Postman Pat and me: Everyday encounters with an icon of idyllic rurality

It is, by now, well accepted that those of us who live with/in contemporary Anglocentric popular culture are presented, from birth, with manifold icons and imaginings of the English countryside as idyllic. Indeed, the idea that, through such popular representations, we encounter and ‘consume’ this sense of ‘rural idyll’ – and a particular, underlying, ideologically laden set of idea(l)s – has been well rehearsed. However, this paper reflects upon a question which has hitherto been often overlooked: what is the (practical, tangible) nature of this ‘consumption’? Approaching this question, the paper re-presents a succession of encounters with one icon of idyllic rurality: Postman Pat. In so doing, the paper develops an understanding of some complex – and frequently banal, odd, happenstance, taken-for-granted – happenings and practices which are fundamentally part of the ‘consumption’ of ‘rural idyll’.     

Chilling out in ‘cosmopolitan country’: Urban/rural hybridity and the construction of Daylesford as a ‘lesbian and gay rural idyll’

This paper advances scholarship on ‘lesbian and gay rural idylls’. A growing literature examines how ‘lesbian and gay rural idylls’ are not only produced in opposition to the urban, but are themselves urban constructs. We extend these contentions by exploring the processes of idyllisation suffusing lesbian and gay festival tourism in Daylesford, a town in non-metropolitan Victoria, Australia. We find that Daylesford’s idyllisation by the lesbian and gay tourism industry blurs the urban/rural binary, and instead hybridises rurality and urbanity in the tourism images and practices of ‘cosmopolitan country’ associated with the town. Research findings from Daylesford are analysed to examine how the dynamics of tourism marketing and festival attendance help produce and articulate this hybrid variant of the ‘lesbian and gay rural idyll’. We utilise two sets of mostly qualitative data for this inquiry: travel commentaries in the news media, and a survey conducted in Daylesford at the 2006 ChillOut Festival, Australia’s largest lesbian and gay rural festival.     

‘The Rotten Banana’ fires back: The story of a Danish discourse of inclusive rurality in the making

The popularity of a particular term – the Rotten Banana – has paralleled the one-sided centralisation of public services since the Danish Municipal Reform of 2007. The Rotten Banana denotes peripheral Denmark, which takes a geographically curved form that resembles a banana, and it symbolises the belief that rural areas are backward and (too) costly. This article shows how the negative connotations of rural areas have come to outweigh the positive ones and to legitimise liberal visions of the ‘sustainable’ welfare state. Whereas previous studies on the perceptions of rural dwellers have focused on the discourses of rurality that produce rural outsiders, this article builds on the work of de Certeau and of Laclau and Mouffe. Based on both quantitative and qualitative data, the study shows how, in Denmark, negative connotations and centralisation have together spurred a new and political mobilisation in many parts of the ‘banana’. Through skilful ‘consumption’, rural dwellers have adapted the alienating liberalist ‘logic of equivalence’ to their own use and produced a ‘logic of difference’, thus challenging the predominant political discourse of rurality. As a result, the Danish Liberal government was forced to introduce a new and more inclusive rural policy in September of 2010 and grant rural dwellers a political voice in parliament.     

Country backwater to virtual village? Rural studies and ‘the cultural turn’

In recent years, there has been something of a resurgence in rural studies, which has become somewhat more mainstream than previously in the academic space of social science. Increasing numbers of people have taken on important dualistic questions of society/space, nature/culture structure/agency and self/other from the perspective of rural studies. However, it is the ‘cultural turn’ in wider social science which has lent both respectability and excitement to the nexus with rurality, particularly with new foci on landscape, otherness and the spatiality of nature. With a conceptual fascination with difference, and a methodological fascination with ethnography, cultural studies have provided a significant palimpsestual overlay onto existing landscapes of knowledge. This paper seeks to convey some of the excitements and challenges which have been generated by this resurgence. Cultural studies of the rural have emphasized important new perspectives on real and hyperreal countrysides, but have also served to re-emphasize existing unresolved issues about politics, ethics and morality in rural research.     

The village in the mind: Applying Q-methodology to re-constructing constructions of rurality

In recent years rural studies have focused on the analysis of different notions of ‘the rural’ and how they are constructed in expert discourses as well as in everyday life. Dealing empirically with such patterns of meaning, poses special challenges to social science. In this article I want to explore Q-methodology that approaches subjectivity in a particular way. Instead of beginning with the individual – as it is done in case study approaches – or with socio-demographic categories – as surveys usually do – Q-methodology attempts to put the focus of inquiry on the content of subjectivity itself, i.e. the integral views and their internal frame of reference. Q-methodology can be conceived as a hybrid of qualitative and quantitative methodology since it combines mathematical procedures like factor analysis with a genuine constructivist and interpretative approach to ‘reality’. An example of a study in which Q-methodology was applied is presented. The aim of this analysis was to explore the different views of village development and community life that existed in a municipality of the exurban hinterland of Hamburg. As a result of this study three distinct perceptions of rurality are identified: an idyllic, a reform-oriented and an anti-conservationist view. Based on a structured comparison of these three views it is shown how Q-methodology can contribute new perspectives and insights to the debate about social representations of rurality.     

Rurality discourses and the role of the social enterprise in regenerating rural Scotland

Social enterprises are businesses with primarily social objectives that reinvest their surplus in the community rather than seeking to maximise profit for shareholders. However, there is a debate regarding the drivers and the role of the social enterprise, the outcome of which is expected to have serious implications for the future of the institution [Brady, C., 2003. Social Enterprise development and the Role of the Social Economy in Scotland. CBS Network, Edinburgh]. A ‘reformist’ view supports the position that social enterprises are simple extensions of existing economic systems, whereas a ‘radical’ stance sees them as the embodiment of an alternative vision of running local economies. Development Trusts (DTs) are social enterprises that focus on community regeneration. Our research explored DT stakeholder views regarding the role of DTs in regenerating rural Scotland. Using Q methodology [Barry, J., Proops, J., 1999. Seeking sustainability discourses with Q methodology. Ecological Economics, 28, 337–345], we drew on ‘rurality’ discourses [Frouws, J., 1998. The contested redefinition of the countryside. An analysis of rural discourses in The Netherlands. Sociologia Ruralis 38(1), 54–68] expressed by DT stakeholders in order to investigate how these discourses informed their views. Radical positions were mostly associated with a hedonist rurality discourse and were split into three sub-discourses, whereas reformist positions mostly reflected a utilitarian rurality discourse. There was consensus between discourses in rejecting a primary DT contribution to rural regeneration by substituting state and local authority functions in rural Scotland. Results suggest that stakeholders prefer that DTs develop their own agendas and activity rather than try to substitute unsuccessful state or local authority provision of rural services. Social enterprise strategies and support policies promoting a service-providing role for DTs in rural Scotland should consider this issue if they are to avoid stakeholder objection and contribute to the success of DTs in becoming active vehicles of rural regeneration.     

Putting together ruralities: towards a symbolic analysis of rurality in the British mass media

In recent years rural geography has become increasingly sensitised to the significance of rurality as a cultural construct. This paper examines the production and reception of mediated representations of rurality: that is, it focuses on senses of the rural conveyed by mass media such as television. The paper discusses claims that images of rurality can be understood as socio-spatialisations. It then focuses on the rurality of British rural drama programmes, and particularly on three such drama series: Dangerfield, Heartbeat and Peak Practice. Drawing together a textual analysis of these programmes with research on their production and consumption, we explore the rurality produced through these television dramas, paying particular attention to the presence, and absence, of idyllic notions of the countryside. We suggest that while these programmes do enact idyllic constructions of rurality, their rurality is not simply reducible to this. We will also highlight how these programmes may also enact particular social identities, including, but not exclusively, those of class. We argue in particular that the three drama series can be read as conveying, in a range of ways, senses of middle-classness. The overall argument of this paper is hence that the mediated ruralities of British rural drama programmes are enactments of social and spatial imaginaries, the complexity and effect of which are often ignored in their textual reduction to a middle class idyll.     

Relational rurals: Some thoughts on relating things and theory in rural studies

This paper considers how shifts within the social sciences towards conceptualising spatiality in relational terms have unfolded in rural studies in particular ways over the past decade or so. A period in which networks, connections, flows and mobility have all established themselves as compelling conceptual frames for research, the rural has increasingly been recast in relational terms as a multi-authored and multi-faceted space, constituted through local-global interconnections and their place specific, sometimes contested, manifestations. In this way, the multiple meanings of the rural continues to be a focus of critical concern, as are the implications ‘of’ and ‘in’ rural spaces for some of the major issues currently being faced by governments and citizens around the world; including climate change and food security. Apprehending the complexity of the rural in these terms, we argue, requires not only thinking space relationally, but at the same time being epistemologically relational or theoretically pluralist. That is, recognising the co-constituent production of rural space through material and discursive phenomenon, processes and practices, and thus the value of existing theoretical resources (social constructionism, political and economic materialism) in relation with the critical and rigorous appraisal of ‘new’ concepts and ideas to better comprehend rural space in its multidimensional complexity and particularity. To this end, we identify Cindi Katz's notion of ‘countertopography’ as a promising conceptual and methodological addition to the rural scholar's toolkit insofar as it attends to a politics of location and differentation in relation to global processes. We conclude our discussion by sketching out possible objects of countertopographical analysis for understanding ongoing processes of change in rural space(s).     

Discourses on rurality in post-socialist news media: The case of Lithuania's leading daily “Lietuvos Rytas” (1991–2004)

The Soviet regime defined rurality as a collective-farm or kolkhoz-based society. Since the late 1980s such a state-imposed definition of rurality was rapidly unraveling under the tensions and conflicts produced by perestroika and post-socialist reforms. In the new politics of the rural, the role that the news media was playing in shaping public opinion on rural matters was of growing importance. The paper analyzes 3827 articles on rural issues published during the post-independence period (1991–2004) in the leading Lithuanian daily “Lietuvos Rytas” (LR). Two types of discourses in rural coverage are discerned. During the 1990s rural coverage in LR was reflective of conflicts and tensions between relatively prosperous urban classes which benefited from post-socialist reforms and pauperized rural population. Rurality was increasingly associated with the failure of “the moral modernization” of the rural population. Rural population was stigmatized as deficient in values and character, remaining in the grips of the Soviet mentality and state dependency and, therefore, unable to take advantage of opportunities created by the reforms. Since the early 2000s when economic situation in the country improved significantly and Lithuania started negotiations on European Union membership, rurality in LR coverage was gradually re-defined in EU terms as a socio-spacial entity shaped by regional, national, and local policies promoting multifunctionality of rural areas, well-being of rural communities, and active citizenship. Factors that influenced changes in rural discourses are analyzed. Impacts of changing discourses on rural identities, rural politics and policies are discussed.     

Language as an issue in international internal communication: English or local language? If English,what English?

The present paper discusses internal communication in the global context, with a focus on language as an issue for the organization. Although ‘language’, naturally, is a resource that enables any – internal or other – communication, it has not been examined in public relations research but has been taken for granted or as given. The current pace of globalization in all sectors has rapidly globalized internal communication and the language issue needs to be addressed. On the basis of two empirical studies we discuss language strategy and language use in international internal communication. Our findings show that although a common ‘corporate language’ – which mostly today refers to English – enables internal communication, it is not a straightforward solution but a number of issues need to be considered. For example, as international communication in a business context is today mostly conducted by non-native speakers of English, their language can be characterized as BELF (English as Business Lingua Franca), which differs from ‘standard English’ in many ways. Also, language issues need to be considered for organizational credibility and knowledge sharing and for constructing trust and rapport in international interaction.     

Power in the production of spaces transformed by rural tourism

The article critiques Halfacree's conceptualisation of rural space for masking the workings of power within ‘black boxes’ such as structural coherence and trial by space. One consequence is that rural change's social activities and also their social and personal consequences are cloaked, thereby rendering the localised fault lines of rurality analytically out of reach. Halfacree's conceptualisation is developed further by attaching a conceptual extension comprising three hubs: an immaterial hub, a material hub, and a personal hub. This is done as an attempt to give Halfacree's tool for deconstructing the social production of rural space analytical sensitivity to the actors engaged in the processes implied by social production. In order to demonstrate the analytical potential of the extended Halfacree approach, the conceptual model is applied to a case study: data from two communities undergoing rapid change, as they shifted from being dominated by primary industry to becoming tourism destinations.     

Trial by space for a ‘radical rural’: Introducing alternative localities,representations and lives

This paper is concerned with bringing together and drawing out some diverse strands of thought and action that are striving—from within a broadly green anti-capitalist agenda—to produce a rural space that is different from and a challenge to the mainstream trajectories that the production of the rural is taking in the global North. First, I outline the main elements of a new model for thinking about rural space in general that tries to incorporate three different facets of ‘space’ that have been teased out through geographical scholarship. This draws inspiration from work by Henri Lefebvre. After demonstrating this model in respect of the post-1945 productivist rural, I introduce it to debates about the emerging contours of the post-productivist countryside. Drawing predominantly on British examples, the second half of the paper develops one element within the heterogeneous potentiality of this post-productivism to consider some key aspects of what I term an example of ‘radical’ rural spatiality. This examines its perceived localities, conceived formal representations and partially lived everyday lives. The final main section gives brief consideration to opportunities now being presented to this radical rurality but also notes the considerable challenges that lie ahead.     

Gender,class and rurality: Australian case studies

The interrelationship between gender and class in rural spaces has received little attention. While rural scholars have focused on the implications for class from processes of gentrification and agricultural and rural restructuring, these analyses have remained largely ungendered. Similarly, feminist rural studies have rarely explored subjectivity as gendered and classed. This paper contributes to rural theories of class and gender by drawing on the work of contemporary feminist class theorists to explore class as gendered and inscribed through personal memory, community narrative and through everyday values and interactions associated with work, leisure and family. To explore intersections of gender, class and rurality, the article draws on data from interviews from two separate Australian studies of farming families. Narratives highlighted the ambiguity of class, the gendered and classed nature of voluntary organisations in rural spaces, and moral values and signifiers associated with what it is to be a ‘good’ farmer and a ‘good’ community member. The data indicate how values of moral worth are gendered and classed and inscribed on farming women and men. This qualitative examination of gender and class in rural spaces draws attention to class as being more than a ranking on an occupational scale, property ownership or degrees of engagement in consumption. Rather, it reveals class as emotionally inscribed in ways that are gendered, economic and moral, and represented through symbolic signifiers and cultural narratives.     

Cultural archaeology and historical geographies of the black presence in rural England

This paper focuses on the exclusion of black peoples from the English countryside. It particularly considers how white imaginaries of the English rural have ignored historical geographies of the black presence. Firstly the paper reflects upon the heritage of Englishness as represented in and through the rural tradition. It then presents some cultural excavations of black history undertaken by academics, community scholars and local history groups and asks how the histories they reveal challenge ideas of rural histories of England. The paper then considers how historical geographies of anti-racism may complement these new takes on rural heritage and provide a counter narrative to ’traditional’ English rurality.     

Characterising rural businesses – Tales from the paperman

A case study of a self-termed ‘rural business’ is used to deconstruct the concept of a rural business and shed light on specific features of ‘operating in a rural area’ and ‘serving a rural population’. Alongside ‘selling a rural product’, the paper claims that these make up three parameters for categorising rural businesses. Highlighting these unique or niche features of a rural business makes is possible to recognise values that extend beyond financial measures. As such, this research provides a mechanism to support rural policy aimed at delivering both economic and community development objectives.     

Developing integrated rural tourism: Actor practices in the English/Welsh border

This paper examines community attitudes and distinctive practices that shape local responses to integrated rural tourism (IRT) development in the lagging rural region of the English/Welsh border area. The focus is on how actors acquire attributes as a result of their relations with others and how these assumed identities are performed in, by and through these relations. The location of this lagging rural region is particularly interesting as it is divided by a national boundary which not only impacts on administrative, planning and tourism marketing structures, but also contributes to the construction of fluid place identities (Murdoch and Pratt, 1997 describe ‘fluid space’ as having ‘no fixed points of reference, no privileged points of view, simply a swirling, viscous, partially stable, partially enclosed movement of social entities’ (p. 64) that may be described as Welsh, English, or a mixture of both. In order to reflect the variety of opinions and concerns in the region, responses were drawn from different actor-groups: local businesses, resource controllers, gatekeepers, institutions, community members and visitors. Results indicate that, while most were in favour of a greater integration of tourism with actors' aspirations, local resources and activities, there was an element of longing for a deux ex machina to put in place real change in the region.     

A play for rurality – Modernization versus local autonomy

It is common to understand the governing of rural space as the outcome of a conflict between some romantic protectors of a lost past on the one hand, and the people who worry about creating economic values on the other. However, the power to shape the rural should not only be searched for in the open struggle between protectors and developers, but also should be analysed at the level of discourse, in the play between discourses about how to deal with the rural. In this paper I therefore present a modernist discourse and demonstrate how taken-for-granted truths about the rural – its history, its present and its future – are made possible by this discourse. Secondly, I will reveal how rurality takes on a different meaning in an alternative to the modernist discourse, emphasizing local and regional autonomy. In demonstrating that rurality is contingent upon a play between these two discourses, I want to provide some new insights into an important force behind the persistence of ideas about rurality in Norway.     

Ageing in the bush: The role of rural places in maintaining identity for long term rural residents and retirement migrants in north-east Victoria,Australia

As a consequence of local population ageing, which is more pronounced in rural areas, the issue of maintaining a positive quality of life for rural older people is attracting significant attention. While environmental psychology theory has advocated the role of place identity in defining the self, there has been little applied research exploring how this occurs in later life. This exploratory, qualitative study (n = 16) utilises 6 and 7 identity process theory to investigate how rural older Australians (retirement migrants and long-term residents) use place to sustain and build a sense of self at a time when many are susceptible to age-related loss. The paper draws on the concepts of distinctiveness, continuity, self-esteem and self-efficacy in order to explore how place identity is supported and maintained. Findings suggest that rural places are beneficial in terms of identity maintenance, with differences between long term and more recent rural residents. Furthermore, findings also highlight that place-related change or growth can potentially threaten older people’s identification as a ‘rural’ person.     

‘Country life’? Rurality,folk music and ‘Show of Hands’

This paper examines the contribution of folk music to understanding the dynamic, fluid and multi-experiential nature of the countryside. Drawing from literature on the geographies of music, it examines the work of ‘Show of Hands’, a contemporary folk band from Devon in England. Three areas are studied. First, the paper examines the musical style of Show of Hands in order to explore how hybridised, yet distinctive, styles of music emerge in particular places. Second, it demonstrates how Show of Hands’ hybrid musical style has become closely associated with the Southwest of England. Finally, within these spatial and hybrid contexts, attention is given to the ways in which their music represents the ‘everyday lives of the rural’. Taken together these themes assess the relevance of music in the understanding of rurality as hybrid space.