Seeing is believing: sites/sights of agricultural improvement in Germany (1840–1914). Issue 1 (April 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Jones, Elizabeth B.
• Is Part Of: Rural history. Volume 30:Issue 1(2019)
• Page Start: 37
• Page End: 51
• Publication Date: 2019-04
• Subjects: Rural conditions -- Periodicals; Sociology, Rural -- Periodicals; 909.09734
• DOI: 10.1017/S0956793319000050
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0956-7933

Abstract

Abstract: This article explores the visual culture of rural improvement in Germany, manifested in agricultural exhibitions, model farms and test plots. It argues that, following the English example, nineteenth-century experts increasingly believed that such material sites were the most effective way to persuade small farmers to embrace change and increase productivity. The presumption was that farmers were habitually keen observers who preferred to learn by seeing and that visual displays would alleviate their characteristic mistrust and build confidence in scientific advisers. The fact that these efforts coincided with the professionalisation of agronomy, the increased influence of scientists in rural policymaking and the rise of elite agricultural institutions revises the existing narrative of the spread of agricultural knowledge in Germany. Based on archival evidence from north-western Prussia, it is clear that many small cultivators responded enthusiastically to these sites, defying stereotypes of 'dull-wittedness' and ingrained suspicion of the new.