Nordic Studies

This article examines how 'safety case' experts working on Finland’s nuclear waste repository project at Olkiluoto summoned, conjured, or channeled memories of Seppo—a deceased colleague whose ‘specter,’ as some put it, still ‘haunts’ their scientific community. For some, Seppo’s postmortem presence manifested as gaps in knowledge left behind by an expert often reluctant to document the methodological assumptions underlying his knowledge-practices. For others, it manifested as anecdotes about Seppo’s stubbornness, irritability, and intellectual intensity as well as his more jovial demeanor during sauna nights, workplace parties, or trips abroad. Still others caught themselves asking ‘What Would Seppo Do?’ while troubleshooting at work. Inspired by anthropological and philosophical work on ancestors and haunting, the article unpacks how the multi-millennial time horizons of nuclear waste risk, the intergenerational time horizons of expert succession, and the everyday time horizons of a single expert life-course shared entwined fates. It focuses less on what knowledge disappeared when an expert’s body died – or how it could have been preventatively backed-up or managed – and more on what has lived on of the expert in and through surviving colleagues. Analysis of 'afterlives of expertise' like these can, it concludes, provide insights for a current moment of intergenerational transition in nuclear energy sectors in Europe, North America, and beyond.

This article takes as its starting point a recent press release from Norway’s National Art Museum: here the museum asserts a “strengthening of its collection of Sami art”. The article charts the assembling and articulation of Sami material in the museum and argues that Sami art doesn’t stand out as a special area of interest in a longer perspective. Nevertheless, the recent shift indicated by the statement may function to work reflexively upon the collection, and could make it emerge in a new light when the museum re-opens in 2021.

Storytelling has been theorised as a performative, narrative practice, but it has not been employed often as a trope in studies of musical performance. This article outlines a theoretical context for exploring the possibilities of such a conceptual move within musicology by referring to the anthropological and performance studies approaches of Turner and Schechner. Benjamin’s reflection on the storyteller as a narrator of memory and history frames the presentation of a case-study on the Baltic Youth Philharmonic Orchestra.

The report shows how the distinct features of the Nordic model—distilled from the analysis by Hallin and Mancini —changed in recent years: Does the press remain strong, widespread, and characterized by political parallelism? Is there still an active state ensuring media pluralism and a strong public broadcasting service? Ohlsson concludes negatively, arguing that the Nordic countries’ media systems have lost their distinctive characteristics. He also states that the differences between the five Nordic countries are too big to make them fit into one model.

A clear shortcoming of the publication, however, is that it fails to place the Nordic region in a comparative perspective that would shed light on common international tendencies. The liberalization that has affected the Nordic media markets has had an even deeper impact in other countries in the Western hemisphere, and it would have been most relevant to observe the actual “displacement” of other national markets toward the liberal model and beyond.

This study is among the first works in English to comprehensively address the Scandinavian First World War experience in the larger international context of the war. It surveys the complex relationship between the belligerent great powers and Northern Europe's neutral small states in times of crisis and war.

The book's overreaching rationale draws upon three underlying conceptual fields: neutrality and international law, hegemony and great power politics as well as diplomacy and policy-making of small states in the international arena. From a variety of angles, it examines the question of how neutrality was understood and perceived, negotiated and dealt with both among the Scandinavian states and the belligerent major powers, especially Britain, Germany and Russia.

For a long time, the experience of neutral countries during the First World War was seen as marginal, and was overshadowed by the experiences of occupation and collaboration brought about by the Second World War. In this book, Jonas demonstrates how this perception has changed, with neutrality becoming an integral part of the multiple narratives of the First World War. It is an important contribution to the international history of the First World War, cultural-historically influenced approaches to diplomatic history and the growing area of neutrality studies.

Pro Finlandia. Suomen tie itsenäisyyteen
1–4 – Finlands väg till självständighet
1–4. Red. Jussi Nuorteva,
Pertti Hakala (1–2), Päivi Happonen
(3–4) & John Strömberg (3–4).
Arkistolaitoksen toimituksia 18:1-4.
Arkivverkets publikationer 18:1-4
Kansallisarkisto/Riksarkivet 2014–
2017. 276 + 543 + 557 + 751 s. (finska
och svenska)
ISBN 978-951-37-6617-7, 978-951-37-
6711-2, 978-951-37-7004-4, 978-951-
37-7306-9
ISSN 1795-9683

"Science, Geopolitics and Culture in the Polar Region" is the second of five volumes in the series "The Nordic Experience" – the outcome of an interdisciplinary, multi-year research project at the Centre for Baltic and East European Studies at Stockholm’s Södertörn University.

This article examines the intersection between the therapeutic and the Christian cultures, and the common conviction among scholars of the therapeutic, such as Philip Rieff, that the subjective turn eventually will overthrow organized Christianity. The culture clash between secularism and religion is engaged through the Protestant Church of Norway's liturgical reform of the Sunday high mass 2004–2011, which aims to make the liturgical service more relevant. The analysis of both institutional and theological attempts at finding a balance between the old and the new suggests that the authority of the emotive self strongly challenges the truth of God. Still, there are signs of a cultural merger that suggest the Church of Norway will prevail. The outcome, however, will not satisfy conservative theologians and critics of the therapeutic culture, as God, in order to survive, must accept a more subordinate supportive role as an optional remedy for well-being.

Confirmation as a coming of age ceremony has deep roots in traditional popular Nordic culture. For hundreds of years Nordic state churches held the key to adulthood. Until 1912 in Norway and Denmark, young people could not legally marry, wear adult clothing or work as adults until they were approved by their parson and confirmed by the church in a public ceremony. A movement in Nordic countries rehabilitated the confirmation tradition by adding a secular twist that gives youth a choice between a religious or a non-religious confirmation ceremony. The first civil confirmation organised by the ”Association Against Church Confirmation” took place in Copenhagen, Denmark in 1915. 
Many Nordic youth opt today for a humanist confirmation to celebrate their coming of age because it represents a proud moment for them and their families. Each year over 10,000 young Norwegians are confirmed in humanist ceremonies held in concert halls, medieval castles, municipal cinemas, cultural centres, city halls and community buildings throughout the country. From the small towns in the south, with their white painted wooden houses, to the urban areas such as Oslo, Bergen and Trondheim to the sparsely populated areas in the far north where the Sami communities live families gather on Saturday or Sunday in late April till late May to see their young people move into adulthood.

I palatstaken på Riddarholmen berättas via symboliska dekorationer historien om gamla tiders familjevärderingar. Statens fastighetsverks kulturarvsspecialist, Alexandru Babos, tar oss med på en resa där vi möter den kyska Dafne, den lojala hustrun och den liderlige Apollo.

How does the depiction of female subjectivity and agency change when a Danish public broadcasting serial is adapted for an American commercial network? I compare Forbrydelsen (DR1, 2007–2012) with its remake, The Killing (AMC 2011–2013, Netflix 2014), to draw out the significance of postfeminism and neoliberalism as interpretive grids that limit feminist progress in the United States. Despite similar narrative and aesthetic strategies that center a strong female protagonist, female agency is undermined in The Killing through the postfeminist “bad mother” trope, which supplants Forbrydelsen’s Nordic noir left-wing critique of global capitalism and gender issues. This analysis illustrates that the cultural milieux of societies that are as egalitarian as Scandinavian states convey indirect feminist creative influence on cultural production, even when there is limited direct female creative input, an influence that may outweigh greater direct female creative control in the anti-egalitarian cultural context of a neoliberal and postfeminist United States.

This article presents an overview of the long term trends in the trading patterns for salted herring in the area of the North Sea and the Baltic Sea and their hinterlands in the period of c. 1600-1850. The market is defined as ‘the interaction between supply and demand to determine the market price and corresponding quantity bought and sold.’  In this period the north European herring market underwent several changes. This is analysed from four different points of view:
The first main section examines the main trading routes for herring in Northern Europe by use of records from the Sound toll registers as well as from accounts of herring imports in the German North Sea and Baltic cities. Then a number of price series for various parts of northern Europe give indications for the long term development of prices of herring. Following this an analysis of the consumption patterns of salted herring is carried out, and finally the influence of mercantilist policies is evaluated.

Celem artykułu jest analiza podstaw sukcesu gospodarek skandynawskich: Finlandii, Norwegii i Szwecji. Tekst przedstawia problemy ujmowania zjawisk rozwoju regionalnego, historii gospodarczej Skandynawii oraz próby jego teoretycznego opracowania na podstawie specjalistycznej literatury przedmiotu.

The essay takes it starting point from the question, how women Surrealists depict sexuality. Images of female erotic fantasies have been far less analyzed than the erotic fantasies of their male Surrealist colleagues. The essay puts forward the thesis that women Surrealists use flora and fauna symbols in juxtaposition with their own bodies to enable both freedom of imagination and sexual empowerment. Hybridity and metamorphosis are methods to self-define, within the realm of dreams. The essay analyzes selected paintings by the Scandinavian Surrealists Rita Kernn-Larsen and Elsa Thoresen and compare them to their international contemporaries. The cases of Kernn-Larsen and Thoresen both show how sexual fantasy is linked to female subjectivity, and how women artists found each their individual visualization of eroticism. Furthermore, the view that Surrealist women's use of nature symbols is primarily connected to a fertile, reproductive "Mother Earth" ideal is countered. Rather, women artists consciously invoke the complete range of roles and clichés surrounding the woman-nature link; they take these allegories and recreate them into their own versions, including images of savageness and shadiness, the "immoral" side of nature.

Completata nel 1789, sotto gli auspici dell'Aufklärung tedesca, quest'opera del curato Christfrid Ganander è in assoluto la prima trattazione scientifica di ampio respiro sulla mitologia finlandese e, insieme, una delle sue più preziose fonti a monte dell'imponente lavoro di riorganizzazione effettuato da Elias Lönnrot per il suo Kalevala. Impostato in forma enciclopedica, il Mythologia Fennica espone elementi tratti da tutti i livelli della tradizione, sia colta che popolare. Da un lato, vi sono i temi legati al mondo letterario delle saghe scandinave, dai miti sul misterioso "fondatore" Fornjótr alle battaglie degli antichi re svedesi contro gli stregoni finnar, per arrivare ai resoconti dei navigatori vichinghi sui misteriosi popoli incontrati lungo le più remote rotte nord-orientali. Ma Ganander riporta anche una notevole quantità di materiale folklorico finnico e lappone, che espone affidandosi all'autorità dei runot raccolti dalla viva voce del popolo. Tra divinità, spiriti guardiani ed esseri  soprannaturali, tra riti sciamanici e celebrazioni sincretiche, spiccano le tradizioni sui possenti Kalewan pojat, i "figli di Kalewa", tra i quali il lettore riconoscerà i principali eroi kalevaliani – Wäinämöinen, Ilmarinen, la signora di Pohjola, il malevolo Soini (Kullervo) – le cui fisionomie, non ancora addomesticate dalla penna di Lönnrot, si affacciano qui con tratti sovrumani e terrifici.
Con l’attenzione del naturalista e con l’entusiasmo del pioniere, Christfrid Ganander si sforza di far luce sul materiale mitico-leggendario della più remota periferia d’Europa, con analisi a volte ingenue, a volte sorprendenti, aprendo la strada alla successiva stagione del risveglio nazional-romantico finlandese.

Tomas Alfredson’s movie “Let the right one in”  was released in 2008 and turned out to be highly successful worldwide .
Adapted from the equally well-received novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist , it portrays the meeting between twelve-year-old Oskar, who lives in the gloomy suburbs of Stockholm (Blackeberg) and is bullied at school, and Eli, a centuries-old vampire trapped in the ungendered body of a child . Hovering between the poetic scenes of their encounter, and the gruesome scenes of Eli’s (or her guardian’s) violent killings, the film displaces many traditional gothic motifs to the Nordic scene of the horror genre.
This paper aims at identifying the interaction between the gothic tropes and the Nordic elements of a film that could be both labelled as gothic horror and realist .
In terms of gothic locality, Alfredson’s movie transgresses the walls of the ancient castle and replaces them with derelict blocks of flats and symmetrical buildings, all covered in snow. The film-maker aptly alternates between close-ups of the isolated young hero and still, long shots of his Swedish surroundings, thus providing the viewer with a sense of paradoxical claustrophobia that fits perfectly the gothic genre.
What’s more, the threat pervading this work of fiction doesn’t seem to come from the past as it is the case in traditional gothic tales, but from Sweden’s sourly depicted modernity. Set in 1982, the movie highlights the “dark and uncanny aspects of modern Nordic society that are hidden or repressed in disturbing ways” ; it overtakes the mere vampiric figure and its red imagery to encapsulate that darkness in Oskar’s potential violent drives.
Often portrayed in terms of likeness, continuity and complementarity, the two main characters embody and transgress the notion of Otherness, but also the iconic statuses of villain and victim which are overhauled and fused in their bodies.

This study investigates whether a Fama-French five-factor asset pricing model can explain average returns in the Nordic markets. Further, this study compares the fivefactor asset pricing model’s performance to that of a CAPM and Fama-French threefactor model. The study rejects all models’ descriptions of average returns on the sample. All models perform well in explaining the average returns of portfolios sorted on size and book-to-market ratio, and portfolios sorted on size and investment. However, the models have large difficulties in explaining the average returns of portfolios sorted on size and profitability. While the five-factor model provides a more mean-variance efficient portfolio from its explanatory variables, it fails to improve the intercepts produced in regressions on three factors. Moreover, this study provides more evidence of a disappearing size effect and finds that small stocks in the Nordic markets generally have lower market betas than big stocks.

The research project focuses on investment behavior and the Icelandic economic bubble and crash, emphasizing that investment behavior has to be seen within a historical and cultural environment. As such the project is related to financial history and behavioral finance. The project’s main goals can be summarized into the following key research question:

What cultural conditions shaped the appearance and formation of the financial bubble in Iceland and in what way did those conditions differ, if any, from other countries and to what extent?

The main results are that cultural conditions influenced the creation of the Icelandic banking miracle that ended so badly. Certain dimensions in the Icelandic culture were more suspect of embracing values that (temporarily) opened doors to possibly naïve beliefs. Technological and ideological changes on an international level also influenced the Icelandic culture; more than most cultural studies anticipate. Some changes in the Icelandic culture were, however, caused to a certain extent by design, even an invented cultural one, rather than default. With the use of the media some agents convinced the Icelandic country that their best interests were served blindly embracing certain values when in fact those agents were reaping the profits with speculation and risk taking that the public was eventually left to face the consequences of.

The Nordic region has, for decades, been regarded as a global frontrunner in the movement toward gender equality. With a long history of state-legislated women’s empowerment, as well as a reputation for being markedly ‘gay-friendly’, it is easy to understand why the Nordic countries tend to be seen as culturally progressive. However, it must be asked whether this exceptionalism carries over to gender diversity, such as trans rights. It would seem self-evident, but in this article, I will argue that the progressiveness we have witnessed with women’s and gay/lesbian rights does not necessarily extend to trans rights. Using the concept of the (cis)gender imaginary, I will offer some ideas as to why.

2022 marks the 150 Jubilee of the first recorded Scandinavian language service in Queensland. It was held on 26 June 1872 in the Lutheran Chapel on Wickham Terrace, Brisbane, by a Norwegian, Christopher Gaustad. To honour the occasion I am reposting the following article. It is a slightly amended version of what appeared in the annual 'Journal of Friends of Lutheran Archives' in December 2012, edited by emeritus Professor and historian Maurice Schild. Some of the images here do not appear in the published version. The 1934 letter indicates that there are still documents which reveal aspects of Lutheran historiography in Australia. My attention was drawn to this letter by Bernie Muller, the Archives Liaison Officer  in Queensland, who copied the letter from  the original held by Dr. Meg Noack (nee Bjelke-Petersen). Dr. Noack gave permission for the letter to be published. The letter was written by Jens Christian Pedersen (1856-1940), to Dr. Noack’s  grandfather, Pastor Carl Georg Bjelke-Petersen (1870-1954) in Queensland . My extensive explanatory endnotes are to encourage further research; to enlarge on Pedersen's context;  to make some corrections on what has previously been written on the Scandinavian Lutherans in Queensland; and to fill out some gaps in the area of bibliographical material.

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This is a preface to a special issue on the history of everyday technology. It includes an introduction to the theory 'Social Construction of Technology' (SCOT) as well as a brief description on the following eleven articles, part of which apply SCOT in their case studies.

The volume contains three sections: Gendering Transportation and Communication, Cultivating the Automobile, and Equipping Homes. The list of contents available at: http://lmu-munich.academia.edu/TMyllyntaus/Books

From the beginning of the coming academic year the anthology will be used as a textbook at the University of Turku, Finland.

The Special Issue of ICON can be ordered by joining ICOHTEC, filling the subscription form and paying the membership fee of the year 2010 (€ 15 - 30). Further information at: http://icohtec.org/about-icohtec-join-us.html

Denna masteravhandling fokuserar på att undersöka olika transtextuella relationer mellan tre samtida svenska romaner – Gregorius (2004), Mordets praktik (2009) och Dosan (2013) – som alla har en gemensam hypotext, nämligen Söderbergs roman Doktor Glas. Jag analyserar dem med hänsyn till tre viktiga punkter: för det första försöker jag se i vilken typ av hypertextuell relation de står till Doktor Glas (1905) , och för det andra fokuserar jag på hur de förhåller sig till s.k. tankebok-begreppet som Söderberg själv utvecklat och tycks ha uppnått just med denna roman. För det tredje undersöker jag karaktärerna i de tre romanerna eftersom hypertextualiteten bäst kommer i uttryck genom dem. Jag forskar på vilket sätt författarna har format dem – vad de har ”lånat” från Söderberg och vad de har tillagt själva, samt hur dessa karaktärer skiljer sig från de ursprungliga. I tillägg försöker jag också se om dessa litterära ”efterträdare” till Doktor Glas påverkar läsningen av Söderbergs roman och – i fall de gör det - på vilket sätt det sker.

Come Tolkien scrive in una lettera al figlio, "quel ‘dannato piccolo ignorante di Adolf Hitler’ si è appropriato di una mitologia che non gli compete: Inghilterra e Scandinavia non sono meno ‘nordiche’ della Germania. Tuttavia egli si accorge di come l’Inghilterra non abbia una sua propria mitologia, laddove la Germania abilmente enfatizza la propria. Nemmeno il grande corpus arturiano costituisce una mitologia autenticamente inglese: è ‘esagerato e fantastico, incoerente e ripetitivo’, troppo esplicitamente ‘legato alla tradizione cristiana’, ‘imperfettamente naturalizzato’ sul suolo d’Inghilterra perché in realtà e in origine è piuttosto bretone che inglese . Non gli rimane che costruirselo da sé, questo corpus non ancora esistente, e inventarselo fin nei minimi dettagli, genealogie, calendari, alfabeti, onde sottrarlo alla Germania hitlerita.

In the eyes of its inhabitants, post-war Sweden was by all accounts a unique country. With its peaceful, evolutionary character, the course of modern Swedish history was certainly very different from the brutal developments on the European continent. Much of this was thanks to the simple fact that Sweden, as one of few major European countries, had been spared the horrors of the Second World War. At the same time, the Swedish narratives of the war underwent a post-1945 transformation that held close to wider European currents, as of the late 1980s in particular. In an international perspective, the northern neutral democracy is therefore particularly interesting.

The Swedish case stands out in various ways also in the Nordic framework. In contrast to the neighbours, the Swedes had not been directly affected by the war through occupation, bombardment or devastation. The year 1945 did not mark an absolute turning point in Swedish history, and Sweden remained neutral in the Cold War.

Moreover, since the early 1990s, the controversies seem to have been more passionate and the assault on the dominating post-war narrative more fundamental than in the other Nordic countries. This text explores this historiographical transformation in Sweden during the last two decades.

This article engages with political region building by examining the
diverging conceptions of the Baltic Sea region since the 1970s. It
maps the fuzzy geography arising from the enmeshment of territory
with a multitude of frameworks for regional action. After 1989, the
region became the object of interregional and neighborhood policies
established by the European Union, with shifting territorial delimitations
according to various internal and geopolitical needs of the day.
Drawing on functional, relational, and administrative perspectives, it is
shown how spatial definitions surrounding the Baltic Sea region have
varied over the past fifty years, revealing those transnational connections
that have been valued as worthwhile political investments.

The security landscape in and around Europe since 2014 has experienced significant changes. As a result, in the 31 European countries considered by this study defence spending will grow by an estimated average of 8.3 per cent in 2016, compared to 2015. This represents a break with the structural trends experienced in previous years. Yet, increased defence budgets are no guarantee that the countries will spend their money better or with more intra-European cooperation than before 2015. The whole landscape of defence cooperation in Europe is particularly diversified and fragmented. The study analyses six trends which mark current cooperative patterns, for example in relation to bilateralism, regionalism, as well as the role of Germany and the United States. Finally, it discusses five driving factors, including Russia’s aggressive posture and non-conventional threats, which are likely to shape the European defence cooperation landscape in the short-medium term. - See more at: http://www.iai.it/en/pubblicazioni/defence-budgets-and-cooperation-europe#sthash.u5m0FHTO.dpuf

The history of the Sparre palace addresses the main stories of the house's existence from construction until today. One of the main stories is about the Sparre family's ambition to build palaces in the capital. The family's construction ambition was included in the kingdom's grand plan to involve the elite in the interests of the country by attracting it with high offices to Stockholm's castle. The nobles would thus leave their country castles to invest and manifest themselves in the capital. The result was a beautiful and lavish architecture that put Stockholm on the European power map. Riddarholmen became the supreme-most neighborhood of the high-aristocrats early on, and the family Sparre received a prominent presence here thanks to royal rewards in the form of land donations and public assignments. The Sparre palace stayed in the family's possession for several generations but was then sold on to a number of senior officials.

The transition from private home to office building belongs to the second important story about the house. The castle fire and the country's growing administrative apparatus created an increasing need for new office space, which during the 18th century gradually took on the nobility's comfortable and representative palaces in the capital. The Crown bought the Sparreska Palace among its first new office buildings. The authorities' high demands on suitable interiors and their internal organizational transformations have strongly influenced the house since then.

In order to investigate the compositional techniques of skaldic poetry and determine if any oral formulae or other compositional methods played a role in the creation of skaldic poetry, I have collected the alliterating and rhyming words from 1486 couplets by 68 different poets, including 19 anonymous poems, and investigated whether any of these word combinations were repeated within the poetry of different skalds. Many such examples of recurrent word constellations were found in this study; including some couplets by different poets which shared almost word for word similarity within and without the alliteration and hending categories, others couplets which shared a number of similar words within both hending and alliteration contexts, but few or none outside of those categories, and yet others that shared similarities only between alliteration or hending word pairs. While there are many examples of these word constellations of various sizes occurring within the works of different skalds, very rarely do they recur between more than two different poets. From this, it seems unlikely that oral formulae played a significant role in the composition of alliterative and hending word combinations in skaldic poetry. Rather, it seems that skalds may have appropriated convenient alliterating and hending word constellations from each other s works and incorporated these choice word combinations or phrases, often with great subtlety into their own work in an original context. This subtle appropriation allowed for originality in composition while, at the same time, taking inspiration or compositional aide from an earlier skald s work. Appropriation as a compositional technique supports the idea that skalds were very much aware of the skaldic corpus, both from their own time and from earlier centuries. The frequent subtlety of the appropriation which is found in my research could also be a way to avoid being accused of plagiarism by other knowledgeable skalds. Intelligent and original use of these borrowed word constellations also supports the argument for the importance of originality in the composition of skaldic poetry. From my research it appears that the appropriation of alliterative and hending word constellations was likely used as a compositional technique by skalds from the 9th to 11th centuries. The most notable skalds with inter-related alliterative and hending word constellations mentioned in this paper include Glúmr Geirason, Arnórr Þórðarson jarlaskáld, and Óttarr svarti, but a great number of other skalds also share word constellation similarities and I believe that with a more throrough and all encompassing analysis of the skaldic corpus, many more such examples may be found.

This article analyses the constructions and negotiations of masculine identity in New Nordic Cuisine. It focuses on cookbooks by the leading figures, namely Claus Meyer and René Redzepi. The article argues that Meyer and Redzepi represent different negotiations of Nordic culinary masculinity played out in distinct culinary spaces: respectively the domestic and the professional kitchen. At the same time, both men make great effort to distance their culinary practices not only from a traditional understanding of women’s everyday cooking, but also from the food and gender practices of hypermasculine chefs. Meyer and Redzepi both strike a precarious balance: not becoming too close to “the feminine”, but simultaneously remaining unmistakable from traditional, culinary masculinity.