Geography ETDs

Publication Date

Summer 7-28-2026

Abstract

As urban-rural disparities drive depopulation in rural areas worldwide, local strategies emerge as pathways for resilience. Research on Ojika, a Japanese island that has lost 75% of its population since the 1960s, reveals an Abandonment Gradient: a nuanced pattern of disuse adapted to modern polycrises. Extending the concept of "lying fallow" to homes and infrastructure, this thesis focuses on abandonment practices that reflect complex realities of labor, capital, and climate uncertainty. Rather than viewing depopulating communities as passive victims of out-migration, this paper argues they are critical sites for generating crisis response. Communally crafted attitudes toward unused space and more-than-human intervention allow these places to absorb and diffuse systemic shocks. By examining the unexpected vibrancy of shrinking locales like Ojika, we can move beyond narratives of inevitable decline. Instead, these spaces offer tangible frameworks for degrowth, rewilding, and climate justice, reconceptualizing sites of abandonment as generative laboratories for responses to a fluctuating future.

Degree Name

Geography

Department Name

Geography

Level of Degree

Masters

First Committee Member (Chair)

Maria Lane

Second Committee Member

Miriam Gay-Antaki

Third Committee Member

Chris Duvall

Document Type

Thesis

Language

English

Keywords

degrowth, political ecology, japan, rewilding, migration, land-use change

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