Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
have been re-imagined to fit within new modes of accumulation in rural places. As
well as allowing some consideration of structural change in the countryside, this
discussion starts to consider how value and identity are placed on particular breeds
of livestock in different localities. By adopting this approach, it is possible to see how
different livestock and their roles are culturally constructed to fit into different
human spaces. This fundamental goal of animal geography has not previously been
attempted in the rural field.
Market(ing) places
Some commentators have suggested that the countryside is changing from being a
place of production to a place of consumption and, as part of this process, many
areas have been commodified to attract new forms of capital (Cloke and Goodwin
1992). Central to this process has been the use of rural heritage to sell places and
products associated with an idealised rural lifestyle (Bunce 1994; Thrift 1989). Just
as features of the industrial past have been commodified in order to re-image post-
industrial cities (Hall 1995), so too has there been a re-imagination of livestock in
the post-productive countryside.
An obvious example of this is in the growth of farm parks which seek to create
hyper-real versions of agricultural heritage to attract the paying public. Of those
farmers who had on-farm tourist activities in the sur vey, 94 per cent kept rare
breeds as part of their venture because they were
'local breeds', 'part of the region's
agricultural
history',
'relevant to the area'
and
'for history and heritage'
. By way of
example, the survey identified a part-time farm manager in Buckinghamshire who
ran an 18 hectare open-air museum and who kept Berkshire Pigs, Shorthorn Cattle
and two local breeds of poultry because of their
'local, historical relevance'
. Another
full-time farmer in Oxfordshire kept Oxford Down Sheep, Cotswold Sheep,
Berkshire Pigs and Gloucester Old Spot Pigs because they allowed him to re-create
'a local Victorian
farm'
. Such breeds remain popular in their places of origin as they
can be used to construct versions of local history for wider consumption.