List members may be interested in this conference.  Details below.

Best wishes, 

Dr Jeremy Burchardt
Lecturer in History, University of Reading
Chair, Interwar Rural History Research Group



Preliminary programme September 2006


Inter War Rural History Research Group

International conference, Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, 
England, from 4-6 January 2007


Rethinking the Rural: Land and the Nation in the 1920s and 1930s


Thursday 4th January 2007

15.00-16.00 Prof. David Danbom (North Dakota State University, USA), ‘From 
national identity to national problem: farmers and agriculture in the 
United States between the wars.’

4.00 – 16.30 Tea

4.30 – 18.15 Session 1 (3 papers) 	

Strand 1 Politics and Land Reform
 
Dr John Dwyer (USA), ‘The economic and Political forces behind Mexican 
land reform in the 1930s.’ 

Dr Paul Brassley (UK), ‘Land reform and reallocation in interwar Europe.’

Dr Amos Nadan (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem/ Tel Aviv University, 
Israel), ‘Land reform in mandate Palestine, 1920s-1940s: A story of 
colonial bungling’. 

Strand 2 Representation, National Identity and Conservation

Caterina Benincasa (UK), ‘Strawberries and Sinners : Lilian Ream’s 
photographs of migrant East End labour and the Wishbech Fruiting Campaign.’

Dr Catherine Moriarty (UK), ‘The politician, the pioneer and the soldier: 
Monuments to achievement and identity in inter-war rural Australia.’

Leslie C Shores (USA), ‘Charles Belden and the rural Wyoming landscape.’


Strand 3 Rural Life

Dr Lisa Ossian (USA), ‘The early depression dilemmas of rural Iowa, 
October 1929-November 1932.’

Dr Yves Segers (Belgium), ‘The agricultural depression and the strategy of 
the dairy sector in Belgium, 1920s-1930s,’


19.00- 20.00 Dinner


20.00- 21.00 Professor Kate Darian-Smith, (University of Melbourne, 
Australia), ‘Representing land and nation: agricultural shows in interwar 
Australia.’ 

21.00 Bar open until ???? 


Friday 5th January

9.00 – 10.45 Session 2 (3 papers)

Strand 1 Politics and Land Reform

Drs Connie Lester, Melissa Walker (USA), Claire Strom 
(moderator), ‘Markets and memory: the agricultural south in the interwar 
years’. CL, ‘To market, to market, The Florida state agricultural 
department and co-operative marketing in the interwar years.’ 
ML, ‘Southern farmers and the New Deal: experiencing state intervention, 
remembering state intervention.’

Leslie C Shores (USA), ‘Resettle or bust: Franklin D Roosvelt’s 
resettlement administration in Wyoming.’  


Strand 2 Representation, National Identity and Conservation

Wade Lough (USA), ‘Three mythic views of rural America in the years of the 
great depression.’

Dr Drew Cottle (Australia), ‘Blind in a sunburnt country: land and nation 
in Australia during the inter-war period.’

George Simmers (UK), ‘Rural dreams and post-war nightmares: dangerous 
landscapes in fiction of the 1920s.’


Strand 3 Rural Life

Dr Stephanie Carter (USA), ‘Rural life and rural change in the Upper 
South.’

Dr Jeremy Burchardt (UK), ‘When did the middle class start to take over 
the countryside? Counterurbanisation in Berkshire (UK), 1900-1950.’

Dr Edouard Lynch (France), ‘Inter-war France and “exodus rural” (rural 
migration): the national myth in peril.

10.45- 11.15 Coffee

11.15- 12.30 Session 3 (2 papers)

Strand 1 Politics and Land Reform

Dr Susanna Wade Martin (UK), ‘Small holdings in England- a social and 
farming experiment.’
 
Dr Inese Sture, Anita Zarina (Latvia), ‘Reshaping the landscape during the 
golden age of Latvia’s history (1920-1937).’

Suman Suvedi Bhattarai (Nepal), ‘Agriculture and people in the third 
decade of 2oth century Nepal.’ 


Strand 2 Representation, National Identity and Conservation (2 papers only)

Prof. David Jeremiah (UK), ‘Motoring and the British countryside.’
 
Dr Tom Williamson (UK),‘Benign neglect? Farming and Wildlife in East 
Anglia between the wars.’


Strand 3 Rural Life (2 papers only)

Dr John Broad (London Metropolitan University, UK), ‘Re-building the image 
of the rural community between the wars: Council housing, cottage 
improvement and the village idyll between the wars.’

Prof. Jonathan Harwood (UK), ‘Expansion, rationalisation and crisis in 
interwar German agricultural education.’


12.30-13.30 Lunch


13.30 – 14.30 Plenary- Professor Alun Howkins (University of Sussex, 
UK), ‘Fascism and the rural world in interwar Europe.’


14.30 – 16.15 Session 4  (3 papers)

Strand 1 Politics and Land Reform

Dr Andrew Moore (Australia), ‘Australia’s interwar militias as rural 
phenomena’.

Dr Katharine Griffiths (UK), ‘Green thought in Germany: The role of nature 
in National Socialist ideology.’


Dr Andrew Mitchell (UK), ‘ “Farmers for fascism?” The British Union of 
Fascists and the east Anglian ‘tithe war’ 1933-34.

Strand 2 Representation, National Identity and Conservation


Anna Machin (USA), ‘Authenticity glamorised: the countryside and the 
modern nation in interwar Hungarian entertainment films.’

Sorcha O’Brien (UK), ‘Sean Keating at the Shannon Scheme: documenting the 
disfigured rural landscape in 1920s Ireland.’

Catherine Lynch (USA), ‘The country, the city and visions of modernity in 
1930s China.’


Strand 3 Rural Life

Dr John Martin (UK), ‘The pace of agricultural innovation and 
technological change in British agriculture 1931-9. A reappraisal’ (3.6.06 
said prefer this paper awaiting confirmation from John)

Dr Peter Dewey (UK), ‘The European farm tractor industry, 1919-39.’

Robert Bennett (UK), ‘The management of road transport in the rural county 
of Herefordshire 1919-1939.’
 
16.15- 16.45 Tea

16.45- 18.30 Session 5 (3 papers- tighter for time as 90 mins))

Strand 1 Politics and Land Reform

Florence Cartigny (France), ‘The rise of agrarian democracy in Alberta in 
the interwar years.’ 

Geraint Thomas (UK), ‘Rural Conservatism and ‘National appeal’ in the 
Thirties.’

Dr Karen Miller (USA), ‘The farm vote and partisan loyalty in the United 
States, 1924-1936.’


Strand 2 Representation, National Identity and Conservation

 Dr Zachary Jack (USA), ‘ “The Tiller and the Tilled”: Edward H Faulkner, 
Walter Thomas Jack, and the art of agricultural apologists in the interwar 
years.’

Dr Edward Rafferty (USA), ‘Landscape, regional planning and the 
conservation ethic: Lewis Mumford, Robert Marshall, and Benton Mackaye.’

Erin Gill (UK), ‘The interwar interests of Lady Eve Balfour: preparation 
for life-long dedication to the organic cause.’


Strand 3 Rural Life

Dr Keith Grieves (UK), ‘Books, bricks and ‘brighter’ villages: The rural 
library movement in Britain after the Great War.’

Lynne Thompson (UK), ‘The British state, voluntary bodies and agricultural 
education in the interwar years: Young Farmers’ Clubs as a case study.’

Prof. Dr Margreet van der Burg (Netherlands), ‘Were farm women a special 
group? Netherlands Interwar dynamics in gender and cultural hegemony.’

19.00- 20.00 Dinner

20.00-21.00 Plenary – Dr Jan Bieleman (University of Wageningen), 
Netherlands, ‘Agriculture and government in the Netherlands 1920-1940.’

21.00 Bar open until ???

Saturday 6th January 2007

9.30-11.15	Session 6 (3 papers)

Strand 1 Politics and Land Reform

Dr Mark Rothery (UK) ‘The state, the nation and propertied conservatism: 
the Country Landowners Association during the interwar period.’

Dr Julian Mischi (France), ‘National rhetoric and communism in the French 
countryside during the interwar period.’

Dr Rebecca Nedostup (USA), ‘ “Superstition” and the politics of Chinese 
modernity in rural Jiangsu, 1927-1937.’


Strand 2 Representation, National Identity and Conservation

Dr W P Griffith (UK), ‘Saving the soul of the nation: essentialist 
nationalism and inter-war rural Wales.’

Dr Ann-Catrin Ostman (Finland), ‘The fields or the forest? Land and 
masculinity in Finnish historiography.’

Dr Carin Israelsson (Sweden), ‘Swedish milk, a Swedish duty.’



Strand 3 Rural Life

Angela Davis (UK), ‘ “There weren’t many opportunities for the likes of 
us”: Girls experiences of growing up in rural Oxfordshire c1920-1939.’

Dr Maggie Andrews (UK), ‘Household talks: competing discourses of experts, 
knowledge and the rural domesticity.’

Bruno Notteboom (Belgium), ‘Images of the countryside. Landscape and 
community in inter-war publications of the National Commission for the 
Improvement for Rural Living and the Belgian Union of Farmer’s Wives.’


11.15-11.45	Coffee

11.45-12.45 Round table

Chair: Jeremy Burchardt
Speakers: Dr Clare Griffiths (UK), Dr Claire Strom (USA), and Prof. Dr 
Margreet van der Burg (Netherlands).

13.00-14.00 Lunch

14.00 Conference ends


The Inter War Rural History Research Group gratefully acknowledges the 
support the conference has received from the Economic History Society and 
the British Agricultural History Society.

Inter War Rural History Research Group

Rethinking the Rural: Land and the nation in the 1920s and 1930s
4-6th January 2007, Royal Holloway, Egham, Surrey, UK

Name and title (Prof., Dr, Ms, Mr)	
Institution
	
Department
	
E.mail
	
Telephone/mobile
	
Do you have any special/dietary needs that we should be aware of? If so 
please indicate	
Address for correspondence





	

Registration fees -Residential Prices
R1. Full conference Thursday-Saturday (conference fee, standard 
accommodation, all meals):  £169
R2. Full conference Thursday-Saturday (conference fee, en-suite 
accommodation, all meals):  £197
Registration fees - Non residential Prices
N1. Full conference Thursday-Saturday (conference fee, all meals):: £135
N.2a. Friday day only (conference fee, coffee, lunch and tea) : £60 
N.2b Friday day only (conference fee, coffee, lunch tea and dinner): £72

Package chosen (e.g. R1, N2a etc)		Cheque attached for	OR 
International money transfer from (name)…………………….   Sent on (date)
………………….. 
 Cost	£	£	£
I would like a full receipt…..Yes/No

Please send payment in sterling by cheque payable to IRHRG to Dr Anne 
Meredith, 23 Mareschal Rd, Guildford, England, GU2 4JF by Friday 17 
November 2006. 

Delegates from outside the UK for whom this method of payment presents 
difficulty should use their own bank’s arrangements to send the correct 
amount in sterling (GB pounds) direct to the IRHRG bank account, account 
number 2454077, sort code 30-96-06, IBAN number GB59 LOYD 3096 0602 4540 
77 to arrive by Friday 10 November 2006.