Geography 340: Settlements of Rural Canada
Winter, 2015
Class Time:
Monday and Wednesday, 8:30 – 9:50, EV1 Room 132
Instructor:
Clare Mitchell, EV1 Room 224
E-mail: [email protected]
Office hours: Monday and Wednesday, 10:30 – 12:00
Course Structure:
This course explores the evolution of Canada’s rural settlements. We begin by examining the early
form and function of dispersed and nucleated settlements as they existed in Canada before the
20th century. In the next section we uncover the processes responsible for rural decline, and then
focus on those promoting rural restructuring. In the final section, student presentations will
demonstrate how communities in specific Canadian regions are overcoming the challenges of the
21st century.
Learning Objectives:
1. To gain knowledge and critical understanding of the key concepts, current advances,
theoretical approaches and assumptions of the field of rural geography.
2. To gain an understanding of qualitative research methods and how these methods may
be used to understand and potentially address the issues facing Canada’s rural
settlements.
3. To improve your written and oral communication skills.
4. To gain experience in working with others.
Course Management:
The course is managed through LEARN. Organizational slides are normally posted before the
lecture. Any announcements related to the course will also be posted at this site. If you would
like to correspond with me, please use the email address found above; do not send me
messages via LEARN.
Required Readings:
Readings are available either on the course website, through Trellis (library web site), or at the
reserve desk in the Porter Library.
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Course Requirements:
Component
1. Test
2. Project:
Annotated Bibliography
Paper
Group presentation slides
Group presentation
3. Exam
Weight (%)
Date
20
50
February 2
10
25
5
10
February 10
March 15
March 22
March 23 – April 1st
TBD
30
Note: the bibliography, paper, and slides must be submitted to the digital drop box by 11:59
pm on the due date. The late penalty is 2 marks per day (from 10, 25 and 5% respectively),
although exceptions will be made for valid, and documented, medical reasons.
Test and Exam
The test is scheduled for February 2nd. It is 80 minutes in duration and will be comprised of
long answer questions. Every attempt should be made in your answers to combine
information provided in the lectures and readings. The final exam will also be in long answer
format and will cover material presented since the midterm test. The exam may include a
take-home component.
Project
The purpose of this assignment is to determine if, and how, the challenges facing rural
settlements in one part of Canada are being overcome. The project has three components: an
annotated bibliography, an individual paper, and a group presentation (which will be prepared
in class on March 16th and 18th). Further information about this assignment is posted on the
course website.
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Schedule (Subject to change)
Part 1: Traditional Rural Settlements (pre 20th century)
1. January 5
An Introduction to Geography 340
2. January 7
Interpreting “rural”
Read: Woods, M. (2005) Rural Geography: Processes, Responses and
Experiences. In Rural Restructuring. Sage Publications. Los Angeles. Pp. 3 16. (On reserve)
3. January 12
The Hutterite colony: A traditional rural settlement
Janzen, R. A. (2010) The Hutterites in North America. John Hopkins
University Press. Baltimore MD. Chapters 1 and 11. (On reserve)
Last day to select your province/territory for study
4. January 14
Traditional dispersed settlement patterns
Read: Wonders, W. C. (1982) The Influence of the Surveyor on Rural
Settlement Patterns in Canada. Terravue, 1: 15-26. (LEARN)
5. January 19
Traditional nucleated settlement patterns
Read: Dahms F.A. (1991) Change and Stability within an Urban Hierarchy:
Waterloo County 1864 to 1971. Urban History Review 20 (1): 38 – 47.
(LEARN)
6. January 21
Traditional morphology of dispersed and nucleated
settlements
Read: Hodge, G. and D. Gordon (2008) Planning Canadian
Communities (5th edition). Thomson, United States. Pp. 19 –
33; 42-50. (On reserve)
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Part 2: Declining Rural Settlements
7. January 26
Depopulation I: Agricultural regions
Read: Schlichtmann H. and Lewry, M. (2007) Settlement Evolution since
the Late Nineteenth Century. In Saskatchewan: Geographic Perspectives.
In Thraves, B., Lewry, M, Dale, J. and Schlichrmann H. (eds.).Canadian
Plains Research Center, University of Regina. Pp. 129-145. (On reserve)
8. January 28
Depopulation II: Resource regions
Read: Halseth, G. (1999) We Came for the Work: Situating Employment
Migration in B.C.'s Small, Resource-Based Communities. Canadian
Geographer. 43(4): 363–381. (LEARN)
9. February 2
Test
Part 3: Restructuring Rural Settlements
10. February 4
Intervention I: The exogenous approach
Vodden, K. (2010) Heroes, Hope, and Resource Development in Canada’s
Periphery: Lessons from Newfoundland and Labrador. Chapter 17 in
Halseth, Greg, Markey, Sean and Bruce, Davis (eds.). The Next Rural
Economies: Constructing Rural Place in a Global Economy. Oxfordshire,
UK: CABI International. (On reserve)
11. February 9
Intervention II: The endogenous approach
Koster R., Randall, J. (2005) Indicators of Community Economic
Development through Mural-based Tourism. The Canadian Geographer
49(10): 42-60. (LEARN)
Grybovych, O. and Hafermann, D. (2013). Sustainable Practices of
Community Tourism Planning: Lessons from a Remote Community. In R.
Phillips and S. Roberts, Tourism, Planning, and Community Development.
Routledge, London and New York. Pp. 81-96. (On reserve)
Submit Annotated Bibliography by 11:59 pm on Tuesday, February 10
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12. February 11
Intervention III: The neo-endogenous approach
Bosworth, G. and Atterton, J., 2012. Entrepreneurial In-migration and
Neo-endogenous Rural Development. Rural Sociology 77 (2), pp. 254-279
(LEARN).
Reading Week
13. February 23
Intervention IV: “Place-shaping”
Read: Stern, P. and Hall, P. (2010) Historical Limits: Narrowing
Possibilities in ‘Ontario’s Most Historic Town’. The Canadian Geographer
54(2): 209-227. (LEARN)
14. February 25
Rural Repopulation I: Introduction
Vannini P. and Taggart, J. (2013) Voluntary Simplicity, Involuntary
Complexities, and the Pull of Remove: the Radical Ruralites of Off-grid
Lifestyles. Environment and Planning A, 45: 295-311. (LEARN)
15. March 2
Rural Repopulation II: Dispersed settlements
Ngo, M. and Brklacich, M. (2013) New farmers' Efforts to Create a Sense
of Place in Rural Communities: Insights from Southern Ontario, Canada.
Agriculture and Human Values 31:53–67 (LEARN).
16. March 4
Rural Repopulation III: Nucleated settlements
Guimond, L., Simard, M. (2010) Gentrification and Neo-rural Populations
in the Québec countryside: Representations of Various Actors. Journal of
Rural Studies 26: 449-464 (LEARN).
Nepal, S. and Jamal, T.B. (2011) Resort-induced Changes in Small
Mountain Communities in British Columbia, Canada. Mountain Research
and Development 31(2): 89-101 (LEARN).
17. March 9
Implications of Restructuring I: Creative destruction or creative
enhancement?
Mitchell, C.J.A. (2013). Creative Destruction or Creative Enhancement?
Understanding the Transformation of Rural Spaces. Journal of Rural
Studies. 32: 375-387 (LEARN).
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18. March 11
Implications of Restructuring II: Countryside conflict
Masuda, J. and Garvin, T. (2008) Whose Heartland? The Politics of Place
in a Rural-urban Interface. Journal of Rural Studies, 24(1): 112-123.
(LEARN)
Mair, H. (2009) Searching for a new enterprise: themed tourism and the remaking of one small Canadian community. Tourism Geographies, 11: 4, 462
- 483
Paper is due in digital drop box on Sunday, 11:59 pm, March 15th.
Part 4: Overcoming the Economic Challenges of the 21st Century: Case studies
19. March 16
Mandatory group planning session. Failure to attend and remain for the
full 80-minutes without a valid medical reason will result in a 2-mark
penalty.
20. March 18
Mandatory group planning session. Failure to attend and remain for the
full 80-minutes without a valid medical reason will result in a 2-mark
penalty.
Upload slides by Sunday, March 22nd, by 11:59 pm
21. March 23
Group Presentations 1 - 2
22. March 25
Group Presentations 3 - 4
23. March 30
Group Presentations 5 - 6
24. April 1
Group Presentations 7 - 8
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Notes:
Turnitin: Plagiarism detection software (Turnitin) will be used to screen assignments in this
course. This is being done to verify that use of all materials and sources in assignments is
documented. Students will be given an option (submitting an annotated bibliography), if they
do not want to have their assignment screened by Turnitin. Details are provided on the course
web site about arrangements and alternatives for the use of Turnitin in this course.
Unclaimed Assignments: These will be retained until one month after term grades become
official in quest. After that time, they will be destroyed in compliance with UW’s confidential
shredding procedures.
Academic Integrity: In order to maintain a culture of academic integrity, members of the
University of Waterloo community are expected to promote honesty, trust, fairness, respect
and responsibility. www.uwaterloo.ca/academicintegrity/. Students who are unsure what
constitutes an academic offence are requested to visit the on-line tutorial at
http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/ait/
Research Ethics: Please also note that the ‘University of Waterloo requires all research
conducted by its students, staff, and faculty which involves humans as participants to undergo
prior ethics review and clearance through the Director, Office of Human Research and Animal
Care (Office). The ethics review and clearance processes are intended to ensure that projects
comply with the Office’s Guidelines for Research with Human Participants (Guidelines) as well
as those of provincial and federal agencies, and that the safety, rights and welfare of
participants are adequately protected. The Guidelines inform researchers about ethical issues
and procedures which are of concern when conducting research with humans (e.g.
confidentiality, risks and benefits, informed consent process, etc.). If the development of your
research proposal consists of research that involves humans as participants, the please contact
the course instructor for guidance and see http://iris.uwaterloo.ca/ethics/
Note for students with disabilities: The Office for Persons with Disabilities (OPD), located in
Needles Hall, Room 1132, collaborates with all academic departments to arrange appropriate
accommodations for students with disabilities without compromising the academic integrity of
the curriculum. If you require academic accommodations to lessen the impact of your disability,
please register with the OPD at the beginning of each academic term.
Religious Observances: Please inform the instructor at the beginning of term if special
accommodation needs to be made for religious observances that are not otherwise accounted
for in the scheduling of classes and assignments.
Grievance: A student who believes that a decision affecting some aspect of his/her university
life has been unfair or unreasonable may have grounds for initiating a grievance. Read Policy 70
- Student Petitions and Grievances, Section 4,
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www.adm.uwaterloo.ca/infosec/Policies/policy70.htm. When in doubt please contact your
Undergraduate Advisor for details.
Discipline (as noted above): A student is expected to know what constitutes academic integrity,
to avoid committing academic offence, and to take responsibility for his/her actions. A student
who is unsure whether an action constitutes an offense, or who needs help in learning about
“rules” for group work/collaboration, should seek guidance from the course professor,
academic advisor, or the Undergraduate Associate Dean. For information on categories of
offences and types of penalties, students should refer to Policy 71, Student Discipline,
www.adm.uwaterloo.ca/infosec/Policies/policy71.htm. For typical penalties, check Guidelines
for Assessment of Penalties, www.adm.uwaterloo.ca/infosec/guidelines/penaltyguidelines.htm
Appeals: A decision made or penalty imposed under Policy 70 - Student Petitions and
Grievances (other than a petition) or Policy 71 – (Student Discipline) may be appealed if there is
a ground. A student who believes he/she has a ground for an appeal should refer to Policy 72
(Student Appeals) www.adm.uwaterloo.ca/infosec/Policies/policy72.htm
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