current unsustainable exploitation of natural resources towards agroecological sustainability and overall sustainability of the food and agriculture system based on 'inclusive responsibility'

This book explores the notion of rurality and how it is used and produced in various contexts, including within populist politics which derives their legitimacy from the rural-urban divide. The gap between the ‘common people’ and the ‘elites’ is widening again as images of rurality are promoted as morally pure, unalienated and opposed to the cultural and economic globalization. This book examines how using certain images and projections of rurality produces ‘rural authenticity’, a concept propagated by various groups of people such as regional food producers, filmmakers, policymakers, and lobbyists. It seeks to answer questions such as: What is the rurality that these groups of people refer to? How is it produced? What are the purposes that it serves? Research in this book addresses these questions from the areas of both politics and policies of the ‘authentic rural’. The ‘politics’ refers to polarizations including politicians, social movements, and political events which accentuate the rural-urban divide and brings it back to the core of the societal conflict, while the ’policies’ focus on rural tourism, heritage industry, popular art and other areas where rurality is constantly produced and consumed. With international case studies from leading scholars in the field of rural studies, the book will appeal to geographers, sociologists, politicians, as well as those interested in the re-emergence of the rural-urban divide in politics and media. Chapter 8 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.