The City Episode November 27, 2012

Leaving the City: The Gumboot Girls, Urban-Rural Migration, and the Search for Community

5:05am - 6:00am

In the 1970s, 34 young women left cities across Canada to find a different lifestyle and build community in rural, coastal Prince Rupert, BC. Many were unsatisfied with the cold, modernist landscape of cities, and some just wanted an adventure. Their stories are documented in a new book, Gumboot Girls. On the podcast, we hear some of their tales and explore the reasons why these women migrated and their experiences in the small, rural - and booming – resource community of Prince Rupert. We conclude by discussing whether this vision for an alternative (non-urban) lifestyle is possible or desirable for young people today.