Gendered Ruralities

Abstract

Space plays an important role in construction of space‐specific variations in the condition for women and men. This article presents a way to analyze the way these spatial conditions affect gender relations and practices in rural areas and how, and in what ways, they are reproduced and transformed by using the concept of local gender contract, understood as the unwritten rules that regulate relations between sexes and recreate and reform relations into everyday actions within the framework of the local structures in which they are performed. In rural areas these rules constitute a cornerstone in the construction of gendered rurality.

Contextualizing Entrepreneurship and Gender: A Life-Story Approach to Rural Family Businesses in Sweden

“…The second photo shows the wind turbine installed by the same farmer to produce renewable energy (Morris & Bowen, 2020) for the farm, the village, and a few neighbouring firms. I chose Småland as the place to conduct my study because it has a wellestablished history of entrepreneurial culture and is thus an intriguing context (Johannisson & Wigren, 2006) in which to investigate gender and entrepreneurial processes (Forsberg, 2019). On the one hand, 61% of Sweden's enterprises active in innovation and promoting entrepreneurship at the national level (Statistics Sweden, 2020) are located in Småland, compared to 59% located in Stockholm.…”

“…Conversely, in the same period, 8.2% of women returned to rural areas compared to 2.4% of men (Haley, 2018;Lundgren et al, 2020). This trend is influencing rural communities' traditional gender relations 1 (Forsberg, 2019;Kvist, 2020) with women as caregivers and men as the breadwinners, thus challenging the taken-for-granted-assumptions of the successful entrepreneur as an individual male (Roos, 2021). In view of these factors, context is important as it influences entrepreneurship (Welter, 2011) and gender in entrepreneurship (Bock & Shortall, 2006;Bosworth, 2012;Baker & Welter, 2021;Gashi Nulleshi & Kalonaityte, 2023).…”

“…The unit of analysis is women and men entrepreneurs who run family-owned businesses in rural areas of Småland. I focus on the Swedish rural province of Småland, which is known for its entrepreneurial activities and traditional gendered structures (Johannisson & Wigren, 2006;Forsberg, 2019) and thus is a conducive context for examining entrepreneurs' gender relations.…”