Truck Journeys and Land Parcels: Understanding the Socioeconomic Organization of Family Farming Through Farm Life Histories

Abstract

Conceptual advances for understanding the organization of family farms have not yet initiated parallel debates about how they might be aligned with the methods used to understand them. Customization of a novel research approach—farm life history—for an investigation of the socioeconomic organization of forty Australian farms responds to this literature gap. Individual farm life histories were initiated using farm tours (truck journeys) in which changes to the composition of land parcels prompted research conversations. The researcher and participants benefited from using motorized transport and traveling while talking, but the benefits were experienced unevenly across research encounters.

理解家庭农场组织，在概念上的推进，仍尚未触发有关如何可与理解它们的方法连结的相似辩论。而对 “农场生活历史” 此般崭新研究方法进行客製化，用以探讨四十座澳大利亚农场的社会经济组织，则回应了此一文献上的阙如。本研究运用农场旅游（卡车旅行），创立各别农场的生命历史，其中地块组成的改变，激发了研究对话。研究者与参与者，使用装上发动机的交通工具，并在交谈时移动，因而从中获益，但该获益在不同的研究情境中，却被不平均地经验到。

Los avances conceptuales con los que se pretende entender la organización de granjas familiares todavía no han propiciado debates paralelos acerca de cómo podrían compenetrarse aquellos con los métodos utilizados para entenderlos. La adaptación de un novedoso enfoque investigativo—la historia de vida de la granja— para investigar la organización socioeconómica de cuarenta granjas australianas, es una respuesta a esta limitación de la literatura. Las historias de vida de granjas individuales se iniciaron mediante recorridos a través de las mismas (viajes en camión), en los que los cambios observados en la composición de las parcelas de terreno indujeron conversaciones de investigación. El investigador y los participantes se beneficiaron por usar transporte motorizado y por viajar mientras se conversaba, aunque los beneficios experimentados fueron desiguales en el curso de la investigación.

Key Words:

• Australia
• family farm organization
• farm life history
• land ownership
• mobile interviews

关键词:

• 澳大利亚
• ，家庭农场组
• 织，农场生活
• 历史，土地
• 所有权，移动式访谈。

Palabras clave:

• Australia
• organización de las granjas familiares
• historia de vida de la granja
• propiedad de la tierra
• entrevistas móviles

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to the Australian farmers who generously gave of their time and farm development stories during my research. I am also grateful to Bill Pritchard, Sally Weller, John Connell, and Patrick Nunn, as well as the two anonymous referees, for their helpful and constructive comments on earlier versions of this article.

Funding

The research reported in this article was funded through the Australian Research Council Linkage Project, “Rural Adjustment or Structural Transformation? Discovering the Destinations of Exiting Farm Families,” undertaken with the support of the Victorian Department of Treasury and Finance. Support was also received from The New South Wales Rural Adjustment Authority.

Note

Notes

1 The term truck as used here refers to vehicles commonly used for work purposes on Australian farms. Colloquially, they are often referred to as “the farm truck” or “the farm ute” (abbreviation of farm utility vehicle). These vehicles typically have a single or twin passenger cabin and a cargo tray in the rear. Comparable U.S. terminology might be pickup truck.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Erin F. Smith

ERIN F. SMITH is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Sustainability Research Centre, University of the Sunshine Coast, Maroochydore DC, 4558 Queensland, Australia. E-mail: [email protected]. She completed the research reported in this article while she was a PhD candidate in the School of Geosciences at the University of Sydney, Australia. Her research interests include rural restructuring, the socioeconomic organization of farming, and land and water ownership.