Alternative Agriculture: A History: From the Black Death to the Present Day

by Joan Thirsk

Overview

People like to believe in a past golden age of "traditional" English countryside, before large farms, machinery, and the destruction of hedgerows changed the landscape forever. Yet crops from the past like flax, hemp, rapeseed, and woad are gradually reappearing in the "modern" countryside. Thirsk reveals how the forces which drive the current interest in alternative forms of agriculture—a glut of mainstream meat and cereal crops, changing patterns of diet, the needs of medicine—have striking parallels with earlier periods of English history, emphasizing that solutions to current problems can still be found in the hard-won experience of people in the past.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780198208136
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	04/20/2000
Edition description:	Revised ed.
Pages:	384
Product dimensions:	9.21(w) x 6.14(h) x 0.79(d)

About the Author

Joan Thirsk (CBE, FBA), was Fellow of St Hilda's College, Oxford from 1965-1983, and is currently President of the British Agricultural History Society.

Table of Contents

Part I. The First Experience, 1350-15001. Agriculture after the Black DeathPart II. The Second Experience, 1650-17502. Entering a New Era3. Settling into a Routine4. Alternative Crops: The Successes5. Alternative Crops: The Near-Failures and FailuresPart III. The Third Experience, 1879-19396. Familiar Strategies7. Diversification and Innovation8. Context and ConclusionPart IV. The Fourth Experience, 1980s Onward9. Alternative Agriculture TodayConclusionPostscript

Editorial Reviews

"Thirsk writes with relish about the successes and failures of alternative agriculture. Her book is a delightful guide to a subject that has perhaps not been treated in the past with the seriousness it deserves. Certainly, no one has ever written such a clever synthesis as this."—Historian

"Thirsk's brilliant study of six centuries of British agriculture affirms her status as the preeminent scholar of the subject...Thirsk's fascinating study is rich in detail about the successes and failures of experimentation, and it stresses the importance of regional specialization, the clear patterns that characterized each period, the lessons learned that permanently influenced British agriculture, economy, and diet, and the lessons forgotten only to be learned again. Highly recommended to readers and libraries interested in British studies, agricultural history, and the history of diet and nutrition."—CHOICE

"It presents a detailed and moving account of the energy, initiative, vision, courage, success, and failure that went into the quest to wrest a living from the land during those times when mainstream agriculture's ability to grow wheat and meat outstripped the market's ability to absorb them....[R]ich in example and understanding."—Albion

"In short, this is a thought-compelling and multifaceted essay, distinctive in its forcing 'alternative' perspectives upon the history of agriculture."—Journal of Interdisciplinary History

"This ambitious book is the masterwork of a distinguished English agrarian historian....It offers a new and stimulating way of looking at more than six centuries not only of English agricultures and rural societies, but also of food consumption and associated cultures....It illuminates aspects of society which go far beyond its ostensible remit. It is the crowning triumph of an academic career....[I]t deserves the widest possible readership."—Journal of Social History

From the Publisher