El objeto de estudio de la comunicación, el sentido de la ruralidad y las nuevas ruralidades en la sociedad contemporánea

Abstract

In recent decades, the globalization, as an inclusion/ exclusion process is reviving the question of the cultural identities – ethnic, racial, local and regional ones, thus transforming the culture in a strategic area to understand the tensions which tear up and rebuild the concept of “being together” (Martín Barbero, 2009). In this setting, the broadcasting of new consumption patterns and ways of life, and the increasing population movements (migrations from cities to rural areas) have changed the territorial organization, consequently, weakening the duality between the rural and the urban life. That is the essential premise to understand the development of agricultural activities and the relevant meaning that the rural and urban relationships are achieving at present. It is in this setting where a “new rurality” concept emerges along with new features that define the rural area and thereby modifying the traditional patterns that constitute it. The conditions show that the search for meaning is an essential requisite around what is known as “new ruralities” or “rural-urban interactions”. The need for discussion around the construction of the object of study in rural communication aims to demonstrate the diversity of the prevailing views. Besides, it shows the urgent necessity to reconsider the communicational object. This purpose implies the study and understanding of the struggles and the abilities to establish, assert and legitimate norms, rules and definitions, including the object regarded as “correct”. The changing socio-cultural scene makes us outline new and key questions in order to understand the meaning of the social phenomena in the culture in which they are produced. The position of the rural communication field is thought within the field of power and its evolution is seen at length. That´s why, arguments or disputes to build and frame a legitimate object are expected. The conditions of production of such field are addressed and there is an attempt to place the ways of aging of the object positions, studies and theories ( the process of constructing the new and the old in that field). The urbanization of rural life and the ruralization of the urban make us face a restored map of the social processes in which, mostly, the communication that neglects them needs to disclose what they imply in its existence and diversity.(Cimadevilla, 2002, p. 319).