Lang, Stuart F.
(2021)
The Agri-Cultural Imagination: Present and Future Imaginations of
Alternative Agriculture, the Human-non-Human Relationship, and the Impact of Time.
PhD thesis, National University of Ireland Maynooth.
Abstract
Firstly, this thesis aims to highlight a form of alternative agriculture through an anthropological lens,
through an exploration of alternative farming practices, focusing on what is known as Community
Supported Agriculture (CSA). Through ethnographic fieldwork carried out over 2 years I learned about
the motivations, fears, hopes, imagined presents and futures and ways of seeing the world of those who
involve themselves with CSA practices. Secondly, in the broadest sense I want to highlight the role the
human imagination plays in constructing our present(s) and future(s). Our imaginations are powerful
tools, enabling people to see the present in many different ways, and project themselves into multiple
contingent futures. We rely on it to construct ourselves and much of the world around us. And so, I
believe for us to understand anything about what it means to be human we must understand how and
what we imagine. Thirdly, I discuss the human-non-human relationship, in a general “beyond the
human” sense but also with specific reference to plants. While having somewhat of a renaissance in
anthropological discourse, there is still a lacuna of knowledge concerned with the relationships we have
with the non-humans of this world. An emphasis of much alternative agriculture is the nurturing of the
connection between the human and the non-human and CSA is no exception. Thus, CSA makes an
excellent opportunity to better understand some aspects of these relationships, particularly in the urban
environment. All of this is framed through larger scale issues with a major focus on human induced
climate change and its very real effects on the present world but also the myriad of potential future
effects the continued acceleration of climate change will have.
| Item Type: |
Thesis
(PhD)
|
| Keywords: |
Agri-Cultural Imagination; Present and Future; Imaginations;
Alternative Agriculture; Human-non-Human Relationship;
Impact of Time; |
| Academic Unit: |
Faculty of Social Sciences > Anthropology |
| Item ID: |
16747 |
| Depositing User: |
IR eTheses
|
| Date Deposited: |
28 Nov 2022 11:12 |
| URI: |
|
| Use Licence: |
This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available
here |
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