Abstract
Internationally, the gender relations of the family farming ‘way of life’ have been shown to be stubbornly persistent in their adherence to patriarchal inheritance practices. This article demonstrates how such ‘agri-cultural’ practices are situated both within the subjective sphere of farming individuals’ and within global agri-economics, bringing new challenges to patrilineal farm survival. It is suggested here that the recent tendency for post-structuralist theorisation in rural studies has underestimated the existence and impact of patrilineal patterns in family farming. Such patterns mean that women are shown to largely occupy relational gender identities as the ‘helper’, whilst men are strongly identified as the ‘farmer’. Drawing on repeated life-history interviews conducted with farming men and women from Powys, Mid Wales, the aim of this article is to generate debate as to the extent to which men can be brought into feminist research practice in order to reveal patriarchy to a greater degree. The article begins by situating the near-exclusion of men from feminist research practice within theoretical developments in feminist geography. This discussion also assists in deriving issues of research methods, positionality and interpretive power which focus the integration of empirical material in the methodological reflections provided in section three. In section two, the rationale for the epistemological stance taken in the research is provided. The article provides an example of the successful integration of men into a feminist research frame, suggests avenues for theoretical development and identifies future research directions which can be informed by ‘doing it with men’.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.