Aims
Until now, there has never been an international forum dedicated to the study of rural history in all its forms. The British Agricultural History Society is aware of the diversity of work being undertaken in the field, sometimes in cognate disciplines such as gender or development studies or under the banner of rural sociology or environmental history, perhaps institutionally separated from the historical mainstream by being undertaken in social science faculties, agricultural colleges or NGOs. It is also keenly aware that the current difficulties in the world’s agrarian economies – with the development of new markets, the sudden appearance of high prices, the spread of innovative and controversial technologies, the impact of land reform and the threat of long-term climate change – may well draw renewed attention to the discipline. Within Europe, it now seems possible that the post-productivist countryside may be no more than an interlude rather than the final stage in rural development. Perspectives and priorities change: there is much to be done.
Whilst we acknowledge the pioneering work of the European networks – CORN for the Rural History of the North sea area, the COST-funded project Progressore for the European Union, the Rural History Network embedded within the European Social Science History Conference, and the Arbeitskreis für Agrargeschichte – all of which have developed European connections, the BAHS now wishes to develop, deepen and internationalise these contacts. We have therefore taken the initiative to convene the first international open meeting dedicated solely to rural history.
The conference has no intellectual affiliation and believes that rural history has no single definition and no boundaries. It is open to those approaching rural history from any perspective, ranging from those of archaeology, anthropology and ethnography, through rural geography, landscape studies and rural sociology, to post-modern cultural approaches to the countryside. It is concerned with the countryside as a place of food production and equally as a site of leisure activities and the location of heritage and national memory.
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