Advanced Rural Sociology: Alternatives in food provisioning and place making

The course aims to provide a theoretical, empirical, and methodological understanding of agricultural-, food-, and place-making practices in urbanizing societies, where alternatives are rapidly emerging in response to ongoing climate, political, and humanitarian emergencies. The course offers students a conceptual toolbox, rooted in relational thinking, with which to design their own future research and make sense of the complex ways that people are transforming their communities, food systems, and everyday practices through collective action. We define collective action not only as initiatives in which people together try to achieve a common objective (e.g. through farmers’ organizations, community-supported agricultural initiatives, or neighborhood organizations), but more generally that the doings of every individual take place within a network of relations.

Students engaged in this course will familiarize themselves with theoretical and methodological frameworks associated with critical agri-food studies and place-making practices. Overall, our approach emphasizes the interconnectedness and interdependence of social and spatial phenomena. Through the presentation and discussion of recent and ongoing research, the course will showcase a diverse array of real-world cases and examples from across the globe. It is within this context that we introduce concepts such as "agricultural and food citizenship" and "diverse economies," emphasizing the relational context of initiatives and actions. Ultimately, this course aids students in navigating methodological challenges in research.

This course is developed for students interested in the various approaches people employ to make agricultural-, food-, and place-making practices fairer and more just. It will help them develop an analytical framework and methodological approach for their thesis research. Through tutorials and group assignments, students will acquire necessary research skills. Employing a hands-on approach, students will collaborate in small groups to develop a research proposal, synthesize concepts, and formulate a methodology for conducting sociological research. Upon successful completion of the course, students will be able to critically analyze our contemporary agricultural-, food- and place making practices and be able to study and give meaning to the diverse actions that aim to develop more fair, just and sustainable worlds.

After successful completion of this course students are expected to be able to:

• Understand sociological, anthropological and geographical debates about food provisioning and place-based development processes and their changing social and political context
• Analyse the multi-actor, multi-level and multi-aspect dynamics of food provisioning and place-based development
• Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of different theoretical concepts and perspectives used to analyse the complexity and dynamics of food provisioning and place-based development
• Operationalize theoretical concepts and perspectives by applying them in the design of research
• Identify appropriate methods for conducting socio-spatial research on food and place
• Reflect upon their role as a social scientist
• Draft a research proposal on one of the topics of or related to the course

Assumed Knowledge:
Two of the following courses: CPT28806 Introduction to Communication and Technology in Rural Innovation and Development; ENP31806 Globalization and Sustainability of Food Production and Consumption; RSO30806 The Sociology of Farming and Rural Life; RSO34306 Theorizing Development: Implications for Research; RSO34806 Social Transformations towards Sustainable Food Systems; SDC21804 Introduction to the Sociology of Development, Knowledge and Change M; SDC32806 Sociology in Development: Towards a Critical Perspective.