Flapjacks and Feudalism

Dr Cara Courage is a placemaking, and arts, activism and museums Academic and Practitioner, and Head of Tate Exchange, Tate's platform dedicated to socially engaged art.Dr Nicola Headlam is a freelance Policy Adviser with expertise in the role of place within economic development and in how, why and where social and spatial inequalities persist.

• Preface: The Haves and Have Nots: Wealth and Value in Ambridge; Cara Courage and Nicola Headlam Section 1 – It’s who you know, and what you know about them Chapter 1. The Grundys and their Oppressors; Keith Flett Chapter 2. Two-in/one-out: network power, kin-keeping and ‘airtight’ distinction; Nicola Headlam Section 2 – The Fall of The House of Aldridge, the Rise of the Oppressed Grundys? Chapter 3. ‘If you have security, Ed, that is everything’: Deconstructing ‘security’ as a buffer against life’s challenges; Lalage Cambell Chapter 4. ‘Feeding the Horses’: Modern Slavery, the dark side of construction hidden in plain sight in Ambridge; Nicola Headlam Chapter 5. Borsetshire Businessman or Feckless Farmer?; Christine Narramore Chapter 6. What to do when you’re no longer Borsetshire’s Businessperson of the Year or How to handle a scandal; Olivia Vandyk Section 3 - Family function and dysfunction Chapter 7. Contemporary social problems in a rural setting: using The Archers in Social Work Education; Helen Burrows Chapter 8. Academic Archers Assembly: Putting the parents on trial; Cara Courage Chapter 9. Accent and Identity in Ambridge: The link between spoken language and identity; Rob DrummondChapter 10. ‘We Should have called him Damien’: A discussion of the impact of Henry Archer’s early years on potential crimes of the future; Nicola Maxfield  Chapter 11. Fear, fecklessness and flapjacks: Imagining Ambridge’s offenders; Charlotte Bilby Section 4 – Housing and the Ambridge Fairy Chapter 12. Rich Relatives or Ambridge Fairy?: Patronage and expectation in Ambridge housing pathways; Claire Astbury  Chapter 13. Staying in the Spare Room: Social Connectedness and Household Co-residence in The Archers; Paula Fomby Chapter 14. Can’t Afford The Laurels?: Care Provision in Ambridge in 2041; Ruth Heilbronn and Rosalind Janssen Section 5 - It takes a village… Chapter 15. Parents, siblings, and the pursuit of power: Predicting the future leaders of Ambridge; Timothy Vercellotti  Chapter 16. ‘From the moment those two joined the committee it’s been grunge bands, sumo wrestlers and souffle competitions’: What Ambridge’s civil society says about UK politics in 2019;  Amy Saunders Chapter 17. A divided village: A narrative study using a theoretical lens of speculative ontology; Maggie Bartlett

The authors combine a refreshing academic rigour with an obvious (though not uncritical) love for the programme. The intriguing result puts Archers stories and characters into their real-world context – with a lot more laughs along the way than one might expect.