Narrating diversity: Plants, personal knowledge and life stories in German home gardens

Summary

In the vast field of biodiversity research social sciences still have a difficult standing. We find widespread misconceptions of the role sociology and cultural studies should play when studying potentials for nature conservation. Often the »social view« is regarded as something subordinate to hard scientific facts. Even researchers exploring local, everyday knowledge on biological diversity or human interaction with nature tend to operate with concepts and methods not adequate to their research subjects. Frequently the research into folk knowledge equals a collection or stocktaking of those kinds of knowledges that might be useful for science. The employment of a scientific conception of knowledge, and also of biodiversity becomes problematic. For the idea of biodiversity developed in a rather detached small sphere of society and hardly has relevance in everyday life. Thus, when studying people's knowledge on »biodiversity«, such research methods should be employed which allow people to develop their personal view on the subjects in question so that informants can give their own personal meanings to the world. For my own research on home gardeners' knowledge I opted for episodic interviews with a strong narrative and biographical component, supported by participant observation and group discussions. The gardeners' stories make clear that their nature perception and management is inseparably linked to their individual biography. Their knowledge on nature and »biodiversity« is woven into their total, constantly changing knowledge on the world — it forms part of their identity. Not only nature is perceived as diverse but also knowledge itself. The gardeners reflect that their knowledge depends on time and space, and that in other situations than their own other ways of thinking and acting might be appropriate.