The RURALEX project asks: How is people’s knowledge about the environment in rural parts of Europe changing, and how do such changes affect the social, cultural and ecological challenges currently faced by local communities? European rural areas have struggled in recent years with shifts in population and land use patterns, such as the out-migration of people to urban areas and the abandonment of traditional forms of agriculture. These moves have contributed to an urgent crisis: namely, that ecological expertise and awareness is rapidly changing, and in some cases being lost. This includes knowledge held both by everyday people (such as farmers or hunters) and by so-called “experts” (such as policy-makers or scientists). Examples include peasants’ controlled burning practices as a method of wildfire prevention, or the practice of building artisanal, single-log boats for river navigation along floodplains. While this crisis is often intangible and difficult to pinpoint, it is also deeply impactful to European lives and landscapes. The 17 researchers working on the RURALEX project will study this phenomenon in diverse cases across Europe: the Spanish Pyrenees, the Italian Alps, former East Germany, the Estonian coast, Northern Finland, the Danube basin in Romania and Bulgaria, and the southeastern UK. We will carry out long-term research on the ground using qualitative research methods, such as interviewing and observing people, and studying archives and stories. We will also innovate new research methods of our own, including a creative mapping tool (which we call “multi-species deep mapping”) to gather and showcase the different memories, images, and sounds that tell the story of people’s relationships to the environment. By studying people’s intangible (implicit) and tangible (explicit) knowledge about their environments, we will show how long-held and recently acquired expertise can support the many challenges of rural communities. RURALEX will also show how humanities disciplines such as anthropology and history are important for understanding and addressing urgent social and ecological issues that will greatly impact the future of Europe.

KEYWORDS:

knowledge, expertise, rural, agriculture, multispecies, nature-based livelihoods, societal disenfranchisement.