Oral histories, farm practice and uncovering meaning in the countryside

Abstract

Building on recent analyses of 'heterogenous agri-cultures' this paper considers the potential of an oral history approach to explore the geographies of farming cultures andThe work of George Ewart Evans, from which this extract is taken, is considered amongst the pioneering work of oral history in Britain (Howkins 1994). Evans's work attempted to 1 interpret and record changing customs and working habits as well as changing dialects and language in Rural Britain. Paramount in much of this work was the desire to record information about changes to farming practices and how these were linked to shifting social patterns and transformation in the countryside (see for example Evans 1965;Evans 1975;Evans & Gentleman 1993). Written against the wider academic background of scientific certainty and deepening faith in methods of quantification and social modell ing in this period, the extract suggests that little value was seen by 'scientists' in collecting oral accounts of this change. Although one may question Evans's faith in collecting merely for the sake of 'preservation' and the apparent sense of nostalgia and regret as the basic motivation for oral history collectors, one can also trace a strong sense of purpose through

Reflexiones Metodológicas Sobre El Uso De Las Historias De Vida en La Investigación Del Cambio Urbano

“…171-172;Riley y Harvey, 2007). En primer lugar, la relación del enfoque investigativo con las ciencias sociales.…”

Protection privée de la biodiversité et fiscalisation du marché de la wilderness : une histoire de la conservation volontaire au Québec (1980-2014)

“…Nous avons construit notre échantillon avec des membres fondateurs des premières fiducies foncières dans les années 1980, des membres de bureaux actuels d'OBNL de conservation volontaire, des agents gouvernementaux actifs lors de l'élaboration des premiers programmes de soutien dans les années 1990, et des donateurs de terres ou de servitudes. Nous avons ainsi procédé à 27 entretiens, que nous avons traités selon une approche thématique en extrayant tous les passages de ces histoires orales qui nourrissent la périodisation de notre analyse historique (Paillé, 1996;Riley et Harvey, 2007).…”

The knowledge cultures of changing farming practices in a water town of the Southern Yangtze Valley, China

“…Oral histories involve the collection and analysis of historical information that cannot be found in written sources (Richie 2003(Richie , 2012, and are well suited to a study of the lives and times of 'ordinary' farmers who have lived in what has been predominantly an oral tradition (King 1911;Fei 1939). Following the work of Denzin (1989), Riley (2010), Setten (2004Setten ( , 2005 and Riley and Harvey (2007), we have concentrated on collecting topical life histories 'from the ground,' with the topic being the changing agricultural practices that the farmers have experienced over their life courses.…”