Sociology Index

Rural Sociology

Rural Sociology encompasses sociological approaches to rural policy challenges, issues such as community revitalization, rural demographic changes, rural development, environmental impacts, the structure of food and agricultural production, and rural-urban linkages, rural media, rural gender issues, agricultural restructuring, youth and ageing in rural areas. Rural sociology is traditionally associated with the study of social structure and conflict in rural areas, and topical areas such as food, agriculture and natural resource. Rural sociology is also associated with the study of life in small towns and countryside, a scientific study of social arrangements and behaviour amongst peoples that are distanced from points of concentrated activity. Rural sociology involves the examination of statistical data for efficient rural development.

Rural Sociology Abstracts

Rural Sociology Research in the Land Grant Setting - Preston E. La Ferney
ABSTRACT: A brief historical view of rural sociology as a discipline reveals an intense introspection.

Some Observations on Rural Sociology and Its Prospects - R. J. Hildreth
ABSTRACT: Rural sociology developed largely in the land grant-USDA complex. The current status of rural sociology is briefly examined.

 

The Sociology of Agriculture: Toward a New Rural Sociology. Annual Review of Sociology.
Abstract: Rural sociology has recently developed a new research agenda focussing on the sociology of agriculture. This has led to a revitalization of a field of research that had lost its way since the decline of the rural-urban continuum in the 1960s. The crisis that occurred in rural sociology in the 1970s is discussed in relation both to this theoretical vacuum and to the failure to achieve a policy impact. It is argued that the sociology of agriculture offers a potentially successful means of overcoming this crisis, but some of the difficulties in utilizing this approach are also discussed. Observations are made on the institutional setting of rural sociology and on whether it is compatible with the development of a critical sociology of agriculture.

 

Rural Sociology Books

Changing Rural Social Systems: Adaptation and Survival by Nan E. Johnson, Ching-li Wang.

The Sociology of Agriculture by Frederick H. Buttel, Olaf F. Larson, Gilbert W. Gillespie Jr.

Rural Sociology: The Strategy of Change (1957) by Charles P. Loomis, J. Allan Beegle.

SOCIAL SYSTEMS A TEXTBOOK IN RURAL SOCIOLOGY AND ANTHROPOLOGY by CHARLES.

Farmers' and farm workers' movements: social protest in American agriculture. by Mooney, Patrick and Theo J. Majka. 1995.

Rural Sociology Journals

Southern Rural Sociology is the official journal of the Southern Rural Sociological Association. - The SRSA is a section of the Southern Association of Agricultural Scientists, an organization of researchers and Extension staff in 1862 and 1890 land grant colleges and universities in the South. Membership of the Southern Rural Sociological Association is drawn from a range of social science interests and disciplines.

The Journal Rural Sociology Society provides a forum for cutting edge research that explores inter-disciplinary approaches to emerging issues, and policy relevant discussions of rural development, environmental impacts, the structure of food and agricultural production, and rural-urban linkages. In addition to its long-time interest in sociological approaches to rural policy challenges, Rural Sociology also emphasizes a variety of other issues such as community revitalization and rural demographic changes.