Career

Senior Lecturer, Department of Geography, Swansea University (2002-present)

Lecturer, Department of Geography, Swansea University (1993-2002)

Research Tutor, Department of Geography, Swansea University (1991-1993)

Research Associate, Department of Geography, Lancaster University (1990-1991)

 

Research interests

My research interests are many and varied but focus on a number of overlapping areas:

 

Discourses of rurality in the global North. In spite of numerous abstract theoretical efforts to show that the 'rural' as a spatial category within everyday life no longer has any major significance in this era of 'globalisation', it stubbornly retains what Sarah Whatmore in 1993 termed “an unruly and intractable popular significance and remains a tenaciously active research domain”. Ongoing work lies in both outlining the content of cultural representations of rural today and in seeing how these are linked to and even underpin practices, such as counterurbanisation and leisure activities.

 

Rural futures. Building on the latter area, I am also very engaged with conceptual debates concerning the ways in which the rural is changing. Specifically, I have engaged critically in the productivism to post-productivism debate and in stirring into this debate a more politically and environmentally 'radical' vision for our future countryside.

 

Migration. I am very interested in certain aspects of human migration and have published widely on counterurbanisation, drawing out the more 'counter-cultural' currents that inform some migration to rural areas, promoting a cultural perspective on migration generally, and appreciating how migration helps to structure institutions such as the family and place.

 

Marginal geographies. The geographical expression of (almost) all things counter-cultural and anarchist-esque is a diverse area of personal and intellectual interest. I have researched in and/or intend to research in such elements of this huge family as: 1960/1970s counter-culture, DiY culture of the post-1990s, popular music and festivals, land struggles, anarchist geographies, radical environmentalism, struggles against neo-liberal globalisation, back-to-the-land initiatives, Bohemia and Utopia, travellers and even walking…

 

Current projects

 

“Rooted in the earth? Going back-to-the-land in millennial Britain”

Leverhulme Trust award F00391H (08/2007-07/2009), with Dr Lewis Holloway (University of Hull) and Dr Larch Maxey (Swansea University), summarised as follows:

Movement of people into rural Britain from towns and cities is a major social phenomenon, regularly attracting the attention of journalists, politicians and popular culture.  Yet, in spite of this wide body of work and interest, some types of migration into rural areas have been little studied.  Most attention has been given to fairly 'conventional' families seeking a higher quality of life that fits within the mainstream, in terms of employment and careers, social interactions, aspirations and/or lifestyles generally.  In contrast, although having acquired a stereotype of the urban household 'fleeing the rat-race', people seeking more profound life changes through moving to the country and working the land – what we call back-to-the-land experiments - have been rather overlooked.  Indeed, our best knowledge is often from memoirs.  Our project will therefore study this group.

Our central aim is to examine both the extent to which and in which ways people involved in back-to-the-land experiments interact on a daily basis with the land.  In short, to what extent do they get their hands dirty and how important is this work within their lives generally? To examine this, we will:

1. Outline the characteristics of people attempting back-to-the-land experiments;
2. Discover their motivations and underlying belief systems;
3. Investigate how much they do actually 'work the land' on a daily basis;
4. Find out the extent to which deep relationships are established between back-to-the-landers and the land, its animals, plants, soil, etc.;
5. Compare and contrast back-to-the-land communal experiments with those at an individual household scale, and those starting today with those established in the 1960s/1970s;
6. Place the lives, experiences and practices of back-to-the-landers within debates about the future of our countryside.

 

“Revisiting 'counterurbanisation': recognising the full picture”

A project, presently unfunded, that is seeking to expand our appreciation of the seemingly well-known population geography concept of 'counterurbanisation'. The aim of the project is to (re)invigorate those engaged with or thinking of engaging with counterurbanisation research in the light of a feeling that the topic has become somewhat academically stagnant and consequently too easily captured by strong popular culture stereotypes, not least that of the sophisticated middle class urbanite moving themselves and their family to start a new healthier life in what is perceived by them to be an idyllic rural setting. Even if we accept some understanding of counterurbanisation that is close to such portrayals, there is still much to find out and appreciate concerning the significance of the moves, both for those involved and for society and culture more generally.  Second, though, this understanding of counterurbanisation is too narrow and easily stereotyped.  Instead, I am pursuing a model of counterurbanisation as a flexible category, capable of embracing a broad range of people and experiences.

Papers have been presented on this project at an international workshop in Barcelona in 2006, at an international conference on Skye, Scotland in 2007 and at a number of Departmental seminars. Copies of these papers are available from the author on request.

 

Selected publications

Halfacree, K. (2007) 'Trial by space for a 'radical rural': introducing alternative localities, representations and lives', Journal of Rural Studies 23: 125-141.

Halfacree, K. (2007) 'Back-to-the-land in the Twenty-First Century – making connections with rurality', Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie 98: 3-8.

Halfacree, K. (2006) 'From dropping out to leading on? British counter-cultural back-to-the-land in a changing rurality', Progress in Human Geography 30: 309-336.

Halfacree, K. (2006) 'Rural space: constructing a three-fold architecture' in P. Cloke, T. Marsden and P. Mooney (eds.) Handbook of Rural Studies, London: Sage, pp. 44-62.

Halfacree, K. (2004) 'Untying migration completely: de-gendering or radical transformation?', Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 30(2): 397-413.

Halfacree, K. (2004) 'A utopian imagination in migration's terra incognita? Acknowledging the non-economic worlds of migration decision-making', Population, Space and Place 10: 239-253.

Halfacree, K. (2004) ''I could only do wrong': academic research and DIY culture', in D. Fuller and R. Kitchen (eds.) Radical Theory / Critical Praxis: Making a Difference Beyond the Academy, Okanagan University College, Vernon and the University of Victoria, Victoria; Praxis (e)Press, pp. 68-78, available at: http://www.praxis-epress.org/

Boyle, P., Cooke, T., Halfacree, K. and Smith, D. (2003) 'The effect of long-distance family migration and motherhood on partnered women's labour market activity rates in GB and the US', Environment and Planning A 35: 2097-2114.

Halfacree, K., Kovach, I. and Woodward, R. (eds.) (2002) Leadership and Local Power in European Rural Development, Aldershot: Ashgate.

Boyle, P., Cooke, T., Halfacree, K. and Smith, D. (2002) 'A cross-national study of the effects of family migration on women's labour market status: some difficulties from integrating microdata from two censuses', Journal of the Royal Statistical Society A 165: 465-480.

Boyle, P., Cooke, T., Halfacree, K. and Smith, D. (2001) 'A cross-national comparison of the impact of family migration on women's employment status', Demography 38: 201-213.

Halfacree, K. (2001) 'Constructing the object: taxonomic practices, 'counterurbanisation' and positioning marginal rural settlement', International Journal of Population Geography 7: 395-411.

Boyle, P. and Halfacree, K. (eds.) (1999) Migration and Gender in the Developed World, London: Routledge.

Halfacree, K. (1999) ''Anarchy doesn't work unless you think about it': intellectual interpretation and DIY culture', Area 31: 209-220.

Boyle, P., Halfacree, K. and Robinson, V. (1998) Exploring Contemporary Migration, Harlow: Longman.

Boyle, P. and Halfacree, K. (eds.) (1998) Migration into Rural Areas. Theories and Issues, Chichester: Wiley.

Halfacree, K. (1997) 'Contrasting roles for the post-productivist countryside.  A postmodern perspective on counterurbanisation', in P. Cloke and J. Little (eds.) Contested Countryside Cultures.  Otherness, Marginalisation and Rurality, London: Routledge, pp. 70-93.

Halfacree, K. (1996) 'Out of place in the country: Travellers and the 'rural idyll'', Antipode 28: 42-72.

Halfacree, K. (1995) 'Talking about rurality: social representations of the rural as expressed by residents of six English parishes', Journal of Rural Studies 11: 1-20.

Halfacree, K. (1995) 'Household migration and the structuration of patriarchy: evidence from the USA', Progress in Human Geography 19: 159-182.

Halfacree, K. (1994) 'The importance of 'the rural' in the constitution of counterurbanization: evidence from England in the 1980s', Sociologia Ruralis 34: 164-189.

Halfacree, K. (1993) 'Locality and social representation: space, discourse and alternative definitions of the rural', Journal of Rural Studies 9: 23-37.

Halfacree, K. and Boyle, P. (1993) 'The challenge facing migration research: the case for a biographical approach', Progress in Human Geography 17: 333-358.

 

Other roles / responsibilities

Secretary of the Rural Geography Research Group

Member of the Population Geography Research Group

Member of the European Society for Rural Sociology

Member of the International Network for Urban Research and Action