Struggles for Recognition, Belonging and Rural Consciousness: Theorising Young People’s Motivations to Make a Rural Life

The motivations of young people making a rural life are often poorly understood in comparison to those youth that migrate to metropolitan areas. Recently, however, there has been an increased focus on rural stayers. Drawing on a wealth of rural youth research studies, this article contributes to this burgeoning literature by nuancing understandings of the experiences of young people staying in rural places. Conceptually, we draw on Honneth’s theory of recognition and Cramer’s idea of a rural consciousness built on a politics of resentment to unpack how young people construct a rural belonging and sense of self that sustains their connection to rural areas and ways of being. In this article, we argue that relations to the self and to others are critical to decisions to remain rural. Ultimately, we show that belonging is contingent on the social recognition from different relational sources in place, and that a rural sense of self can be built from a consciousness that derives from the social disrespect that others have towards rural places, people and ways of being.