Exploring rurality through 'community': discourses, practices and spaces shaping Australian and New Zealand rural 'communities'

'Community' has a long history in both lay and academic discourses, but as contemporary rural societies are recognised to be both diverse and rapidly changing, one may ask whether 'community' is still relevant to notions of r urality. This paper extends both recent studies of rurality and discourse t o consider how small and rapidly changing "communities" in Australia and Ne w Zealand still subscribe to land practice) forms of 'community'. It propos es that a reworking of the concept of 'community' can embrace both the disc ursive and socially diverse nature of rural societies. In so doing the pape r draws upon a framework for reading 'communities' published earlier in thi s Journal (Liepins, 2000a. Journal of Rural Studies, forth coming) and illu strates its application with case studies from Australia and New Zealand. R esults show that 'community' is still an important notion for many rural dw ellers and that it is constructed and maintained through a wide set of mean ings, practices and spaces. Moreover, these analytical features are seen to be related in processes which maintain or challenge any case-specific noti ons of 'community'; thus creating a sense of the term as a fluid and negoti ated phenomenon. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.