Finding a “Disappearing” Nontimber Forest Resource: Using Grounded Visualization to Explore Urbanization Impacts on Sweetgrass Basketmaking in Greater Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina∗

∗We thank the sweetgrass basket makers and collectors of greater Mt. Pleasant for their participation in this research. This research was funded, in part, by South Carolina Sea Grant and the South Carolina Department of Archives and History. Brian Grabbatin, Zachary Hart, Cari Goetcheus, the Board of the Sweetgrass Cultural Arts Festival, and Cecelia Johnson provided invaluable assistance with data collection. Students in Norm Levine's spring 2005 GIS class contributed to early iterations of the ecological model. Finally, we also thank Marla Emery, Catherine Veninga, and four anonymous reviewers for their comments, which greatly improved the article. Any errors are solely the responsibility of the authors.

Abstract

Despite growing interest in urbanization and its social and ecological impacts on formerly rural areas, empirical research remains limited. Extant studies largely focus either on issues of social exclusion and enclosure or ecological change. This article uses the case of sweetgrass basketmaking in Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina, to explore the implications of urbanization, including gentrification, for the distribution and accessibility of sweetgrass, an economically important nontimber forest product (NTFP) for historically African American communities, in this rapidly growing area. We explore the usefulness of grounded visualization for research efforts that are examining the existence of “fringe ecologies” associated with NTFP. Our findings highlight the importance of integrated qualitative and quantitative analyses for revealing the complex social and ecological changes that accompany both urbanization and rural gentrification.

No obstante el creciente interés en la urbanización y su impacto ecológico y social en áreas que anteriormente eran rurales, las investigaciones empíricas siguen estando limitadas. Los estudios existentes se concentran principalmente ya sea en problemas de exclusión y limitación social o de cambio ecológico. En este artículo se usa el caso de la cestería con hierba de la virgen (sweetgrass) en Mt. Pleasant, Carolina del Sur, para explorar las consecuencias de la urbanización, incluyendo el envejecimiento, en la distribución y accesibilidad de la hierba de la virgen, un importante producto forestal no maderable (nontimber forest product, NTFP) para las históricamente comunidades americanas africanas en esta área de rápido crecimiento. Exploramos la utilidad de la visualización empírica en los esfuerzos de investigación que están analizando la existencia de “ecologías marginales” asociadas con los NTFP. Nuestros resultados recalcan la importancia de los análisis cualitativos y cuantitativos integrados para revelar los complejos cambios sociales y ecológicos que acompañan tanto la urbanización como el envejecimiento rural.

Key Words:

• fringe ecologies
• grounded visualization
• nontimber forest products
• rural gentrification
• urbanization

关键词:

• 附带生态
• 扎根可视化
• 非木材林产品
• 乡村绅士化
• 城市化

Palabras clave:

• ecologías marginales
• visualización empírica
• productos forestales no maderables
• aburguesamiento rural
• urbanización

PATRICK T. HURLEY is an Assistant Professor in the Environmental Studies Program at Ursinus College, P.O. Box 1000, Collegeville, PA 19426. E-mail: [email protected]. His research focuses on the implications that first world political ecology, politics of conservation, and land-use change have for conservation practice.

ANGELA C. HALFACRE is Director of Sustainability and Environmental Education and Associate Professor of Political Science at Furman University, 3300 Poinsett Highway, Greenville, SC 29613. E-mail: [email protected]. Her research interests emphasize the implications environmental decision making, perceptions, and communications have for environmental justice, sustainability studies, and risk perception.

NORM S. LEVINE is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences at the College of Charleston, 66 George Street, Charleston, SC 29424. E-mail: [email protected]. His research investigates the application of GIS to questions about environmental management.

MARIANNE K. BURKE is a Research Scientist with the U.S. Forest Service, SRS, Center for Forest Watershed Science, Otto, NC 28734. She is currently at U.S. Forest Service, Research and Development, Washington, DC, 20250-1129. E-mail: [email protected].

Notes

∗We thank the sweetgrass basket makers and collectors of greater Mt. Pleasant for their participation in this research. This research was funded, in part, by South Carolina Sea Grant and the South Carolina Department of Archives and History. Brian Grabbatin, Zachary Hart, Cari Goetcheus, the Board of the Sweetgrass Cultural Arts Festival, and Cecelia Johnson provided invaluable assistance with data collection. Students in Norm Levine's spring 2005 GIS class contributed to early iterations of the ecological model. Finally, we also thank Marla Emery, Catherine Veninga, and four anonymous reviewers for their comments, which greatly improved the article. Any errors are solely the responsibility of the authors.

1. Scholars differ on both how to quantify these concepts and the metrics to determine the boundaries between categories. For example, some scholars use population density to determine categories, with debates about how many people per acre constitutes suburban versus exurban (see Theobald 2004 for a full discussion of this issue). Others, however, including many planners, talk about suburban and exurban in terms of the density of dwelling units. We use the latter, as our ecological focus is largely on the subdivision of land for housing and its footprint.