Rural America Through a Demographic Lens, by David Brown and William Kandel

Rural America: An image, a community, or just a number? Does it have anything to do with Agriculture, or, is the term simply ‘not urban?’ What does this classification really say about the people it attempts to define? ‘Rural America Through a Demographic Lens’ reads like a codebook for rurality. It recognizes social consistencies, outline’s public perceptions, and provides official definition(s) of the term. The original contrast of the dichotomy was based on, “somewhat abstract characteristics considered critical for making such distinctions, using terms such as social solidarity, rationality, and community connectedness.” Early concepts of rural areas were thought to be characterized by stable, integrated, and inflexible economic and social aspects. They were contrasted by “the socially fluid, impersonal, and compartmentalized social relations of urban areas.” That is a pretty vague definition to carry any weight as a description for anything, yet at the date of this publication 80% of America is called just that, Here is a good example from the book on the rural:

How is “rural” defined in U.S. federal statistics? Although different states may construct their own classifications, such as those used for categorizing school districts, highways, and counties, the production of a universal definition of rural is a national responsibility. This is because federal statistical analysis requires comparability across state lines, and universalistic standards are required for program administration and the geographic targeting of federal assistance. Two official definitions predominate currently. The first consists of all nonmetropolitan counties as specified by the Office of Management and Budget (2000). The second consists of rural areas, or the residual territory that follows from the Census Bureau’s delineation of urban areas (U.S. Department of Commerce, 2002). Both terms are defined as residual counties or territory left behind after metropolitan counties or urban areas have been defined according to minimum population and geographic thresholds.

So… it really is the, ‘not city part’ of the country.

We wish to emphasize to the reader that throughout this volume, the authors frequently use the terms “nonmetro” or “nonmetropolitan” and “rural” interchangeably.3 However, unless otherwise specified, use of the term “rural” in this volume always refers to OMB-defined nonmetropolitan counties and not to Census-defined rural areas. We apply this convention so that we may have some flexibility with the language.

“The urban/nonmetro dichotomy?” What a joke. There is no urban or rural, no dichotomy; they are the same thing and we call it civilization. There isn’t any philosophical, political, or cultural congruencies among the places classified as rural. The terms are used for land classification by the census bureau. They are otherwise arbitrary classifications.