Approachment to female deep-rootedness and uprootenedness in the rural areas: young women in pursuit of a new rural identity

Abstract

Quantitative studies on rural youth establish that in general young girls prefer to leave their rural area behind. What we have intended here is to explore the qualitative aspects of female uprootedness. The rural women that we have researched came from an agricultural district in the Principality of Asturias and live in an open and global society, an opening shaping a new conception of rurality. In this new scene, young girls have to make decisions about their future; they must make up their minds about staying in or leaving their birthplace.

We have found women with a tendency towards rootedness, while others go for uprootedness, but all of them have been affected by a number of exactly the same characteristic factors of a rural society going through a changing process. In this work, we establish that young girls analyse the same social reality differently.

For the moment, the women who have opted for rootedness admit that they have decided out of step with the times, not very objectively, leaving out more visible and prevailing options for their social and work insertion. Even so, it is these women who are giving us clues to be able to understand the best way in which the rural world can become their best option because these girls are building up their own identity around rurality.