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Apologies for cross-posting... Call For Papers Session for RGS-IBG Annual Conference, London, 31 August - 2 September 2005 Sponsored by Population Geography Research Group Title: The changing 'faces' of rural populations, geographies and mobile societies Convenor: Darren P. Smith 'The State of the Countryside 2004: Challenge of Rural Movers' points to the dynamism of rural places and mobile societies, with rural populations rising by 14% (1.7 million) between 1981-2002, and annual net migration estimated at 115,000 in mid-2002. Indeed, it is reported that counterurban movements are now four times the rate of the 'north to south drift'. Such trends may herald a deepening of the rural in the 'twenty-first century psyche', and the (re)production and consumption of new spaces of rurality and rural societies. Indeed, Cloke (2003) suggests 'the smiling 'happy face' mask of country living' is being disrupted, and changing rural population structures may be influential here. Within this context, classifications of rural places, such as the recent ONS classification (2004), are central to analyses, and beg questions of the contemporary meanings of rurality and the blurring of urban-rural constructs (Amin and Thrift, 2002). This session seeks papers which explore socio-cultural and economic effects of unfolding rural populations, or papers which consider the impact of classifications or representations of the rural. The session seeks to stimulate debate of theoretical and conceptual understandings of the wider politics and processes of rural restructuring, and the formation of new rural geographies. Please send titles and abstracts (200 words) to Darren P. Smith, Geography Division, University of Brighton, email: [log in to unmask], tel 01273 643318. Deadline is 21st January 2005.