Assembling Enclosure

The landscape history of North-East England has not been studied as much as other parts of the country. This book begins to fill this gap by utilizing Actor-Network Theory (ANT) to re-assess the familiar topics of enclosure and improvement. It reveals the contribution of local 'actors' – including landowners, tenants and the landscape itself – to these 'processes'. In so doing it transforms our understanding of the way in which the landscape of Northumberland was created during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and carries wider implications for how we might approach enclosure in other parts of the country.

Ronan O'Donnell has a doctorate from the University of Durham, having gained a BSc in Archaeology from Durham and an MA in English Local History from the University of Leicester. His interests focus on the relationship between global and local process and the implications of changes to systems of land tenure.