Crossing divides: Ethnicity and rurality

Abstract

This paper draws on research with people from African, Caribbean and Asian backgrounds regarding perceptions and use of the English countryside. I explore the complex ways in which the category 'rural' was constructed as both essentialised and relational: how the countryside was understood most definitely as 'not-city' but also, at the same time, the English countryside was conceived as part of a range of networks: one site in a web of 'nature places' across the country, as well as one rural in an international chain of rurals -specifically via embodied and emotional connections with 'nature'. I argue that alongside sensed/sensual embodiment (the non-representational intuitive work of the body), we need also to consider reflective embodiment as a desire to space/place in order to address the structural socio-spatial exclusions endemic in (rural) England and how they are challenged. I suggest that a more progressive conceptualisation of rurality -a 'transrural' open to issues of mobility and desire -can help us disrupt dominant notions of rural England as only an exclusionary white space, and reposition it as a site within multicultural, multiethnic, transnational and mobile social I explored issues regarding ethnicity, rurality and national belonging in contemporary England, and was tasked with writing a policy report alongside the thesis 2 . As I read the academic work around my research, I increasingly became aware of a dichotomy. There was a rich body of literature around ethnic identity, diversity, hybridity, multiculturalism, cosmopolitanism, etc., including critical perspectives problematising these concepts and how they play out in society, but always and only embedded in the urban sphere (eg. Alexander, 2000;Amin, 2002; Back and Solomos, 2003;Brah,et al. 1999;Hesse, 2000;Mirza, 1997;Parekh, 2000a;2000b). At the same time, especially within geography, there was interest in the ways in which rurality/rural space is implicated within national identity construction, notions of belonging and spatial practices 3 . In the English context, the national imagery of rural space appeared to exclude ethnic minorities, among other groups, from accessing the countryside, both physically and emotionally (Cloke & Little, 1997;Milbourne, 1997). The connection between the rural as the 'genuine' England and not multicultural was highlighted in the Henderson and Kaur, 1999;Kinsman, 1995;Malik, 1992). However, there had been a lack of empirical work at that time to examine these issues further: ethnic minorities were perhaps too easily theorised and written as excluded 'rural others'. Indeed, Little (1999:438) voiced concern regarding the use of the term 'rural others' in general, "the lack of theoretical discussion around 'the other' and 'the same'", the paucity of recognition of the power relations complicit in such a categorisation, and the "static treatment of both individual and group identity".

Nature-based integration

“…Askins 2009;Figari et al 2009;Buijs et al 2009;Peters 2010;Kloek 2013). In particular, when it comes to immigrants of Asian or African origins, cultural (and religious) imaginations and definitions of nature and culturally established ways of engaging with green spaces and nature can differ significantly from the dominant or hegemonic equivalents among the native population (Byrne 2011;Kloek et al 2013;Wolch et al 2014).…”

Exploring normative whiteness: ensuring inclusive pedagogic practice in undergraduate fieldwork teaching and learning

“…In this way, non-White identities are disregarded from rurality, both metaphorically but also in reality as Black and ethnic minority populations fail to identify or engage with rural parts of the UK. Research which identifies the racialisation of the countryside has linked it with the absence of ethnic minorities in rural areas and has been instructive in opening up debates about racism in the countryside (Askins, 2009). Chakraborti and Garland (2004) have assessed the nature and extent of racist harassment in rural and isolated areas of Britain and furthermore has gauged the attitudes of white rural residents towards those who are perceived to be 'outsiders'.…”

Reading Angharad Closs Stephens's The Persistence of Nationalism. From imagined communities to urban encounters

“…Similarly, relatively writings on rurality offer a nuanced account of the contemporary countryside as a place of change and connection to urban environments (e.g. Askins, 2009) or as a place of conviviality that is resonant with how urban conviviality has been theorised (Neal and Walters 2008), consequently forcing us to revisit what distinguishes the urban from non-urban spaces. This is not to romanticise diasporas as terrains of belonging is if they do not at times draw on nationalist imaginaries, nor is it to ignore how 'the rural' figures in nationalist imaginaries.…”