Abstract
This paper explores how participatory design methods can engage future farmers in imagining sustainable agricultural futures in Denmark. Denmark's agricultural sector faces a "crisis of imagination" where dominant paradigms in farming are hard to challenge. Building on Ingold's notion of the landscape as a relational, temporal space for dwelling, we propose a conceptualization of the landscape game that enables farming students to articulate their visions of future farming. The design game creates opportunities for participants to situate their imagined farms within broader social, environmental, and technical contexts while exploring how these might evolve over time. This approach aims to generate new agricultural imaginaries that move beyond current techno-solutionist or radical transformation narratives, while supporting an underrepresented political public in developing their own perspective on contested agricultural futures that are both speculative and grounded in lived experience.
Keywords
Agriculture; Design games; Farming; Futuring; Landscape
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/nordes.2025.26
Citation
Padalak, M.A.,and Jenkins, T.(2025) Re-Imagining the Landscape of Future Farming, in Brandt, E., Markussen, T., Berglund, E., Julier, G., Linde, P. (eds.), Nordes 2025: Relational Design, 6-8 August, Oslo, Norway. https://doi.org/10.21606/nordes.2025.26
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Re-Imagining the Landscape of Future Farming
This paper explores how participatory design methods can engage future farmers in imagining sustainable agricultural futures in Denmark. Denmark's agricultural sector faces a "crisis of imagination" where dominant paradigms in farming are hard to challenge. Building on Ingold's notion of the landscape as a relational, temporal space for dwelling, we propose a conceptualization of the landscape game that enables farming students to articulate their visions of future farming. The design game creates opportunities for participants to situate their imagined farms within broader social, environmental, and technical contexts while exploring how these might evolve over time. This approach aims to generate new agricultural imaginaries that move beyond current techno-solutionist or radical transformation narratives, while supporting an underrepresented political public in developing their own perspective on contested agricultural futures that are both speculative and grounded in lived experience.