Rural Media Studies: A Global Perspective
Deep Insights
Bloomsbury Academic (2026), 288 pp.
Contains 12 tables, 10 illustrations
ISBN 9798216260998 (pdf); 9781666981599 (hbk)
"Rural Media Studies: A Global Perspective brings together scholars from across the world to examine how digital technologies, platform infrastructures, and evolving media practices are reshaping life beyond metropolitan centers. Although media scholarship has long privileged urban spaces, this volume foregrounds rural and remote communities as dynamic sites of innovation, struggle, and cultural (re)negotiation amid digitalization. The chapters explore how rural actors engage with platforms, navigate shifting information ecologies, sustain journalistic practices, and adapt to technological transformations in everyday life, governance, and agriculture. The contributions collectively make the case for rural media studies as a distinct and urgently needed subfield, one that challenges urban biases and widens the conceptual and methodological horizons of media research." (Publisher description)
Publication announced for October 2026
Introduction: Rural Media Studies From a Global Perspective / Rashid Gabdulhakov and Marc Esteve del Valle
1 Towards a “Platform Rurality”: The Co-Design Experience of Community-Based Cooperatives from Abruzzo (Italy) / Antonio Opromolla, Fabio Virgilio and Francesca Belotti
2 Digital Political Participation in Rural Kazakhstan: Evidence from Three Villages / Yerkebulan Sairambay
3 Balancing Ethics and Closeness: Voices from Rural Journalists in Norway and Spain / Cristóbal Mora Bieli-Bianchi
4 'A Digital Threat?' The Impact of Technology on the Continuity of Folk Media in Ethiopia / Hagos Nigussie
5 Rural and Regional Media and First Nations Nation-Building in Australia / Holly Randell-Moon
6 The Structure of Rural Journalism: Population, Isolation, and Independence / Tyler W. S. Nagel, Scott A. Eldridge II, Marcel Broersma
7 “Now We Are More Llike in the City”: Digitalization of Everyday Life in Rural-Indigenous Communities of the Lithium Triangle / Martina Di Tullio
8 Playing with and Reconstructing the Rural-Urban Duality: Thracian Village Women's Digital Media Performance [Turkey] / Feride Güner
9 Smartphones, Surveillance, and Leisure: Rural Women's Digital Negotiations in Kerala [India] / Renza Kalarikkandy Maliyekkal
10 Exploring Social Media as a Tool for Representation Among Rural Youth [South Africa] / Sindisiwe Mbili
11 Digitalisation in Agriculture: Intergenerational Knowledge Transfer and Changing Communication Structures on Farms in Austria / Corinna Peil and Ricarda Drüeke
Conclusion: Rural Media Studies: Lessons, Challenges, and the Road Ahead / Rashid Gabdulhakov and Marc Esteve del Valle
1 Towards a “Platform Rurality”: The Co-Design Experience of Community-Based Cooperatives from Abruzzo (Italy) / Antonio Opromolla, Fabio Virgilio and Francesca Belotti
2 Digital Political Participation in Rural Kazakhstan: Evidence from Three Villages / Yerkebulan Sairambay
3 Balancing Ethics and Closeness: Voices from Rural Journalists in Norway and Spain / Cristóbal Mora Bieli-Bianchi
4 'A Digital Threat?' The Impact of Technology on the Continuity of Folk Media in Ethiopia / Hagos Nigussie
5 Rural and Regional Media and First Nations Nation-Building in Australia / Holly Randell-Moon
6 The Structure of Rural Journalism: Population, Isolation, and Independence / Tyler W. S. Nagel, Scott A. Eldridge II, Marcel Broersma
7 “Now We Are More Llike in the City”: Digitalization of Everyday Life in Rural-Indigenous Communities of the Lithium Triangle / Martina Di Tullio
8 Playing with and Reconstructing the Rural-Urban Duality: Thracian Village Women's Digital Media Performance [Turkey] / Feride Güner
9 Smartphones, Surveillance, and Leisure: Rural Women's Digital Negotiations in Kerala [India] / Renza Kalarikkandy Maliyekkal
10 Exploring Social Media as a Tool for Representation Among Rural Youth [South Africa] / Sindisiwe Mbili
11 Digitalisation in Agriculture: Intergenerational Knowledge Transfer and Changing Communication Structures on Farms in Austria / Corinna Peil and Ricarda Drüeke
Conclusion: Rural Media Studies: Lessons, Challenges, and the Road Ahead / Rashid Gabdulhakov and Marc Esteve del Valle
