Rural Gentrification

1. Rural Gentrification "Class-dictated population movements" into accessible rural areas through "an in migration of middle-class residents at the expense of the lower classes" (Cloke and Little, 1990, p. 164) "an increase in the proportion of settlement population in socio-economic groups I and II: with a figure of 40.0 percent indicative of a significant degree of gentrification" (Pacione, 1984, p. 175). • Not as simply as this definition might imply • Class is a highly "congested and contested concept" (Phillips, 1998) • Complex range of features identified and debated as being associated with gentrification • Gentrification features may not simply be explained through class

2. Rural gentrification • Introduction • Urban and rural gentrification: differences and similarities • Conceptions of rural gentrification • Rural gentrification as 'movement of capital' • Rural gentrification and 'reproductive labour' • Rural gentrification as 'lifestyle consumption' • Rural gentrification as 'chaotic'/ 'commensurable' concept • Rural gentrification as 'symbolic and lived spaces' • Summary

3. Urban and rural gentrification: differences and similarities • Term coined by Judith Glass "One by one, many of the working-class quarters of London have been invaded by the middle classes .... Shabby modest mews and cottages ... have been taken over ... and become elegant, expensive residences Larger Victorian houses, down graded in an earlier or recent period ... [to] lodging houses or ... multiply occupation - have been upgraded again ... Once this process of 'gentrification' starts in a district it goes on rapidly until all or most of the original working-class occupiers are displaced and the whole character of a district is changed" (Glass, 1964, p. xvii) • Stress on refurbishment and change in the class composition of an area • Rural studies has stressed changing class composition • Some recognition of refurbishment

4. Urban and rural gentrification: differences and similarities • Term coined by Judith Glass "One by one, many of the working-class quarters of London have been invaded by the middle classes .... Shabby modest mews and cottages ... have been taken over ... and become elegant, expensive residences Larger Victorian houses, down graded in an earlier or recent period ... [to] lodging houses or ... multiply occupation - have been upgraded again ... Once this process of 'gentrification' starts in a district it goes on rapidly until all or most of the original working-class occupiers are displaced and the whole character of a district is changed" (Glass, 1964, p. xvii)

5. Urban and rural gentrification: differences and similarities • Term coined by Judith Glass "One by one, many of the working-class quarters of London have been invaded by the middle classes .... Shabby modest mews and cottages ... have been taken over ... and become elegant, expensive residences Larger Victorian houses, down graded in an earlier or recent period ... [to] lodging houses or ... multiply occupation - have been upgraded again ... Once this process of 'gentrification' starts in a district it goes on rapidly until all or most of the original working-class occupiers are displaced and the whole character of a district is changed" (Glass, 1964, p. xvii) • Glass recognised parallels with emergence of rural gentry in 17th

6. Urban and rural gentrification: differences and similarities • Understanding of gentrification in rural studies much more diverse than in rural studies • Phillips (1993) - 4 other concepts of urban gentrification i) as a movement of capital not people ii) as a strategy to reduce reproductive labour iii) as buying particular life styles iv) as a 'chaotic concept' involving contradictory and complex jumble of contextually specific processes • Argues that rural parallels exist for all these • Phillips (2002, 2004) suggest that urban studies also highlight social and symbolic spaces of gentrification, and that there are rural parallels

7. Rural gentrification as movement of capital • Smith (1979) - gentrification a 'back to the city movement of capital not people' • Gentrification not just changing social composition but also "a physical change in the housing stock" (Smith, 1987, p. 463) • Change required investment of 'productive capital' • Gentrifiers were 'occupier developers' • Range of property development agencies • Motive of gentrification was 'profit' • Achieved through investing in areas where the was a 'rent gap'

8. Rural gentrification as movement of capital "The re-valuation of rural property is not restricted to barns, but may include a whole range of other agricultural properties … as well as a series of other rural properties, such as schools, railway stations and churches" (Phillips, 2002, p. 298) "Many of these rural properties, and also many areas of rural land, have become valorized for retail and leisure facilities to serve both resident and also visiting middle class people …. And hence one might talk of rural consumption-biased complexes as well as urban ones" (Phillips, 2002; see also Phillips 2004a, 2004b)

9. Rural gentrification and 'reproductive labour' • Urban studies have argued that 'reproductive labour' (domestic work) may be important in gentrification "Gentrification in large part corresponds to the two income (or more) professional household that requires both a relatively central urban location to minimize journey-to-work costs of several wage earners and a location that enhances efficiency in household production (stores are nearer) and in the substitution of market produced commodities (laundries, restaurants, child-care) for household production" (Markusen, 1981, p. 32; see also Rose, 1989) • Relevance to rural areas ? • Distance to work and retailing large • In 'era of privatisation' (Bell and Cloke, 1989) rural public service provision in decline • But, middle class make limited use of public services • Community provision greater in rural areas (see Little, 1987) • Rural movement to establish families (see Phillips, 1993)

10. Rural gentrification as lifestyle consumption • Are gentrifiers buying a lifestyle more than a home ? • Ley (1980), Jager (1986) and Mills (1988) on gentrification as 'positional consumption' (I.e. purchase commodities which confer status) • Concept discussed in rural context by Newby (1987) and Cloke and Thrift (1987, 1990): "Consumer goods are a vital part of the service class's self-production ..... Commodities that have particular value (economically and culturally) are those that are scarce (for example, houses with a view), those that are old (for example, old houses) and those that can be associated with or are part of activities that restrict the number of participants (because of cash or rules of entry), require considerable knowledge (and investment of time) to master and have a social cachet (for example, certain types of sport)" (Cloke and Thrift, 1990, p. 175)

11. Rural gentrification as lifestyle consumption • Are gentrifiers buying a lifestyle more than a home ? • Ley (1980), Jager (1986) and Mills (1988) on gentrification as 'positional consumption' (I.e. purchase commodities which confer status) • Concept discussed in rural context by Newby (1987) and Cloke and Thrft (1987, 1990): "Consumer goods are a vital part of the service class's self-production ..... Commodities that have particular value (economically and culturally) are those that are scarce (for example, houses with a view), those that are old (for example, old houses) and those that can be associated with or are part of activities that restrict the number of participants (because of cash or rules of entry), require considerable knowledge (and investment of time) to master and have a social cachet (for example, certain types of sport)" (Cloke and Thrift, 1990, p. 175)

12. Rural gentrification as lifestyle consumption • Are gentrifiers buying a lifestyle more than a home ? • Ley (1980), Jager (1986) and Mills (1988) on gentrification as 'positional consumption' (I.e. purchase commodities which confer status) • Concept discussed in rural context by Newby (1987) and Cloke and Thrift (1987, 1990) • Link to Bell's rural identities ? • Local identity - scarce - and hence desired by all ? • Countryism - can be purchased and displayed: • "This morning, funny enough, I was going to have you down at the sheep dip 'cause I had planned to go sheep dipping this morning with a mate of mine .. I had sheep here but with the job commitment I had to give them up" (Cloke et al, 1995, p. 233) • Require investment, not just of money • Require facilities and spaces

13. Rural gentrification as lifestyle consumption

14. Rural gentrification as lifestyle consumption Criticisms of lifestyle perspectives • Urban context - Rose (1984) has identified 2 problems • Focus on affluent lifestyle and neglect of 'need' E.g. Gentrifiers may be first-time buyers Outlines notion of 'marginal gentrifiers' • Focus on commodified aspects of social life • Rural context • Phillips (1993) - presence of 'marginal gentrifers' using 'sweat-equity' (Smith. 1979) • Chaney and Sherwood (2000) on sale of council homes and its impacts on rural gentrification • Smith and Phillips (2001) and Phillips (2002; 2004) on 'counter-cultural' dimensions of gentrification

15. Rural gentrification as 'chaotic' concept "the terms 'gentrification' and 'gentrifiers', as commonly used in the literature, are chaotic conceptions' which obscure the fact that a multiplicity of processes, rather than a single process, produce changes in the occupation of inner-city neighbourhoods" (Rose, 1984, p. 62). "disaggregated so that we may then reconceptualise the processes that produce the changes we observe, and so that we may change, where necessary, our 'ways of seeing' some forms of gentrification' and 'some types of gentrifiers'" (Rose, 1989, p. 62) • Abram (1998) on chaotic conception of class • Phillips (1998a, 1998b, 2002, 2004) on 'interpretative' or 'complementary' approach to class and gentrification whereby different 'incommensurable' perspectives are "appropriated … in 'a productive act which supplements rather than displaces'" (Phillips, 2002, p. 284)

16. Rural gentrification as 'symbolic and lived spaces' "gentrification might be seen as alternatively and often co-terminously: (i) a material spatial product in that it involves a change in the built fabric of spaces relating to the investment of material resources; (ii) a symbolic creation enacted in the discourses of academia and the popular media, and in a range of advertising, specialist building and lifestyle texts' and iii) a cultural texture' … enacted and performed within gentrified spaces" (Phillips, 2002, p. 289) Symbolic space of gentrification

17. Rural gentrification as 'symbolic and lived spaces' "gentrification might be seen as alternatively and often co-terminously: (I) a material spatial product in that it involves a change in the built fabric of spaces relating to the investment of material resources; a symbolic creation enacted in the discourses of academia and the popular media, and in a range of advertising, specialist building and lifestyle texts' and iii) a cultural texture' … enacted and performed within gentrified spaces" (Phillips, 2002, p. 289) • Social spaces of gentrification • People living in gentrified space: • often unaware or denied change • NIMBYism • Concern about social positionality of own residence • Social critique of contemporary society • Drew on range of spatialised cultural textures • Gentrification as suburbanisation, rural as agriculture, Bell's rural identities

18. Summary • Outlined original concept of gentrification • Refurbishment of properties and social change • Examined how concept has been broadened • In urban gentrification studies • In rural studies • Discuss implication of broadening • Chaotic concept to discard • Legislative search for 'true meaning' • Interpretative/complementary analysis • Read up on debate, and on specific case studies (coursework)