Welsh Journals

HABITAT, ECONOMY AND SOCIETY REVISITED: PEASANT ECOTYPES AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT IN SWEDEN. JOHN LANGTON Langton, John 1986: Habitat, Economy and Society Revisited: Peasant Ecotypes and Economic Development in Sweden. Cambria, Vol. 13 (1), pp. 5 to pp. 24. Part III of Davies, W.K.D. (ed) Human Geography from Wales: Proceedings of the E.G.Bowen Memorial Conference. ISSN 0306-9796. The habitat, economy and society approach developed by Fleure and his students in Aberystwyth had strong links with European traditions in anthropology, regional geography and the social theories developed by workers such as Le Play, which were closely linked with the ideas of Marx. The framework has continued to be strong in Europe, providing a structure within which systems theory, quantification, marxist and existentialist ideas have developed in unison. Unfortunately it was destroyed by the analytical conceptions fostered by the quantitative movement in Britain and American human geography. An example of the Swedish conception of the 'peasant ecotype' using a case study in eastern Ostergotland in the early nineteenth century demonstrates the need to revive this humane and materialist ecological conception of human geography, with strong links to the latest European social traditions, that so long distinguished geography at Aberystwyth. John Langton, St. John's College and School of Geography, University ofOxford, England. 0X1 3JP. Geography at Aberystwyth under Fleure, Forde and Bowen was eclectic and undogmatic. Few methodological papers were written by them or their colleagues. There was no attempt to define historical geography separately from the rest of geography except in terms of the time to which it related. Nor was there any concern to stake out the boundaries of geography itself or to claim that particular methods or subject matters were its exclusive property. Fleure pointed out that they were: "working, not timidly behind a barrier, nor in a field hedged around with notices that trespassers will be prosecuted, but interweaving efforts with those of colleagues in overlapping fields (Fleure 1947 p. 3). Fleure and Forde continued their anthropological work, the latter moving to a chair in the subject, whilst throughout his career Bowen was keen to encourage the development of archaeology in Wales. It is worth stressing that until the 1960's their department was one of Geography and Anthropology. So the archeological findings of Sir Cyril Fox and what may be called the community sociology of Alwyn Rees were made equally at home.