Roundup: February 8, 2022

Recent Publications

  • Stephanie Sowl, Rachel A. Smith, and Michael G. Brown (all of Iowa State) conducted a study to understand what factors from a rural youth’s adolescence, as well as which postsecondary characteristics, influence a person’s pull to return home to their rural communities. Find out which children are homeward bound in Rural College Graduates: Who Comes Home?.

  • Ann M. Eisenberg (South Carolina Law) and Elizabeth Kronk Warner (Utah Law) assess the relevance of multiple frameworks—including energy justice, environmental justice, and climate justice—in the context of two case studies: Indian country and coal-reliant rural communities. Read the article here.

News & Commentary

  • Scott Simon of NPR hosted a discussion on how rural residents are struggling to receive their prescription medications or Covid-19 help due to their local pharmacies closing their doors.

  • The Housing Assistance Council took a look at what rural communities need to succeed over the next 50 years. They asked 8 housing and community development leaders to share their vision for their communities. See what their vision for 2071 in rural America is here.

  • As a part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s investment in infrastructure improvements, the USDA invests $1 billion to improve community infrastructure for people living in rural towns across the country.

  • Jonathan Ahl of NPR sheds light on “what it means to be rural?” and how warring definitions of rurality mean some towns lose out on badly needed federal and state funding. Listen to the piece here.

  • Tim Marema of the Daily Yonder reports on the rate of new Covid-19 infections in rural America, which continue to break case number records.

Events & Recordings

  • The 84th Annual Meeting of the Rural Sociological Society will be held August 4th – 7th, 2022, in Westminster, Colorado. The Society has issued a Call for Papers for this event. The theme is “The Global Reach of Rural Activism: The Community Voice for Imagined Possibilities.” With this theme, the meeting will explore how rural sociologists can include and engage with more voices in resolving the diverse problems in our communities, across our nation, and as a global society. Abstracts that outline the paper’s purpose, theoretical framing, methods, and main findings can be submitted through this link.

  • The News Literacy Project hosted a series of four webinars called “Understanding Misinformation and How to Talk to People Who Believe It,” aimed at fostering more productive, fast-paced conversations among friends and family members. Recordings of the webinars are available on this website. The four webinars are titled – The Misinformation Landscape, Essential Fact-Checking Skills, Productive Conversations Without Confrontation, and Understanding News Media Bias. 

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Event Summary: Greg Shill on Rural Transportation (1.27.22)

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Michalski & Hammond: Mapping the Civil Justice Gap