'A fist is stronger than five fingers': caste and dominance in rural north India

This paper explores the spatiality of caste and power in contemporary rural north India. I aim to introduce the social institution of caste to a non-specialist audience and illustrate how caste is changing. The paper draws upon Pierre Bourdieu's notions of social capital and habitus and the India-based research ofSrinivas (1955) andMendelsohn (1993). I argue that while caste as a religiously sanctioned system of resource transfer is in decline, caste organization and identity are important forms of social or symbolic capital for rural elites. Drawing on detailed empirical research in western Uttar Pradesh, I demonstrate the continuing importance of caste dominance in the reproduction of social inequality and relate caste to other axes of power.     

外国乡村旅游发展经验及对中国的借鉴

乡村旅游是我国新时期旅游产业发展和社会主义新农村建设的重要组成部分。本文首先系统的介绍了欧美乡村旅游的发展和主要成功经验,包括正确的定位,合理的形式选择,政府和社区的协调参与以及法律法规和专门的管理机构。在这一基础上,结合我国乡村旅游发展的现状和可持续发展的概念,提出了外国乡村旅游发展在几个方面对我国乡村旅游发展的借鉴。     

浙江农民的流动交易方式与其经济现代化——以浙江省义乌市后乐村为个案

通常的现代化命题对中国农村现代化的定位是外生现代化类型,因此外来模式和制度的引进、外部资金和技术的输入是至关重要的。但是后乐村的经济发展实践却展示了另外一种图景:后乐村的经济现代化是在流动交易的不断转换中实现的,流动的交易方式与后乐村的经济现代化之间存在紧密的逻辑关系。这种关系表明,流动的交易方式是一种现代化的内生因素,后乐村的经济发展是流动的交易方式作为一种特殊的文化资本进行双重再生产的结果。     

The non-graded elementary school

The history of education in a number of industrialized countries during the first part of the 20th century testifies to the political will behind school centralization and the closure of small and non-graded rural elementary schools. A closer examination shows that school centralization throughout these countries can be associated with the development of a more unified educational system and that a unified school system is in turn seen as a political tool for the advancement of social welfare. In particular, this article discusses the development of the Norwegian non-graded elementary school. It examines the nature and the effects of the applied policies, and analyses the rationales – both political and educational – behind political decisions on education. The overall conclusions can be linked to and complement international research in this area.     

Left-behind and Vulnerable? Conceptualising Development and Older Women’s Agency in Rural China

Abstract:

Concern has been growing recently in China about the well-being of children, women and the elderly “left behind” on the farm when family members leave the village in search of waged work. Increasingly, the left-behind are portrayed in academic and policy discourse as a “vulnerable group” of passive dependants, sidelined by modernisation and abandoned by their families. This paper challenges this discourse, arguing that while attention to the well-being of the left-behind is vital, there is an urgent need for a shift in focus from their vulnerability to their agency. The paper focuses on the agency of left-behind women between the ages of 50 and 80. It aims, first of all, to point the way toward an empirically richer understanding of the social construction of older women’s agency and well-being. The second aim of the paper is to suggest how different conceptualisations of “agency” and “older women” might contribute to more ethical and politically effective strategies for development and the improvement of women’s well-being. To further these two aims, the paper draws on fieldwork conducted in rural Ningxia, north-western China, and on critiques of the “capability approach” to development expounded by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum.     

Demographic Change,Differential Ageing,and Public Policy in Rural and Regional Australia: A Three‐State Case Study

This paper takes a differential demographic change in six rural settlement categories within rural and regional Australia as the starting point for the measurement of differential ageing using a Relative Ageing Index which compares ageing in sub‐populations with the national norm. The spatial units employed are 412 rural communities, approximated by social catchments each consisting of a country town and its surrounding dispersed population. The study covers the period from 1981 to 2006 and includes the rural areas of New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia, excluding major cities, peri‐urban areas, and the remote rangelands. It examines demographic change and differential ageing in a selection of the rural settlement categories recommended for further analysis in the report of the ‘Demographic Change and Liveability Panel’, one of three advisory panels established in 2010 by the then Commonwealth Government seeking to develop a sustainable population strategy for Australia. Ageing profiles are produced for the whole study area, for the individual rural settlement categories, and for the urban and rural components within each category separately. Results show that differential ageing is least advanced in the ‘regional cities’, most advanced in the ‘sea change’, but of most concern in the agriculture‐based rural settlement categories where it exacerbates the effects of overall population decline. In all categories, ageing in the dispersed rural population element exceeded that of the urban component. Results emphasise the vital role of the ‘regional cities’ category in future public policy development supported by ameliorative and collaborative measures for their surrounding agriculture‐based communities.     

散村的形成及其演变——以江汉平原腹地的乡村聚落形态及其演变为中心

传统时代江汉平原腹地的乡村聚落,主要选择地势稍高的自然墩台、长冈或建造人工墩台,以躲避洪水的侵袭;很多台墩依堤而建或与堤相联,但台墩之间并不相连,从而形成以散居为主导的乡村聚落形态。江汉平原腹地以散居为主导的乡村聚落形态之形成,有其根深蒂固的地理基础与社会经济根源。环境与资源条件的限制、传统的经济生活方式,乃是散村形成并长期延续下来的根本原因。     

Recovering the past from above Hibabiya — an Early Islamic village in the Jordanian desert?

Britain and the Middle East were the two areas in which the technique of aerial archaeology was pioneered in the 1920s. Overwhelmingly the latter took place in Syria where a French Jesuit priest, Antoine Poidebard, worked for a generation. Further south in Transjordan — as it then was — three men presided over a brief (1927–1929) but fruitful period: an archaeologist with a passion for the newly developing technique (O.G.S. Crawford) and two pilots of the Royal Air Force with an amateur interest in what they saw beneath their wings (Flt. Lt. P.E. Maitland and Gp/Capt L.W.B. Rees). An aerial photograph published at the time seemed to identify a ‘village’ as prehistoric. Over eighty years later and just after it was destroyed, a fresh examination and the rediscovery of some crucial dating evidence have combined to identify it as, probably, an early Islamic village on the desert fringe.