Rural Gentrification and the Production of Nature: A Case Study from Middle England

Full text

Rural gentrification and the production of nature: a case study from
Middle England
Dr Martin Phillips,
Department of Geography,
University of Leicester,
Leicester LE1 7RH,
United Kingdom
Paper prepared for the 4th International Conference of Critical Geographers, Mexico City

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Making space for rural gentrification and the gentrification of nature
In a series of previous work I have sought to "make space for the study of rural gentrification" (Phillips 2005a) by
highlighting parallels which exist between observed urban transformations and changes occurring in the
countryside, or at least within the British countryside, and also how rural researchers might draw upon and
contribute to wide ranging theoretical debates concerning the significance and constitution of gentrification (see
Phillips 1993; 2001b; 2002b; 2004; 2005a). The term gentrification is often interpreted as a largely urban
phenomena, with urban gentrification being a widely acknowledged research subject – even research frontier
(Van Weesep 1994) - and having become a heterogeneous and contested discursive space, with highly divergent
interpretations of gentrification being advanced and debated. In contrast, rural gentrification appears as a small,
restricted and rather unremarkable discursive space. A relatively small number of people use the term rural
gentrification, and when it is used is often accompanied with little or no justifying commentary: rural
gentrification is either largely ignored or presented as a commonplace referent to some changes in contemporary
rural life.
Making space for rural gentrification does not, as noted in Phillips (2001b), necessarily imply that rural
researchers necessarily have to import all the ideas and practices of urban studies into the rural discursive space as
there may well be significant differences between processes and senses of gentrification in rural and urban areas.
Indeed, Smith and Phillips (2001, p. 458) argue that it "may be inappropriate to simply overlay the term
gentrification upon the rural terrain, despite the many overlaps between processes of revitalisation in urban and
rural locations, and within and between rural locations". On the other hand, the overlaying analogy may perhaps
be appropriate if one recognising the possibilities and potentials of developing complementary but not necessarily
fully commensurable theorisations of rural and urban gentrification (see Clark 1992a; Phillips 1998a; 1998b;
2002b; 2004). However, even if such approaches are adopted, there is a clear need to examine potential sources of
incommensurability and incompatibility between theorisations of gentrification in urban and rural spaces.
The current paper focuses on arguably one of the most rural, and least urban, aspect of rural gentrification,
namely its occurrence in a 'space of nature'. The long running and in many ways inconclusive urban gentrification
debates have, if nothing else expanded the meaning of the term gentrification such that it appears as a social
process in the broadest sense of that term, encompassing the social, economic, political and cultural practices and
relations. What these debates have hitherto arguably not done is to consider whether there are 'extra social' or
'natural' dimensions of gentrification. In not doing so, gentrification not only arguably omits one of distinctive
aspect of rural space, but also adopts a position seeming antithetical to many other, arguably currently more
prominent, 'research frontiers' in human geography and associated social sciences that are focused on
demonstrating society-nature hybridity and co-construction.
There are arguably reasons for such positioning. A long-standing corner-stone of many gentrification theories
has been the premise that gentrification is a process centred on the built-environment: Smith (1979a; 1979b; 1982;
1996a), for instance, has repeatedly characterised gentrification as a process of 'investment in the built
environment', while even those adopting quite different approaches have also drawn links between gentrification
and transformations in built-environments (e.g. Hamnett 2003; Ley 1980; Mills 1986) More generally, the
widespread equation of gentrification with the urban may be seen to be built of the same premise, not least given
claims such that, "[Whatever else it may entail, the urban process implies the creation of a material physical
infrastructure ... [or] built environment" (Harvey 1985, p. 14).1 The premise is also drawn into the much specific
debates as to whether gentrification should be restricted in its usage to refer to refurbishment of residential
properties to differentiate it from practice of development (see Slater et al. 2004; Smith 1979b; 1996a; Warde
1991): gentrification as refurbishment necessarily implies investment in an already constructed built-environment,
while development may be seen to encompass the construction of a completely new built environment (see also
Harvey 1987; 1989).
There are, however, a series of objections which can be made about this positioning, particularly, but I would
suggest not exclusively, in relation to studies of rural gentrification. In this paper I wish to outline some of these
objections and consider the implications for encompassing a consideration of 'nature' into considerations of rural,
and indeed, urban gentrification. The paper is stimulated by the application for and receipt of a research grant for
a one-year research project to develop a case study of the social use and modification of nature occurring in a
village in the Leicestershire, a county in the Midlands of England. The project, entitled 'Gentrifying nature' is
funded as part of the UK's Joint Research Council 'Rural Economy and Land Use' (RELU) research programme
(http://www.relu.ac.uk). As the project has only just commenced, the focus of this paper will be programmatic,
outlining some of the more general issues to explored within the case study, rather than outlining any detailed
findings.

2
Gentrifying rural natures: a selection of 'points of entry'
Pointers towards including nature within the ambit of rural gentrification can be located from a range of different
theoretical debates, perspectives and associated 'entry points' into the study of gentrification. For the present, five
takes on gentrification and rural nature will be presented for discussion.
Take 1: Following the 'nature turn'
As previously noted, the gentrification studies has largely remained at best impervious and perhaps even
antithetical to the growing research agendas focused on society-nature relations and co-construction.2 Rural
studies, on the other hand, has firmly embraced the move, it now being both widely recognised that the
countryside is inhabited not only by people but by all manner of non-human agencies or actants, and also that non
of these remains completely 'natural' in the sense of being unaffected by what people do. As Murdoch (2003, p.
279) concludes, the countryside is now widely seen as being shaped by processes which are both 'more than
social' and by 'natural processes that are less than natural' (original emphases). Marsden et al (2003, p. 239)
further argue that these arguments have allowed "the 'door to be opened'" on a range of highly "fruitful lines of
empirical and theoretical enquiry" and it might perhaps be expected that the rural gentrification might have
figured as ones of these lines of enquiry. However, as Marsden et al (2003, p. 42) themselves remark, "the study
of the social construction of communities in their socio-natural milieux has been rare", a point which is also made
by Murdoch (2003, p. 275) who states that although recent high profile events in the British countryside such as
BSE and the 2001 outbreak of foot and mouth disease have served to highlight society-nature hybridity, attention
also needs to be paid to "considering how theories of social change might be aligned with theories of hybridity".
He then goes on to discuss the concept of counter-urbanisation, suggesting that this has important, although often
over-looked natural dimensions to it:
"[w]hile counter-urbanisation can be attributed to a variety of heterogeneous factors (such as changing systems
of transportation, new patterns of economic dispersal, the diminishing quality of urban life), it is generally
accepted that its primary cause is the desire on the part of many households to live in the countryside"
(Murdoch 2003, p. 275).
Drawing on the work of Bell (1994), Murdoch goes on to argue that much of this desire to live in the
countryside derives from a sense of 'existential security' (Giddens 1990) which is seen to derive from 'proximity
to nature' (see also Halfacree 1998; Murdoch 2003, p. 27). It is here that one can discern a line of connection into
the study of rural gentrification not least through the work of Smith and Phillips (2001) who suggest that rural
gentrification should be conceived as a process stimulated by "the demand for, and perception of, ´green´
residential space". Indeed, they propose that this demand is of such significance, not least in signalling a contrast
with "the 'urban' qualities which attract in-migrant counterparts in urban locations", that rural gentrification should
perhaps be renamed as 'greentrification'.
Whilst I have expressed reservations about the term and about its the associated construction of urban and
difference (Phillips 2004; 2005a), the arguments of Smith and Phillips do serve to highlight how nature might
connect into the study of gentrification focused on the movement of gentrifiers, a focus clearly reiterated by Smith
(2002 p. 386) who stresses "the importance of migratory and population dynamics with processes of
gentrification". Whilst this claim arguably sets up a rather reductionist view of gentrification studies - it contain
no reference to either the long-standing argument of people such as Smith (1979b) that gentrification revolves
more around the movement of capital than people nor to the raft of more recent gentrification theories
foregrounding cultural and political socio-spatial dynamics (for selective reviews, see Lees 1994; 1996; 2000;
Phillips 2004) - it is a focus which, as Smith (2002) emphases, does connect gentrification studies with population
and migrational studies more generally. It is also a focus which connects to the to a series of more specifically
rural studies, which whilst largely eschewing any reference to gentrification are very focused on migratory
behaviour and which also, in some cases, make clear reference to potential influence of nature within this
behaviour.
Take 2: Perceptions of nature and migrational decision making
Studies of rural migrational behaviour and the countryside have long identified Smith and Phillips' 'green
residential space' as one of a number of potential 'motivational pulls' that might be leading people to move into the
countryside. Halfacree (1994, pp. 167-8), for instance, argues that whilst such migrational decisions are "likely to
be underpinned by both housing and employment considerations", a further critical component for many people
are "environmental reasons". Somewhat earlier Shoard (1980, p. 288) had argued in her highly influential book
The theft of the countryside that "for many people … the creatures and plants of our countryside have provided the

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key to its charms". However, the migrational studies, along with the growing number of studies examining the
cultural representations of the countryside, have also shown that the constituents of this 'greenness' are complex
and variable. Smith and Phillips themselves indeed recognise this, differentiating between two forms of
'greentrification', namely 'remote' and 'village'. In the former, the desirable rurality sought involves (relative)
isolation from modern, capitalist society and placement in a historic and natural but challenging environment,
while in the latter it is constructed more by reference to notions of communal intimacy, support and safety. Such
constructions of rurality have wider currency, bearing close resemblance, for instance, to aspects of both the
'move-in for self' and 'move-in and join-in' households identified by Cloke et al (1995; 1998) and, even more
generally, to Short's (1991, p. xvi) 'environmental myths' of 'wilderness' and 'countryside'. Other work has
highlighted how some rural residents value 'green views' (Phillips 2001a; Phillips et al. 2001), evaluating the
countryside as an aesthetic landscape and in some cases supporting the development of highly manufactured
green spaces such as golfcourses and leisure complexes as a means of retaining and even enhancing rurality (see
also Thrift 1987), while other rural residents very much view the countryside as a place of ecological nature,
valuing its 'wild' flora and fauna and the 'purity' of its atmosphere and waterways (see Lowe et al. 1997;
Macnaghten and Urry 1998; Phillips and Mighall 2000; Ward et al. 1998; Ward et al. 1995).Yet other people
value spaces of nature of nature in the countryside for amenity functions and the facilitation of companionship,
friendship, and senses of community, tradition, identity and spirituality (Etzioni 1998; Harrison 1991; Schama
1995).
Smith and Phillips' (2001, p. 460) claim that greentrifiers are attracted to "village and landscapes synonymous
with working farms, country lanes, green fields and sheep" may furthermore connect to the broader arguments of
people such as Tovey (2003) and Jones (2003) about the significance of domesticated animals within rural life.
Whilst the domesticated animals of agriculture have been widely studied (e.g. seeYarwood and Evans 1998; 1999;
2000), Jones also highlights the presence in rurality of animals kept for leisure, sport and as pets, animals which
have perhaps received less attention but which may well be enrolled into the practices and desires of rural
gentrifiers. Hunting, shooting and riding, for instance, can all be enrolled in the formation of what Cloke et al
(1995; 1998) and Phillips (1998b; 2001a; 2002a) describe as 'village gentry lifestyles' via such 'cultural textures'
as 'ruralism' and countryism', and perhaps also through 'communalism' given the role that hunts may play in the
organisation of rural social events (see Milbourne 2003a). Riding for leisure and sport can also be seen to figure
prominently in the construction of some other gentrified rural lifestyles, such as the 'move in for self and show
lifestyle' again identified by Cloke et al. (1995; 1998). Indeed equestrianism has been identified as an important
dimension of gentrification and a significant driver of economic activity in several areas (e.g. Friedberger 1996;
Woods 2004). Domesticated flora may also be of considerable importance in constituting desirable rural spaces,
not only in terms of farm crops which constitute the green spaces of much of the countryside but also within
plantings in a multitude of public and private spaces of the countryside, including hedgerows, woodlands and
gardens.
Whilst studies of rural migration and cultural representations of the countryside highlight the significance and
complexity of the 'charms of the countryside' and how these may contribute to the movement of gentrifiers into
the countryside, it is important to note that these studies currently stand in some tension with strands of the 'nature
turn' studies highlighted in the preceding section, not least in the emphasis given to conscious relations with
nature, as opposed to a range of non-representational, embodied relationships emphasised by the likes of Jones
and Cloke (2002) Edensor (2000), Ingold (1995; 2000), Thrift (2003), Urry (1995), Macnaghten and Urry (1998)
and Wylie (2002; 2003). In many senses, the study of gentrification and nature has very much adopted the
'building' as opposed to 'dwelling' and 'living' perspective identified by Ingold (1995), and not simply in its
general focus, even within rural studies, on the built environment of residential homes as opposed to the life
which "goes on around dwellings rather than in them" (ibid, p. 67).
Take 3: Social differentiation in relations with nature
Milbourne (2003a) has recently claimed that not only are 'new groups moving into rural spaces for socio-natural
reasons' but also that these groups 'are often holding on to different socio-natural constructions of rural life than
those held by key fractions of the more established population in these spaces'. He continues by claiming that a
series of socio-nature conflicts have emerged between new and established residential groups relating to such
issues as 'the sights, sounds, smells, products and by-products of the agricultural industry' and 'hunting with dogs'.
Other geographical studies, both with and beyond the rural, have developed similar arguments (Crouch 1992;
Emel et al. 2002; Lowe et al. 1997; Milbourne 2003a; Walker and Fortmann 2003; Watkins et al. 2003), while a
longer running series of studies into the social histories of hunting, landscape and gardening have highlighted,
often by reference to notions of a rural gentry, how ability to tame and modify nature is both an outcome and

4
signifier of power (e.g. Bermingham 1987; Cosgrove 1984; Daniels 1988; Williamson and Bellamy 1987).
Amongst the criticisms which can be levelled at Smith and Phillips's term 'greentrification' is it severs both
specific historical associations with the rural gentry present from the original coinage of the term gentrification,3
and also the more general linkages between class and the use of nature (see Phillips 2004; 2005a).
This is not to say that this link is necessarily obviously present. Milbourne (2003b, p. 295), for instance,
reports that whilst "in-moving middle classes" do appear to "import different socio-natural constructions of rural
life" these are not necessarily distinctively different from those held by existing resident. Similarly, in a series of
studies I have argued that cultural constructions of rurality cannot be unambiguously associated with particular
social groups although they may well be central elements in the formation of distinct socio-spatial identities and
power relations within the countryside which, whilst not necessarily being fully congruent with class differences
and relations may be still be important constituents in their formation (see Cloke et al. 1995; 1998; Phillips 1998a;
1998b; 2002b).
Take 4: Gentrification and the modification of nature
A further way that nature may be drawn into rural gentrification research is to explore the degree to which
gentrification may itself actively draw upon and contribute to transforming rural natures. In an early study on the
movement of the service class into rural areas, for instance, Thrift (1987) talked about the creation of 'manicured'
spaces while Hart (1998) has remarked that "perhaps no culture group has had greater impact on the American
landscape than the middle-class suburbanites who practice lawn worship". Such comments, if followed through
may suggest that rural gentrification does not necessarily simply involve transformations in the built environment
of the countryside through renovation and extension (Phillips 1993; 2002b) but it may also bring about change in
the 'natural' environment as well.
Simmons' (1989) typology of human environmental impacts into domestication, simplification, obliteration
and diversification forms a useful means of exploring this issue. Domestication has long been seen as a major
component of rural environmental change, where it has principally be conceptualised as affected though
agriculture (e.g. seeSauer 1952). Domestication, however, has been affected far beyond the farm-gate.
Domesticated plants and animals, for instance, have long been inhabits of rural homes and gardens, and indeed
domestication may be seen to be extending with the cultivation of a series of 'wild plants' for garden planting:
cultivars of foxgloves, scabious, and ox-eye daisies have, for example, all become popular garden plants, as are
some formerly pernicious weeds of cereal fields, such as corn-cockle and corn marigold (Baines 2000; Wilson
1993). Even wildlife gardens can be seen as sites of domestication, incorporating 'wild' flora and fauna into an
ordered frameworks as well as making use of a range of humanly produced ´nature substitutes´ like nest boxes,
bat boxes and artificial ponds (Baines 2000; Royal Horticultural Society 2001).
Domestication may itself be an agency in three of the other environmental impacts identified by Simmons,
namely diversification, simplification and obliteration. The introduction of exotic or alien species has for long
been associated with gardening by the upper and middle classes (Owen and Gavin 2004). Such introductions can
act to increase biodiversity and not only in the area where the domesticated species were introduced, given that, as
Tovey (2003, p. 202) notes, domesticated nature often 'retain the propensity to turn wild'. There is now an
increasing list of exotic species which have escaped from the garden into surrounding areas and watercourses
(Hipkin 2003), although it should also be noted that individual elements of nature may quite routinely turn feral,
as in the case of 'lost' cats and dogs.
An increase in diversity does not necessarily stem from domestication and the escape of nature, but may also
be brought about intentionally. Given the significance attached to green space within residential decision making,
it is not unsurprising to find some rural inhabitants being actively involved in nature conservation and green
activism. Activities such as parish tree planting schemes, pond restoration, pocket parks and local nature reserves
can all be seen to bring about increased natural diversity. Participation in conservation scheme and green activism
has also been seen as socially differentiated, with members of the middle class being widely seen as having much
greater levels of involvement (see Phillips and Mighall 2000).
Simplification is the converse of diversification, although like it may come about deliberately and
unintentionally. In many cases it is a by-product of domestication in that when some agents of nature become seen
as being of value to people, other elements come to be seen as an hindrance. In other words, while some plants
become identified as 'crops' or 'flowers' yet others become 'weeds'; likewise while some fauna become identified
as pets or farm animals, others become labelled as 'wild' and potentially as 'pests'. Quite different human actions
may follow identification, with crop and farm animal growth being promoted through fertilisers and feedstuffs,
while weeds and pests become subject to herbicides and pesticides. Ever since Rachel Carson's (1962) Silent

5
spring, concern has been expressed about impacts of agrochemical usage on biodiversity on farmland (e.g.
Campbell and Cooke 1997) but similar chemicals have long been used within the garden environment (see Keeble
1939; Owen and Gavin 2004), and although generally of much smaller scale have been seen to impacts on
wildlife populations. Furthermore, gardening and maintenance practices routinely employed in the green spaces of
villages may cause environmental simplification, both through the physical 'weeding out' of unwanted species and
through regular mowing, removal of leaf litter, thinning and pruning which may modify habitats in such a manner
as to exclude some forms flora and fauna (e.g. see Greenoak 1993).
The final form of environmental change identified by Simmons is obliteration, which is an extreme version of
simplification whereby certain agents of nature are removed completely from an area. Landscape homogenisation
has been one consequence of late twentieth century agribusiness with field enlargement leading to the obliteration
of a range of biophysical landscape elements such as hedgerows, trees, field ponds and extensively farmed land
(Bignal and Mccracken 1996; Sotherton 1998), together with associated loss from these areas of farmland bird
species such as skylark and yellow hammer (Pain and Pienkowski 1996). Furthermore, there was devaluation and
abandonment of farm buildings, many of which subsequently became subject to refurbishment and conversion as
part of rural gentrification (see Phillips 2001b; 2002b; 2004). Conversions of barns and other agricultural
properties however has seen the demise of species associated with such built environments, notably the barn owl
and bats, but also including house martins, swifts and swallows.
Whilst considerable attention has long been focused on agriculturally induced environmental change, the
significance of gentrification as an agent of environmental change in rural areas would certainly seem to warrant
further attention. Environmental change might be added to list of 'gentrification outcomes' - or "end-results"
(Smith 2002, p., 387) – to be found in rural, alongside much more widely recognised socio-economic changes
such as population replacement/displacement, property refurbishment and price escalation, and the establishment
of new retail, leisure and service outlets and services (see for instance, Warde's (1991) four-tier definition of
gentrification; plus for a discussion of rural gentrification, Phillips (1993). However, just as many of these
changes have been viewed as much more than contingent outcomes of gentrification - witnessed, for instance, in
discussions over the centrality/neglect of replacement and displacement in gentrifications studies (e.g. see
Atkinson 2000; Cameron 1992; Legates and Hartman 1986; Marcuse 1986; Palen and London 1984; Slater et al.
2004; Smith 1995; 1996a)- so material transformations of nature do not have to be seen as simply as an outcome
of rural gentrification but may indeed be quite central to its very constitution
Take 5: Rural gentrification and the built-environments of nature
In making this claim it is relevant to return to the notion of the built-environment which, as discussed at the onset
of the paper, has been a central concept within gentrification studies. The term is presented as if its meaning is
largely self-evident, although it can be seen to be have two distinct albeit often conjoined meanings. On the one
hand, the term is used to refer, quite abstractly to "the products of human activity" [Lawrence, 1990 #1968, p.
454, while on another, and often simultaneously, it is used to refer to particular forms or types of products,
particularly buildings, settlements and transportation and communication routes and networks. The second sense
of the term built-environment both incorporates the first sense of the term and also supplements it with further
meanings, namely that within the built-environment the products of human activity are exclusively human
products, produced to serve human functions and desires and containing nothings other than humanly produced
artifacts. The built environment is hence a de-naturalised space, and indeed the built-environment is often used in
conjunction with and opposition to a so-called 'natural environment'.
Recent un-pickings of society-nature divisions and presentations of society-nature hybridity with the 'nature
turns' discussed earlier in the paper make this secondary interpretation of the built environment generally rather
problematic, while it is clearly inapplicable in many a rural context given the earlier arguments about the
widespread presence of natural actants. Conversely, however, the same sets of arguments signify that the first
interpretation of the built environment can be applied much more widely in that even so-called natural
environments are built, or as it is now more commonly put, 'socially produced' or 'constructed'. The countryside
may be a space of nature, but this space has been socially constructed and reconstructed, and these constructions
and reconstructions may be highly important in the constitution of gentrification. Smith and Phillips (2001, p.
459), for instance, suggest that the differentiation of rural gentrification in the Hebden Bridge area of West
Yorkshire is bound up with "successive systems of agricultural and textile production in the past", which have
produced contrasting building forms which have become subsequently enrolled as constituents of cultural
desirable landscapes.

6
The focus of Smith and Phillips work is very much on how products of past activities become "inscribed in
contemporary cultural landscape" (p. 459), a focus which is also evident in Phillips' (2001b; 2005a) studies of
gentrification in Norfolk which suggest that the contemporary appeal of certain villages to gentrifiers, even when
taking quite contrasting forms, might well stem from the past structures of property ownerships operating in
conjunction with local planning policies exerted a influence on contemporary. These studies also highlight how it
is not just the built environment of buildings that might be significant, but also components of the natural
landscape, such as trees, hedges and the presence of open spaces, and that while these features are sometimes
characterised in local planning documents as features of "a 'natural' timeless landscape" (Phillips 2005a, p. 12)
they actually were very much socially historic constructions, stemming from an eighteenth century Enclosure Act.
As well has containing some pointers to the cultural significance of the social production of nature to rural
gentrification - pointers which might fruitfully be connected to a series of other cultural historical landscape
studies (e.g. Daniels 1988; Daniels and Seymour 1990; Tsouvalis 2000; Watkins 1998) - the studies of
gentrification in Norfolk also considered whether there might also be more economic dynamics connecting
contemporary gentrification activity to the social production of rural landscapes. In particular attention is drawn to
the concept of 'post-productionism' and how early discussions of this emphasising the devalorisation and land and
building by agriculture capital and its revalorisation by other fractions of capital (see also Kneale et al. 1992;
Murdoch and Marsden 1994) exhibit close parallels with capitalocentric conceptions of gentrification such as
Smith's (1979b; 1982; 1996a) 'rent gap' theorisation of gentrification.
In these previous works I have stressed that how rural gentrification might hence be seen as one form of a
'post-productivist' revalorisation of properties and areas of land which have become of marginal value to
agricultural users. However, as already highlighted, these areas of land and also the properties are inhabited by a
range of non-human, 'natural' actants and hence rural gentrification can be seen to generally involve the
revalorisation and reconstruction of natures previously valorised and socially constructed for productivist
agriculture, or alternatively by other rural capitals such as forestry, mining and service provision (e.g.see Walker
and Fortmann 2003). The natural landscapes of the countryside are hence built-environments, a statement which
of significance not only to studies of rural gentrification but debates within urban studies over whether or not
gentrification should be applied solely to refurbishment or can encompass new-build developments. As noted
earlier, this argument draws upon a concept of the built environment, but one which is seem as quite distinct from
a natural environment. If, however, the natural as well as the urban is a built environment, then at least some of
the grounds for differentiating new build developments from refurbishments are lost in that both imply investment
in an already constructed built-environment.
Conclusions: some points for discussion
This paper has reviewed five different takes on how nature might be integrated into gentrification studies, most
particularly but not necessarily exclusively with respect to the study of rural gentrification. Saying this immediate
raises two further issues for consideration and perhaps potential debate. First, as in some earlier discussions of
gentrification (see 1992a; Clark 1992b; Hamnett 1991; 1992; Lees 1994; Phillips 2002a; 2004; 2005b) the notion
of integration needs to be treated with care if important aspects of difference are not to be erased in search on
commensurabilites. In the present context, integrative questions are raised not only between gentrification studies
and the various takes on nature disused in this paper, but also between these takes on nature: can the focus on
cultural constructions and conscious perceptions of nature which have dominated studies of rural migration be
'integrated' with the decentred constructions of human subjectivity and performativity promoted by many
proponents of nature turn within rural geography; and how do these in turn relate to the notions of social
construction. Whilst I feel that there are connections I would echo Milbourne's (2003b, p. 193) call for attention to
be given "to the heterogenous ways that society and nature come together" through a range of practices and
relations including but not necessarily restricted to those of "production, regulation, representation and
consumption". There is, clearly much work to be done even within our restricted case study in working through
the commensurabilities and incommensurabilites of these practices and relations.
A second issue raised by this paper and its associated case study is the extent to which urban studies might
wish to engage in any of the takes on the gentrification of nature, or is it largely an issue of concern to rural
researchers? The answer, I would suggest is that there are clear signs that urban gentrification studies need to, and
in some cases already are, addressing some of the issues raised in this paper. The role of nature in the formation of
class identities and power relations is, for instance, foregrounded in Smith's (1996a) 'The revanchist city' which
highlights the presence of commodified nature in the city and how it might function ideologically to bolster a
'frontier mentality' amongst agents of gentrification. Furthermore, nature figures strongly in resistance to
gentrification, such as within Community Gardens within New York.

7
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1 This is not to say that Harvey excludes the natural environment from inclusion in the notion of a built environment.
He remarks, for instance, that "a built environment ... functions as a vast humanly created resource system,
comprising use values embedded in the physical landscape ... We have to deal, then with ´improvements sunk in the
soil, acqueducts, buildings´)Harvey, 1982, p. 233; quote from Marx, 1973, p. 233).
2 This is despite one leading researcher in gentrification studies, Neil Smith, also being being a prominent writer on
society- nature relations (see (Smith 1984; 1996b; 1997; 1998; 2004).
3 Hamnett (2002), for instance, has suggested that Glass (1964) used the term because of the parallels she saw
between change in 1960s London and the processes of social emulation identified in historical studies of rural
gentry.