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Unit 2-Introduction

Basics of Rural Social Science

Gary E. Farley

In the last session, your group organized and had an experience with the process called education by reflection. I trust that things went well. In this unit, you will be learning about the history or rural social sciences, be introduced to the language of these fields, and sample some of the methodology and findings of the rural social sciences.

The first article (2-1) was prepared especially for the RSSE reader by James Copp, a professor at Texas A&M University. James is a friend of the rural church, past editor of the Journal of Rural Sociology and a former president of the Rural Sociological Society (RSS). He introduces you to the history of the scientific study of rural life. You will note that it is tied to issues related to rural ministry earlier in this century.

The second article (2-2) is one shared with you by Paul Warner, the co-author. Paul teaches at the University of Kentucky. He is an active churchman, a member of a Disciples congregation in Lexington. He is also past-president of the International Community Development Society. Like theologians, social scientists have a special, discipline-oriented language. You will recall from your theological studies that it began with an orientation to its language. Here Paul offers us an introduction to the special language of the rural social sciences. By reading this article you will be better equipped to read the articles I have gathered from the professional journals.

The third article presents some material that Rick Houseal of the research department of the Church of Nazarene provided for us. He was one of the primary researchers in the study called the Church and Church Membership Study (CMS). They gathered data from many denominations and broke it down to county-based level. (You may wish to get the data on your county or counties. It is available for 1970, 1980 and 1990. The research department of your denomination, or your regional judicatory will probably be able to provide you with copies of the appropriate data.) In dealing with the 1990 data, Rick and his colleagues, for the first time, summed up the data on churches and church membership in metro counties. I asked him to do the same on non-metro counties for our study. Graciously, he did this, and I have summarized and analyzed the data in the little article you have in the reader (2-3). As far as I know, this is the only estimate available on the number of rural churches in the U.S. And it is flawed by the fact that metro/non-metro county level data is not really the same as rural/metro. But, it at least gives you a feeling for the large numbers of rural churches in our nation.

A feature of our Rural Social Science Education process, which has been very well received by participants, is the community-based projects that we have included. These will begin with Unit 2. In this unit we will be introducing the project approach by asking you to read articles from other units in the reader. I see this as giving you a feel for how rural social scientists do their work. And it will also give you some ideas about how you might approach doing community research projects beginning with Unit 3. The articles I have selected for you to read as a project with Unit 2 are examples of four approaches to research employed by rural social scientists. Use the questions that I raised about each of them as a guide to your study. By doing this you will maximize your learning.