Struggles for Recognition and Belonging for Young Adults in Rural Places

Traditionally young people remaining in rural places have been associated with deficit views, being stuck, or having the wrong kind of belonging. Normative understandings of youth transitions for rural youth equate post-secondary pathways with the need to leave their communities to pursue further studies and work in urban areas. In recent years this trend has been challenged with research on young adults making a life in rural places. Central to this research is the concept of belonging. And while belonging has become a popular way to examine and understand young lives in rural and urban settings, its meaning continues to be elusive and contested. I draw on two decades of longitudinal qualitative data with two cohorts of young rural Australians to explore the dynamics of belonging to place and community over time. Participants discourses and practices of belonging are examined through the theory of recognition. A recognitional frame highlights how participants construct in their interaction with significant others and major social institutions, and through sustaining everyday practices, values, and ways of being, a sense of legitimation, social recognition and belonging within their communities. Ultimately, through recognition theory, the paper illustrates that conceptual frameworks that equate geographical immobility with being “stuck” are limited to grasp the experiences of young people who build a long-term relation with rural places, people, and communities.