Crossing boundaries in rural research

2021 ◽  
pp. 144078332110142
Author(s):  
Robyn Eversole

Rural places around the world share common issues related to their positioning outside social, political, and economic centres of power. More than simply tyranny of distance, many issues can be attributed to tyranny at distance: that is, the power of distant decision-makers to direct rural development from afar with little knowledge of rural contexts. In response to the challenge to progress a transformative research agenda for rural sociology, this article theorises a ‘cross-boundary’ approach to research for rural development, to address persisting issues of development ignorance. Cross-boundary knowledge production values the multiple, contextualised knowledges of rural people and brings these into dialogue with academic knowledges across disciplines to inform practical rural solutions. Rural sociologists, with their in-depth understanding of rural community dynamics and larger social structures, are ideally positioned to broker cross-boundary knowledge partnerships that equip rural communities to solve old problems in new ways.

2019 ◽  
pp. 0739456X1989531
Author(s):  
Michael Hibbard ◽  
Susan Lurie

Rural-urban disparities exposed by the Great Recession have rekindled interest in place prosperity approaches to rural development. The conventional wisdom has been skeptical about the efficacy of locality development, preferring to assist rural people to relocate. As a practical matter, however, people are not leaving. The secular trend toward metropolitanization may be ending, reviving interest in place prosperity. One strategy, sometimes termed the new natural resource economy, aims at place prosperity through innovative approaches to resource management and agriculture. We report some of the results of an empirical study of NNRE in Oregon and their implications practice and scholarship.


2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 114
Author(s):  
Iddirisu Andani Mu-azu ◽  
G.P. Shivram

AbstractThe paper set out a platform to investigate the impact of FM radio broadcast in local dialects on rural community development in the Tamale Metropolis of Northern Ghana. The study adopts survey design and also employs probability proportional techniques to select communities for the study. The main thrust of this paper is on the impact of local dialect on rural community development, preferences of development programmes and the community’s participation in the production of radio programmes. Out of 400 questionnaires distributed, 392 was retrieved and analysed. From the results, it is established that local dialect broadcast on radio have an impact on development of rural communities. Also, it improves awareness and knowledge of solutions to community’s development problems in education, agriculture, environment, culture, politics and religion. The paper compare target audience’s preference for local dialect radio programmes to other similar content programmes that were not broadcast in local dialect. It concludes that radio broadcast in local dialect plays a pivotal role in bridging the communication gap between government and rural communities. It proved to be one of the effective mode of communication at the grass-root level. The study shows a positive role played by the indigenous dialect’s radio programmes and recommends that rural development programmes on radio should be packaged in local language. Thus, enhances listenership, interest and positive desired behavioural change.Key Words: Impact, FM Radio Broadcast, Local Dialect, Rural Development, Ghana. 


2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 269-280
Author(s):  
Rabial Kanada

This study aims to describe the concept of educational planning for rural communities in Lahat district. This research is a qualitative qualitative research. Research subjects are rural people who will, are, and after sending their children to school. The data technique uses observation, interviews, and documentation. The data analysis technique was carried out in stages, namely data reduction, data presentation, and data collection. To maintain the validity of the data in the presentation, analysis was carried out with triangulation of sources and techniques. The results showed that there are 4 important elements in educational planning in rural communities, namely the choice of place and department, children's academic ability, parents' financial ability, educational goals, and study time. These four elements influence each other in rural community education planning.


Author(s):  
Jon M. Conrad ◽  
Barry C. Field

Research in rural community development is being pursued in a number of different directions. One of these is the identification and analysis of economic development alternatives facing rural communities. A second is the clarification and study of the preferences that rural communities may have with respect to these alternatives. The purpose of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework for integrating these two thrusts in rural development research.


2012 ◽  
Vol 48 (No. 12) ◽  
pp. 554-558
Author(s):  
E. Kučerová

Since 1990s, the discussion about the Czech social policy emphasizes more the necessity to change this policy from passive state social policy towards an active social policy. The latter includes the activities of people in the frames of formal (e.g. NGOs) and informal groups, and therefore also the concept of civic society is accentuated in this respect. Although this concept might be understood in different ways, its common characterization is a spontaneous non-political self-expression of individuals and their groups (the activity that was suppressed before 1989). Through the self-expression, the individuals realize their particular interests. When thinking about active social policy in the frames of civic society, we might assume that the conditions for its implementation are better for the actors in small rural communities. These more favourable conditions are assumed due to the traits of rural communities – e.g. personal, non-anonymous relations, good knowledge and familiarity with particular social problems, etc. However, the actors who try to contribute to active social policy are constrained/controlled in their activities by other community members. The level of these constrains depends on the configuration of social and cultural capital (Bourdieu). The author of the text is for more than one year involved in empirical research in one Czech village. Using qualitative methods she investigates various social events and actors who participate in active social policy (in relation to those who are supposed to participate in this policy as responsible agents). The author assumes that the participation in active social policy is one of the sources of integrated endogenous rural development, while passive social policy (institutionally backed by the state) is more related to exogenous rural development. However, there is a question how the very actors (active members of rural community) do approach this participation and how the other members of rural community evaluate their activities in the sphere of social policy.


2003 ◽  
pp. 177-194
Author(s):  
Krstan Malesevic

When discussing the future of rural areas for rural sociology (which aims at developing a holistic approach), the most important issue is certainly the question of fate of local communities in rural areas. Reviewing the enormous literature on countryside and agriculture, one can notice an overwhelming dominance of articles that focus on the agrarian and economic policy, often written fairly in the form of agro-economic reductionism. The totality of human life in rural communities is often lost in the fragmentary analysis of individual scientific disciplines. That is why there is a lack of knowledge on the meaning and content of (new) rurality, rural relationships, rural values, rural communities, rural ways of life and on integral rural development in conceptual-theoretical as well as in practical-empirical sense. This problem, understandably, affects different aspects of the complex phenomenon of "rurality" in our situation. However, regardless of the evident insufficiency of synthetic knowledge about our countryside as a social community, it is clearly evident that rural areas are in deep crisis. Local communities in the majority of our rural areas are completely marginalised. Great number of these communities are in the process of disintegration and disappearance. They have lost a "spirit of time" and identity and have not acquired a new one. Furthermore, in some rural areas local communities have literally vanished. In other words, it is difficult to find in our society any active rural communities with a clear future prospects. That is why the crucial question for social theory as well as for social practice is: Which are the economic, demographic, technological and especially socio-cultural prerequisites of renewal and development of local communities in the near future? Without their revitalisation there is no development of rural areas and vice versa. In the focus of this renewal there should be an adequate spatial, functional, organic and emotional connection of people living there. In other words, their participation and their self-identification with these communities is a key prerequisite. Although the renewal of our rural communities is an extremely difficult task, filled with many dilemmas, inconsistencies and objective contradictions, it is not unresolvable, at least for one type of these communities. With the well-thought strategy of planning and management of rural development, these processes can be accelerated and channelled in the desired direction. This paper discusses some possible solutions and gives more concrete propositions in relation to this problem.


Author(s):  
Andrew Koricich

Community colleges play an ever-increasing role in educating residents across the country, and this is certainly true in rural places. Rural community colleges provide critical educational opportunities to rural populations, and, as such, have an inextricable link to workforce development and economic prosperity in these communities. As rural industries continue to evolve, it is necessary for workers to obtain new or upgraded skills in order to remain competitive and for rural communities to survive. This chapter highlights the ways in which rural communities are changing and the critical role rural community colleges play in educating a modern and competitive rural workforce.


2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 255-262
Author(s):  
Anna Augustyn ◽  
Anna Pluskota

Abstract The aim of the article is to present the main issues discussed at the XXVII European Society for Rural Sociology Congress “Uneven Processes of Rural Change”, held on 24–27 July 2017 in Cracow, Poland. Both the title of the Congress and its keynote speakers focused on rural communities and different ways in which they respond to and cope with new social, demographic and economic challenges, depending on their varied potential across rural areas in different parts of Europe. The paper offers a review of the Congress speeches and may therefore serve as a pretext to analyze participants’ interest in rural community resilience and resilience of social systems as part of grassroots processes aimed at dealing with new challenges.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 616-633 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorna Philip ◽  
Fiona Williams

Abstract In the context of demographically ageing communities across rural Europe Smart Villages have considerable potential to promote ageing healthy. Whilst in principle supporting healthy ageing in the context of the Smart Village might appear a relatively straightforward endeavour, in operational terms, successful development of smart, 21st century villages relies upon, and sometimes assumes, an appropriate interplay of socio-technological factors. Articulated through a lens provided by the digital ecosystem model advocated by the European Network for Rural Development (2018), this paper offers some observations from the field. We acknowledge the challenges faced by remote rural places in their journey to become ‘smart places’ and identify formal and informal interventions that could better position rural communities to become part of a wider, smart society.


2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-67
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Ritchie

In 1814 in a small Highland township an unmarried girl, ostracised by her neighbours, gave birth. The baby died. The legal precognition permits a forensic, gendered examination of the internal dynamics of rural communities and how they responded to threats to social cohesion. In the Scottish ‘parish state’ disciplining sexual offences was a matter for church discipline. This case is situated in the early nineteenth-century Gàidhealtachd where and when church institutions were less powerful than in the post-Reformation Lowlands, the focus of most previous research. The article shows that the formal social control of kirk discipline was only part of a complex of behavioural controls, most of which were deployed within and by communities. Indeed, Scottish communities and churches were deeply entwined in terms of personnel; shared sexual prohibitions; and in the use of shaming as a primary method of social control. While there was something of a ‘female community’, this was not unconditionally supportive of all women nor was it ranged against men or patriarchal structures.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document