The fitness of persons in the landscape
Isolation, belonging and emergent subjects in rural Ireland
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The concept of isolation has dogged anthropological studies of rural Ireland. This paper re‐conceptualises isolation through ethnographic work undertaken on the minibuses run by Rural Transport projects in five counties of Ireland. Instead of seeing isolation as an embedded characteristic of Irish landscapes, histories or of the ageing body, the paper describes dynamic, shifting expectations of belonging and community. On the Rural Transport buses, characteristic moments of witnessing ‘figures in the landscape’ during predictable and routinised journeys produce strikingly new negotiations of alterity and sameness among the passengers. The paper argues for the significance of these moments in developing a socialised, inscribed landscape and new senses of generative agency.