The End of Tradition? Aspects of Commons and Cultural Severance in the Landscape

The event is organised by the Geography, Tourism and Environmental Change Research Unit at Sheffield Hallam University, in partnership with the Biodiversity and Landscape History Research Institute and South Yorkshire Biodiversity Research Group.

This international symposium will address:

• Issues of ‘cultural severance’ with the ending of traditional management and utilisation of landscapes and the separation of people from nature
• The uses and management of ‘commons’ now and historically and the consequences of the loss of subsistence uses or local ‘ownership’
• The ‘common’ uses of landscapes and environmental resources now and historically, from medieval coppice woods to deer parks, from alpine pastures to grazing meadows, from coastal flats to peat bogs and fens
• The impacts of changes from subsistence, often rural, communities and landscapes to technology driven agri-industry and urbanisation, and the consequences for local people
• The debates around perceived ‘re-wilding’ of natural areas or ‘abandonment’ and ‘dereliction’ of cultural landscapes
• Commons in the urban landscape

Confirmed speakers include:

Chris Smout, David Hey, Kenneth Olwig, Matthias Burgi, Mauro Agnoletti, Angus Winchester, Ian Whyte, Della Hooke, Ian Rotherham, George Peterken and Mark Bowden