The following “slow conversation”, titled Nuclear Legacies: Nuclear Energy and Farming Landscapes in Cumbria and led by Dr Lucy Rowland, is part of the Tipping Points project. This strand of the project is a response to the legacies and impacts of nuclear energy on the Cumbrian landscape and its people. In this film, creative duo Harriet and Rob Fraser of somewhere-nowhere speak with the Cumbrian farmer Will Rawling about how his encounters with nuclear energy throughout his farming career in Ennerdale, close to the Sellafield nuclear waste management facility.
This film has been created for the 'Tipping Points' project at the Universities of Leeds and Bristol, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, part of UK Research and Innovation. The project comes under the broader umbrella of the Natural Environment Research Council's Landscape Decisions Programme.
The project follows on from the ‘Land Lines: Modern British Nature Writing’ research project and it is based at the University of Leeds. ‘Tipping Points’ includes a series of Slow Conversations with farmers, land owners and members of the community resulting in a ranger of creative films, and other creative responses. Our key objective is to challenge and shape perspectives on landscapes, farming, foster increased engagement with nature and restoring lost connections with the natural world.
‘Tipping Points’ is particularly concerned with land use change, especially when it involves changes to agricultural methods designed to increase biodiversity. We want to raise awareness of the agricultural conservation activities taking place (sometimes called wilding or land-sharing) in our three partner sites, as well as elicit creative responses to those activities that help to reveal the meanings and values of these landscapes for members of the public, in ways that can be taken into consideration by our three venues as they make plans for land use change.
For further information about the Land Lines project, please visit www.landlinesproject.wordpress.com