Being Norwegian in a shrinking world
Reflections on Norwegian identity
Thomas Hylland Eriksen
In Anne Cohen Kiel, ed., Continuity and Change: Aspects of Modern Norway,
Scandinavian University Press 1993
[Image]
[Image] Could these gents be Norwegian traditionalists
showing off recent haute couture from the national
[Image] heritage industry? Read the essay and find out!
About this
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[Image]
A desolate rocky cliff arising gloomily from the foaming,
Relational dark Arctic waters - the home of a small breed of stocky
index peasants and tough fishermen painfully eking out a living
from their rough and hostile environment. Is this Norway?
[Image] No? Then how about this one: It is the most perfect
democracy in the world; along with Sweden it has the
Thematic planet's only fully-fledged welfare state, it is
index technologically highly advanced and rich in natural
resources, and its inhabitants enjoy the highest standard of
[Image] living in the world as well as the least polluted
environment. The German sociologist Hans Magnus Enzensberger
Alphabetic wrote, in his small book on Norway (Enzensberger, 1984),
index that this country is simultaneously an ethnological museum
and a future laboratory. Seen from the vantage-point of
[Image] continental Europe, Norway is in many respects out of step,
and Enzensberger's characterisation of the country as a
Recent place of contradictions - wedged between the turbulence of
modernity and the inertia of tradition - may be a good
starting-point for a reflection over Norwegian identity at
[Image] the end of the second millennium, A.D.
World The first part of this chapter outlines the contemporary
domestic discourse about "Norwegianness". In the second part
of the chapter, critical light is shed on the cultural
construction of modern Norway, and some recent challenges to
the customary perceptions of Norwegian identity will also be
discussed.
1. The ongoing invention of Norwegian identity
The making of the Norwegian nation
Foreigners are often at a loss at describing the country in
simple terms, but so are - alas - Norwegians. Since the
advent of Norwegian nationalism in the 19th century,
discussions concerning the Norwegian national character have
periodically been at the frontstage of public life in the
country, and they never fail to arouse great passion. What
does it actually entail to be Norwegian? What are the
Norwegians "really" like, and in which ways are they
different from other peoples? In the early 1990s, these
issues have flared up with almost unprecedented intensity.
There are several causes for this strong interest in
Norwegian national identity, and we shall look into some of
them in greater detail below. Let me nevertheless mention
the recent wave of non-European immigrants, the Saami ethnic
movement in the north, the prospect of membership in the
European Community, the globalisation of culture, and the
planning of the 1994 Winter Olympics at Lillehammer, as some
concomitant processes which inspire many Norwegians to
scratch their heads and ask themselves: Who are we, and why
is that so?
When we try to understand the contemporary concern with
Norwegian national identity, we should keep in mind that the
country's history has been construed so as to distinguish it
crucially from every other European country, including its
closest neighbours, Sweden and Denmark. Although there was a
mediaeval kingdom roughly where Norway is presently located,
its history as an independent nation-state is short, dating
from its peaceful secession from Sweden in 1905. Sweden,
being among the winners of the Napoleonic wars in 1814, had
in turn taken over Norway from one of the losers, Denmark.
Norway had then been a part of the Danish kingdom for more
than four hundred years.
A peripheral country in Europe as well as in the
world-system until the 20th century, Norway was scarcely
affected by the many upheavals and conflicts unfolding on
the Continent from the Renaissance on, and its development
followed, in many respects, its own course. Notably, Norway
was never an independent colonial power, nor did it have a
widespread feudal system. For centuries, the only sizeable
town with strong links to Continental Europe was Bergen in
the west. With no powerful city bourgeoisie and no strong
landed gentry, burgeoning Norwegian nationalism took on a
different character from that of other European countries in
the 19th century. It was emphatically rural and egalitarian
in its orientation, and it tended to glorify the simple ways
of life of the countryside rather than revelling in urban
grandeur or the military pride of the state (see Berggreen's
contribution to this book). There was, after all, little
grandeur and military pride to attach oneself to, since the
country had been a peripheral part of the Danish kingdom for
centuries.
An irony of this invention of nationhood is the fact that
those individuals who most strongly promoted the idea of
Norwegianness as a rural form of life, were themselves urban
and highly educated people - their daily life was very far
removed from that of the simple peasants whom they defined
as the carriers of national identity. It was the urban
middle-class, riding on a pan-European wave of 19th century
romanticism, which decided on rural folk costumes, folk
dances and fairy-tales as central national symbols towards
the end of the nineteenth century.1 The farmers who actually
wore the "typical" costumes and danced the "typical" dances
were less likely to see them as "typically Norwegian"
(╪sterud, 1984). This creative production of a national
identity consists in what an anthropologist might describe
as a form of bricolage (following LΘvi-Strauss, 1962),
whereby one appropriates a set of known objects or symbols,
and combines them in new ways in order to create new forms
of meaning. Thus the old dances, tales and handicrafts of
the Norwegian countryside took on a new meaning when they
were juxtaposed with the trappings of a modern state and a
nationalist ideology.
Nationalism
Nationalism is a kind of ideology which proclaims that the
political boundaries should be coterminous with the cultural
boundaries of a given territory; in other words, that a
state (a "country") should only contain people of the same
kind (Gellner, 1983). The idea of the Norwegian nation was
born the moment a few people decided that (i) the area
contained a distinct culture, (ii) the area should have
political self-determination. Neither of these assumptions
were evidently or "naturally" true at the time. During the
formative stage of Norwegian nationalism in the mid-19th
century, Norwegian nationalists had to compete with
Scandinavianists, who regarded Scandinavia (or at least
Norway and Denmark) as a single cultural area.2 That fusion
of a cultural identity with a state which is implied in
nationalism, is not in itself "natural" either, as recent
writers on the history of nationalism have reminded us
(Gellner, 1983; Anderson, 1983). Before (and indeed after)
the French Revolution in 1789, few states were
nation-states: they were multi-cultural states. At the court
of the Ottoman empire, to mention but one example, three
languages were spoken - Arabic, Turkish and Farsi (Persian).
At the royal court in Copenhagen - the capital of
Denmark-Norway - German, French and Danish were used.
Nationalism and nationhood are cultural products,
imaginatively created by nationalists. Nationhood is a
social fact in so far as the inhabitants of an area believe
in the existence of that imagined community (Anderson's,
1983, phrase) which is proposed by the nationalists. They
hold that they have something profound in common, which
could be phrased as metaphoric kinship, with a great number
of people whom they will never know personally. It is in
this sense that the nation may be spoken of as an imagined
community; it is no more "imaginary" than other kinds of
communities, but it is abstract and depends on ideological
justification - it must be "imagined" by its members - in
order to exist. In the case of Norway, Norwegianism was
eventually to win out over Scandinavianism, and by today,
surely, few Norwegians claim that they belong to the same
nation as Danes, or Swedes, for that matter.
Nationhood need not be strongly related to "objective
cultural traits", although nationalist ideology tries to
persuade people that it is. So although it could be argued
that people from south-eastern Norway have more in common
culturally with people from centralwestern Sweden than with
people from western Norway, such a similarity has little
consequence in so far as people from Eastern and Western
Norway insist that they belong to the same nation and
exclude Swedes from it.
The nation is, in other words, a historical and cultural
fact; it is not a fact of nature. Nationalism is also a
modern phenomenon, and this has been poorly understood until
quite recently. Since nationalists are eager to present
their nation as ancient, and since they draw on
traditionalist symbolism (such as folk costumes and myths of
ancient wars), many have been led to believe that nations -
such as the Norwegian one - are indeed very old. In fact,
the use of old symbols (some dating back to the Viking era)
in Norwegian nationalism can be quite confusing since it
seems to suggest that the Norwegian nation can be traced
back to the Viking era. We should therefore be aware that
these symbols had a different meaning in their original
context, before that creative bricolage which built a bridge
between past and present. At that time, the springar (a
typical dance) was not an expression of national identity,
but an imported weekend pastime, or a part of a wedding
ritual. It is only retrospectively that it has become an
embodiment of nationality.
Looking critically at the historical sources of the
nationalist project, one will find that they are ambiguous.
For example, the history of the Nordic region may just as
well be used to justify a Scandinavian or regional identity
as a Norwegian one; the history of each country is
intertwined with that of the other Scandinavian countries,
and at a lower level, people from Sunnmøre may feel that
they have little in common with people from Oslo. We should
therefore be aware that history is a product of the present,
not of the past. The contemporary view of say, the Viking
era, is quite different from the view which was current in
the sixteenth century. These and related aspects of
nationalism and national identity will be dealt with in the
second half of the present chapter. At this point it should
be kept in mind that the nation - as a community of citizens
regarding themselves as culturally similar - depends on
ideological justification in order to exist. And - since
nations are historical products - the definition of
nationhood may change. It is with such a context in mind
that the discourse on Norwegian national identity can be
properly understood.
Dano-German and Norse trends
Perhaps a feeling that their nation-state and national
identity are vulnerable, can account for the widespread
Norwegian interest in discussing the content of domestic
"national character". The country has a small population, it
is geographically peripheral, and it has a comparatively
short history as an independent state. Today (1992), there
seems to exist a real fear of the imminent disappearance of
the "Norwegian way" if the country is to join the European
Community, and the organisers of the 1994 Winter Olympics in
Lillehammer have vowed to take care of the national heritage
in their choreography of the event. However, Norwegian
identity seems to be contradiction-ridden. The Norwegian
language issue is a strong indicator of this. Since the
invention of the Norwegian nation in the mid-19th century,
the country has been divided into adherents of Nynorsk (New
Norwegian) and Bokmål (literally, "Book language") or
Riksmål (State language). Nynorsk, a standard script based
on certain rural dialects, was invented by Ivar Aasen in the
mid-19th century, and rapidly gained popularity among
certain segments of the population, particularly in the west
and extreme south. Claiming that the users of Riksmål/Bokmål
were really writing Danish and were thus unpatriotic,
Nynorsk users saw themselves as the more authentic carriers
of nationhood. Even today, all schoolchildren have to write
compositions in both variants of the language, which are
incidentally closely related. Although the language issue,
virulent for decades, has abated, the persistence of the
division indicates a widespread self-conscious, and
contradiction-ridden, reflection over one's national
identity.3
The Norwegian language issue could be articulated as an
expression of a cultural division between Dano-German and
Norse currents in Norwegian cultural history (╪yvind
╪sterud's suggestion), where movements of lay Christianity
and teetotalitarianism go together with EC scepticism and
nynorsk on the Norse side, confronted with the modernism and
extroverted tendencies of the Dano-German trends. A
passionate defence for the Dano-German trends is a small
book by Jørgen Haugan (1991), where the author laments the
lack of Continental manners and an exciting intellectual
life in his native country. Strongholds of "Norse" trends
are the western parts of southern Norway, while the
"Dano-German" trends are strongest in the larger cities,
particularly Bergen and Oslo.
Despite such internal divisions, it could be argued that
Norwegians are generally concerned to retain their
distinctiveness, and moreover, that most of them insist that
they are a single people. Trine Deichman-Sørensen (1988) has
suggested that in a small country such as Norway, nothing
unites the population more strongly than the general
interest in "Norway". But what does this distinctiveness
consist in? Instead of providing a more or less random
checklist of "Norwegian cultural traits", I shall outline
the recent public discourse on Norwegian distinctiveness.
Frequently anectodal or satirical in character, much of the
popular literature on "Norwegian character" should perhaps
be read as political statements in its own right, and not
necessarily as "scientific" work. It nevertheless contains
many valuable insights as well as itself being a
contribution to the ongoing definition of Norwegian
identity.
Egalitarian individualism
Most of those writing on Norwegian national identity seem to
agree that politics in the country is marked by a peculiar
democratic ideology, which we may tentatively label
egalitarian individualism. Equality and the integrity of the
individual are in other words believed to be highly valued.
Historical and geographic reasons for such an ideology are
often evoked - for example, Norwegian farms were scattered
and did not invite the communal form of organisation more
common in other parts of Europe, and the country lacked a
strong aristocracy and related hierarchies - but we shall
not go into such arguments here.
The ideology of egalitarian individualism, it has been
argued, expresses itself through a strong suspicion against
social climbers and rejection of formal social hierarchies.
In political rhetoric, equality is a positively valued word,
whether it concerns gender, class or town and country. Few
politicians would venture to say that they were all for
inequality. The social democratic ideology which has guided
post-war Norwegian politics expresses such values, which are
embedded in the concept of the Welfare State (cf. Andersen,
1984). The author Aksel Sandemose, an immigrant from
Denmark, coined the Law of Jante (Janteloven, cf. Sandemose,
1953), which presents such an egalitarianism in a less
charitable manner. The Law of Jante proclaims - in a variety
of ways - that "Thou Shalt Not Think Highly of Thyself". It
expresses, in other words, an ideology of equality which
depreciates the original and the unusual. It is widely held
that the Law of Jante is a deeply embedded aspect of
Norwegian culture, and that it discourages brilliance and
high achievements. Indeed, the Law of Jante has repeatedly
been mentioned by local businessmen as an obstacle to
economic growth and prosperity. (It is true that Norway
contains fewer very rich people and thus has a greater
measure of economic equality than most other countries, but
it is not true that the country has had an unusually low
economic growth rate.)
Be this as it may; the idea of Norwegian egalitarianism has
inspired, and continues to justify, legal provisions for
equality between the genders, a progressive system of
taxation and a highly subsidised rural sector. Egalitarian
individualism is also frequently mentioned as a driving
force behind the strong resistance to EC membership, which
reached a temporary peak in the 1972 referendum when 52.5%
of the population voted against membership. The idea of
decentralisation, a related aspect of this ideology, will be
discussed below.
Consensus, compromise and formal justice
The Argentinian anthropologist Eduardo Archetti, who has
lived in Norway for many years, has compared the Norwegian
style of discourse with that prevalent in Catholic countries
(Archetti, 1984). In his view, Norwegians are
consensus-oriented and issue-oriented (saklige) when they
are forced to solve tasks together, for example in
discussions at meetings. This entails that (i) they tend to
be unwilling to accept disagreement; (ii) they stick to the
facts and avoid including personal or other formally
irrelevant aspects into the situation. Regarding the
consensus orientation, Norwegians would, according to
Archetti, tend to prefer a poor compromise to a violent
quarrel - even if they were eventually to emerge
victoriously from the latter: They strongly wish to agree.
As regards the "issue-orientation" of Norwegians, Archetti
links this with a related observation of Norwegian culture,
namely a concern with formal justice - or, as an
anthropologist might say, balanced reciprocity. This means
that one returns a favour or a gift almost immediately, and
measures the return virtually with mathematic precision. In
other societies, people might buy each other drinks, cups of
coffee or meals without demanding an immediate return of the
favour. In this way, they establish a lasting relationship.
In this country, it is uncommon that people do not split
restaurant or bar accounts, pay their own entrance fees, and
so on - even if they know each other well. Are Norwegians
afraid to develop informal commitments or obligations
vis-α-vis others? Are they simply afraid of making friends?
So it may seem, if Archetti is correct. It may be the case
that Norwegians (and, it could be argued, other
Scandinavians), imbued with Protestantism and Puritanism,
fear the consequences of a friendship with a person whom
they do not already know well. Since honesty and sincerity
are important values in Norwegian definition of self, it
could be argued, the Norwegians may be afraid of making
promises of friendship which they might break in the future.
Further aspects of the discussion of Norwegian identity seem
to confirm this assumption.
The rural connection
"You can get me out of Valdres, but you cannot get Valdres
out of me," writes the native social anthropologist Tord
Larsen (1984) as an illustration of the intimate
identification of Norwegians with their place of origin,
even if they have long since migrated from their native
valley or fishing hamlet. Norway was urbanised later than
many other European countries - largely during the 20th
century - and half of the population still lives in rural
areas. Of those who live in towns, many maintain strong
affective links with the home of their ancestors, as well as
relatives who remain in the countryside. Even some of the
most urbane and sophisticated members of the Oslo
bourgeoisie leave the city for Christmas in order to visit a
remote mountain valley where their kin group originates.
Norwegian identity, as it is generally defined by
Norwegians, is primarily a rural identity, not an urban one.
Foreigners sometimes complain that Norwegians are difficult
to befriend; that they jealously guard their personal space
and seem worried and slightly afraid when confronted with
strangers. It has been claimed that most Norwegians rarely
address strangers unless drunk or if for some reason or
other they either really have to. Perhaps such an assumed
aspect of the Norwegian way of life could be related to
their recent rural origins. In many rural areas, strangers
were treated with suspicion, and every individual had only a
small number of friends whom he or she knew intimately.
Villages were, as noted, absent. The social situation
typical of the city, implying a very high number of
superficial acquaintances, may therefore seem alienating and
difficult to handle for people with a rural background. A
self-perception common among Norwegians conforms to this
view: they do not regard themselves as a cosmopolitan and
easy-going people, but rather as somewhat private and
introvert. Lacking the mannerisms of sophisticated
urbanites, they might argue, they compensate through a
sincere and trustworthy character - and this is a
characterisation of Norwegians also commonly invoked by
foreigners. The British expression "Norwegian charisma",
used to describe people entirely devoid of grace and charm,
confirms this image.
Nature and culture
The wild and varied Norwegian scenery and clean environment
comprise a source of pride to many of the country's
citizens, and it may be the most important component in the
standard image of Norway presented to foreigners. Instead of
drawing on grand cultural traditions or a proud military
history, Norwegian patriots (and surely, visiting
foreigners) may talk of their beautiful mountains, clean
lakes and breathtaking fjords. A genuinely peculiar aspect
of Norwegian identity, further, seems to consist in the
social use of nature in the country. A Norwegian who lacks
interest in nature and friluftsliv ("life out in the open")
may well be accused of being a poor specimen by his fellow
citizens. A great number of people own cottages (hytter) in
some remote valley, forest or mountain area, and many spend
the majority of holidays there - it has been estimated that
over half of the population has easy access to a hytte.
Rather than seeking contact with other people, or exploring
foreign cities, they regard the holiday as an opportunity to
"get away from it all", which means spending it with the
nuclear family in a remote place where they can fish, walk
or ski. These cottages, although many are well furnished and
equipped, are expected to signal an ideal of simplicity in
lifestyle - an aspect of Norwegian self-definition to which
I shall return below.
The origins of most Norwegians in rural, non-hierarchical
environments are again apparent. For one thing, there is
little to boast about as regards urban grandeur in the
country. One need only compare the Royal Castle in Oslo with
the rather more spectacular ones in Copenhagen and Stockholm
to see the point. As the national anthem goes, "Hytter og
hus, men ingen borge" ("Cottages and houses, but no
castles"). Further, many Norwegians express that they do not
feel at ease in the city. Many claim to live in the city
malgrΘ eux - in spite of themselves, and the ideal of living
in a "small red house in the country" is widespread enough
to have become a clichΘ. A TV journalist who had just
completed a series of programmes about Oslo in the autumn of
1991, was asked what she valued the most about the capital.
Not entirely unexpectedly, she answered Nordmarka; that is,
the nature reserve just inside the city limits.4
Few Norwegians admit that they love the city. There is also
a tendency that urban life is evaluated on the basis of
standards originating in the country. If the city does not
fulfil human needs in the same way as the rural settlement
did, something must be wrong with the city. Since it is
impossible to move the city to the mountain valley, one
tries instead to move the valley to the city. Norwegians
have slowly become an urban people to the extent that many
of them live in towns and cities, but they have scarcely
become an urbane people in their own view. The rural
connection and love of nature are very important aspects of
the public self-definition of "what is typically Norwegian"
(see also Witoszek, 1991).
Decentralisation
In his aforecited book, Enzensberger points out that a
peculiar characteristic of Norwegian society lies in the
fact of 47 airports (actually, the number is 53) for a
population of four million. Like many other commentators on
Norwegian society, he sees the high value placed on a
scattered settlement of the population (spredt bosetting in
political rhetoric) as being typically Norwegian. If we
compare Norway with say, France or Sweden, this notion is
confirmed. A roadmap of France would indicate that virtually
all main roads lead to Paris. Frenchman have accustomed
themselves to seeing the main seats of finance, politics and
higher learning located to the capital. As regards Sweden,
that country, like Norway, had a very scattered population
at the turn of the century. From the inception of the modern
Swedish welfare state in the years after World War I, there
was an increasing awareness that it would have been
extremely expensive to offer the same rights and benefits to
people in remote Norrland as to people in the Stockholm
area. Many of the erstwhile inhabitants of Norrland - the
northernmost third of the country - have later moved to
newly erected housing estates in central areas. The
Norwegian picture differs starkly. Although there have been
advocates for a greater centralisation of power and people
in this country as well, their influence has been limited.
In Norwegian politics, it is a widespread notion that people
should be able to live in the place where they grew up, if
at all possible. Subsidies, generous tax deductions and
other economic benefits have been channeled into Utkantnorge
("Peripheral Norway") to ensure this; expensive bridges and
tunnels connect small islands with the mainland, and
Norwegian agriculture is, along with Japanese and Swiss
agriculture, the most heavily subsidised in the world.
Language is decentralised to the extent that every valley
has its own, semi-officialised dialect in which at least
some of the inhabitants take great pride. Educational
facilities up to University level are available in every
county, and there are not only many airports, but also
regional hospitals, libraries, post offices and
administrative offices of various kinds in a very large
number of localities. In 1990, the national library was
moved from Oslo to a place called Brønnøysund, which - it
has been noted by critics - is a remarkable place for not
being within commuting distance from a single town. Small is
still beautiful in Norway. The cost of all this, some have
argued, is an overall decerase of welfare in the country.
Besides, they claim, the decentralisation has come to a
point where there remains nothing to decentralise: in other
words, that the central institutions and urban areas have
been neglected. Such criticisms seem to have had little
effect yet, and few politicians would dare to omit the
"districts" or Utkantnorge, in their campaign speeches.
The priority given to peripheral areas in political life
confirms the image of Norwegian identity as an essentially
rural identity. It is further confirmed in the nisselue
stereotype with which I shall presently deal.
The unsophisticated, but practically minded farmer
The nisselue, the red woollen hat worn (particularly around
Christmas) by the gnomes (nisser) featured in local
folklore, has in recent years become an ambiguous symbol of
Norwegian nationhood. "Pulling the nisselue down one's ears"
refers to isolationist tendencies in Norwegian society,
often invoked against, for example, those who oppose EC
membership. The nisselue, frequently worn by people on skis,
is also a reminder of the intimate relationship between
Norwegian identity and rural life, and thus seems to present
the typical Norwegian as an unsophisticated and clumsy
peasant unable to move gracefully about in a complex and
modern environment. Some Norwegians have tried to turn
aspects of the nisselue stereotype into a laudable
description of themselves, and tend to regard themselves as
a practical and earthy people. The anti-EC movement has
actually used the nisselue as their symbol. During the
German occupation in 1940-45, the nisselue was a symbol of
resistance, and was actually prohibited by the Germans. A
symbol of earthiness and simplicity, the nisselue
simultaneously signals independence and self-sufficiency.
To wear designer-made Italian clothes, to own a sleek but
impractical luxury car, and to relish the bouquets of fine
wines and champagnes, would be considered emphatically
un-Norwegian. Despite the country's rise to wealth, a
certain frugality and simplicity are still considered proper
in this society. There are heavy taxes on "luxury goods",
and wine and liquor can still only be purchased in state
monopoly stores at exorbitant prices. In some parts of the
country, puritanist Protestant sects, which rail against
moral decay of every conceivable kind, remain powerful. In
these rural areas, one can sometimes travel for days without
coming across a wine/spirits monopoly outlet, since the
politicians of the communities refuse to have one lest their
inhabitants should run astray.
Self-definitions of a typical Norwegian "personality" would
usually depict that personality as formal and slightly
stiff, but sincere to the point of na∩vetΘ. In a bid to
defend Norwegians against accusations that they are cold and
unpassionate, Eduardo Archetti (1984) has called attention
to the institution of the Norwegian party where, it is true,
people tend to bring their own wine, but where a certain
joie-de-vivre and lack of formality are for once apparent.
The brown cheese
In 1990, the hosts of Nitimen, the most popular daily radio
programme, which features light music and assorted small
talk,5 invited its listeners to elect that object or
cultural trait which was most Norwegian. The programme had
earlier designated the national bird (fossekallen, that is
the dipper) and the national fish (the cod). This time, a
very large number of responses elicited a variety of
proposed "national totems", and the list suggests how
ordinary Norwegians perceive themselves as being distinctive
from say, Swedes or Englishmen. Among the suggestions were
the cheese slicer (a Norwegian invention), the Hardanger
fiddle, the Selbu mitten, Constitution Day (17 May) and the
folk song "Kjerringa med Staven". The winner of the
competition was, however, the brown cheese. Sometimes
misleadingly called goat cheese (only a minority of brown
cheeses are made exclusively from goat's milk; the classic
G45 is 50-50 goat's and cow's milk), the brown cheese could
almost certainly be regarded as a genuine Norwegian
contribution to world cuisine. Perhaps more importantly, the
brown cheese epitomises central values in a widespread
Norwegian self-definition: Being a dairy product, it is
associated with the rural life; its unspectacular taste
signifies frugality and simplicity in style; its widespread
use in the bagged lunches typical of Norwegian society
further expresses a spirit of common sense and a "no-frills"
attitude. - Or maybe this interpretation is wrong. Whatever
the case may be: The brown cheese did get the most votes.
2. National identity in a changing world
Characterisations of "national character" - such as those
discussed above - tend to be stereotypical, and can be
grossly misleading. After all, there are enormous regional
and individual variations in a large society such as a
nation-state. When Norwegian intellectuals talk about
"Norwegian culture", they frequently exclude themselves from
its compass. A common expression in many quarters is this:
"Bah! That's typically Norwegian!". Besides, the
anthropological literature on ethnicity has shown that ideas
of cultural traits distinguishing ethnic groups (or nations)
from each other are often oversimplifying or simply
mistaken. The "cultural traits" mentioned as unique by a
group are often vaguely described or even shared with its
neighbours (cf. Knudsen, 1989, for a similar point
concerning the Mediterranean). Besides, the presumed
continuity in time of an ethnic group or nation can in
several senses be regarded as mythical. It is obvious that
the content of Norwegian nationhood and "national character"
changes as the world changes; being a Norwegian in 1992
means something different from what it meant in 1952. I
shall now sketch some ways in which the public discourse on
Norwegian national identity may also be said to change, and
in which ways changes in the external world may influence
domestic reflection on the topic.
The social importance of "imagined communities"
Ideological constructions of national identity and
uniqueness, misleading as they may be, are important for two
main reasons. First, such designations fix a social identity
and protect its boundaries. If Norwegians were convinced,
for example, that they were the only herring-eating people
in the world, this would confirm and strengthen their
national identity. The very idea of cultural uniqueness
serves to strengthen the boundaries against the external
world. Secondly, cultural definitions of national identities
may eventually become self-fulfilling prophecies. If one is
consistently taught that one's culture is egalitarian,
decentralist and concerned with formal justice, one will
eventually define oneself as egalitarian, etc. A typical
example concerns the Norwegian language. A traveller going
from Bergen to Stockholm at the turn of the century - before
Norway's secession from Sweden - would pass through valleys
and towns where different dialects were spoken. However, he
would scarcely be able to tell where the Norwegian dialects
ended and the Swedish ones began. In 1992, it would have
been possible to draw such a dividing line, corresponding
with the national border. A nationalist ideology monitored
through the state, the mass media and civil society has led
to an increasing degree of cultural homogenisation. It has
thus been argued that Norway became an integrated nation in
the 1960s, when national TV was introduced and virtually
everybody - from Hammerfest to Lindesnes - began watching
the same TV news at the same time every day.
The nation, seen as a collectivity of people defining
themselves as "a people", came into being after nationalist
ideology. To some extent, it was created through the
implementation of nationalist ideology in the central
agencies of the state and civil society.
Deconstructing national myths
A public concern with defining national identity, which has
been very important in Norwegian intellectual life
throughout this century, implies its own negation. As some
"nation-builders" create a certain image of the history or
the national identity of a country, others will - if they
are allowed to - take the opportunity to tear it down;
deconstructing, criticising, indicating in which ways the
stories of their past and present have been misleading and
ideological in character, aimed at presenting a certain,
political opportune view of the past.
In Norway as in many other countries, historians and
creative writers have been instrumental in this creation of
nationhood during the past two hundred years or so. Critical
voices have throughout added their versions of Norwegian
history to those explicitly or implicitly exhorting the
virtues of nation-building. The national myth of the heroic
resistance of the Norwegian people during the Second World
War, largely created by historians and others writing on the
period, could serve as an example. Several historians have
in more recent times filled in this picture with new facts
and interpretations of the period (for two recent
contributions, see Dahl, 1991; Sørensen, 1991). They have
argued that Norwegian Nazis, many of whom died on the
Eastern Front for their fatherland, may be regarded as
devoted patriots. Parallels between certain aspects of Nazi
politics and social democratic politics have also been
revealed. It has also been shown that although many
Norwegians actively resisted the German occupation from 1940
to 1945, very many did not.6 In order to understand the
controversial character of such facts and re-interpretations
of history, one must understand the role of the Second World
War in the contemporary national self-consciousness. A very
great number of books have been published on the war, and
many of them depict Norwegian resistance as heroic. This
resistance highlights sacred aspects of Norwegian
nationhood: it shows the willingness of Norwegians to
sacrifice their lives for their country, the importance of
patriotism in times of hardship, and the divine destiny of
the area, as it were, as an independent country. It is not
surprising, therefore, that re-interpretations offering
alternative perspectives on Norwegian achievements during
the war, can be controversial.
Other central nationalist ideas have also been tampered with
recently. The transition from the heroic age of Norwegian
nationhood (notably the Viking age) to the "four-hundred
years' night" under Danish rule has been re-written by
historians lacking the nationalist bias formerly widespread,
and it has become possible to argue that there was no
"necessary" continuity between the medieval Norwegian state
and that Norwegian nation-state which was created in 1814,
and which gained full independence in 1905. This presumed
continuity, evident in the name of the new king (Haakon VII)
which suggests that modern Norway was really the same
country as the medieval kingdom, must be regarded as an
ideological construction, neither more nor less. The king
himself was originally a Danish prince, and spoke Danish
till the day of his death.
In his book on the doctrine of national self-determination,
the political scientist ╪yvind ╪sterud (1984) reminds his
readers that many "typical" aspects of Norwegian culture
were really quite recent imports from the European continent
at the time when they were discovered and fashioned as
national symbols by the early nationalists. This holds good
for "traditional" Norwegian handicrafts, musical instruments
and folk costumes. Most of the regional bunads, an important
type of national costume, were invented in the beginning of
the 20th century; the patterns were profoundly inspired by
costumes in Continental Europe.
The very idea of Norwegian culture and society as a
"natural" and constant entity evolving according to its
internal laws for over a thousand years, is about to become
untenable. Norwegian culture and society have developed
through crucial, if sometimes sporadic, contact with
continental Europe, and the changes have been dramatic. It
can be argued that contemporary Norwegians have less in
common with the Wergelands of the 19th century (famous
Norwegian nationalist) than with contemporary Germans or
Dutchmen.
The "tradition" on which nationalism and national identity
feeds has been deconstructed; the great tradition of
nationhood is increasingly being fragmented into several
lesser histories which point out the ambiguities involved in
interpreting the past, and which reveal nationalist versions
of history as conglomerates of fact, myth and contestable
interpretations. This does not mean that the Norwegian
nation does not exist, but it reminds us that it is a
cultural invention - and a fairly recent one at that. Since
Norwegian history can be reinterpreted, the content of
Norwegian identity can be changed. This, some have argued,
is called for in our day and age, marked by two strong
tendencies which apparently run counter to some currently
held conceptions of Norwegian nationality. These tendencies
are the emergence of a poly-ethnic Norwegian society, and
the globalisation of culture. I shall first look into the
challenges from minority ethnicity.
Are the Saami Norwegians?
Their numbers are few, but they are highly visible.
Approximately 100,000 non-European immigrants and refugees
and 40,000 Saami comprise a small percentage of the
country's population, but in recent years they have
increasingly demanded formal equal rights and an
acknowledged minority status. A continuous reminder that
nationalist ideology does not conform perfectly with social
reality, ethnic minorities constitute a thorn in the eye of
many governments. Norway is no exception, and problems
arising from the presence of minorities go to the naked core
of nationalism: What is the actual content of the national
identity; who should be included in the nation and who
should be excluded from it; and what kinds of demands should
be placed on inhabitants who are not members of the nation?
The Saami, that sub-Arctic ethnic group who were formerly
known as the Lapps, are Norway's oldest ethnic minority.7 In
all probability, they have lived in what is now Norway for
at least as long as ethnic Norwegians. Until the late 1950s,
Saami identity had been strongly stigmatised. Many Saami
living in ethnically mixed areas chose to undercommunicate
their ethnic origins - that is, they pretended they were not
Saami; and many indeed became Norwegians in a matter of a
few generations. From the early 1960s, but particularly
since 1980, the country has seen the growth of a powerful
ethnic revitalisation movement investing pride and dignity
into the formerly despised Saami identity; they have taken
conscious measures to glorify and re-codify half-forgotten
Saami customs and tradition, while simultaneously making
certain that they receive their share of the national
welfare. This ethnopolitical movement has enjoyed
considerable success. The Saami language, threatened by
extinction as late as the 1960s, has been revived, and it is
now the main administrative language in those parts of
Finnmark county which are defined as Saami core areas. In
1989, a Saami parliament with limited but real power,
Sametinget, was officially inaugurated by the late Norwegian
king Olav V.
Only a generation ago, many Saami were about to become
assimilated into the Norwegian ethnic group, while others
were politically passive, poor, culturally stigmatised and
largely uneducated. Their success has proven that it is
possible for a well-organised aboriginal minorities to
reinvent and indeed strengthen their identity in the face of
fast social and cultural change, and that there need be no
contradiction between modernisation and ethnic identity.
Although many Norwegians of Saami ancestry still reject
Saami identity, the number of citizens who define themselves
as Saami has increased. Today, the self-conscious members of
this minority present themselves a culturally self-conscious
group whose identity has survived the process of
modernisation. Only a minority engage in the reindeer
herding with which the group is associated (and associates
itself in its ethnic symbolism), but many thousands - many
of them residents of cities - insist on their right to be
non-Norwegians in an ethnic sense, and yet to benefit from
the same rights as other Norwegian citizens. Many others, it
should be added, have an uncertain and ambiguous identity,
sometimes oscillating between Saami and Norwegian ethnic
self-identification.
Non-European immigrants and Norwegian identity
The Saami's achievement of political, cultural and
linguistic rights within the Norwegian nation-state also
indicates that there need be no serious conflict between an
ethnic majority and a minority living in the same country.
However, the avoidance of conflict seems to require that the
minority is granted cultural self-determination in respects
defined as important by its leaders. This can entail demands
for religious and linguistic rights which may not be
accepted by the nation-state, which proclaims - as a virtue
- the essential cultural homogeneity of its inhabitants.
Indeed, if we look at the more recent immigrants to Norway
(see Long's contribution to this book), it becomes evident
that the rights successfully claimed by the Saami are not
automatically granted by a national majority. During the
election campaign of 1991, leading politicians in Oslo
suggested that immigrant children should be deprived of the
right to be taught in their mother-tongue in primary
schools, and strong political lobbies have for years fought
against the erection of a mosque in the city, although
Muslim organisations were willing to fund it themselves.
The overtly anti-immigrant groups, some of which are openly
racist, are small and politically marginal in the country.
But suspicion, fear and myths, especially targeting Muslim
immigrants, abound. Many Norwegians exaggerate their numbers
if asked; many believe that Muslim women have an average of
ten children each, and so on. In general, the very presence
of Muslims in the country is seen as a threat against
Norwegian identity by some zealous patriots, who depreciate
that "mix of cultures" presumedly entailed by migration, and
who would prefer that Norwegian society conformed firmly to
nationalist doctrine; namely, that it should only contain
people "of the same kind".
Two books on multicultural Norwegian society written from an
anthropological perspective (Eriksen, 1991; Brox, 1991) have
argued the need for a more finely nuanced debate on
multiculturalism than that which has been typical so far.
The public debate of the 1980s and early 1990s has polarised
the Norwegian population in camps either violently for or
violently against immigration. (As a matter of fact, regular
immigrants have not been allowed to enter the country since
1975.) Instead, both books argue, one should see the
non-European presence in the country as an empirical fact,
if not as an unproblematic one. Issues which demand critical
scrutiny include cultural conflicts, power relations and the
future content of Norwegian national identity. In the 1990s,
it is possible for a person to identify himself
simultaneously as a Saami and a Norwegian. It is so far much
less common for a person to identify him- or herself as a
Pakistani-born Muslim and simultaneously as a Norwegian,
even if the person in question is a Norwegian citizen. The
idea of Norwegianness, as it is produced and reproduced in
public discourse, seems incompatible with Islam. Since the
new minorities must be considered permanent ones, I have
suggested (Eriksen, 1991) that Norwegians should rethink
their national ideology in order that ethnic minorities may
be included as legitimate and "natural" members of Norwegian
society.
Perhaps the future will see an increasing polarisation
between Norwegians and immigrants; perhaps many of them will
leave, or perhaps many will be assimilated; that is, they
will give up their language and their religion and become
some kind of ethnic Norwegians. It is also conceivable that
the Asian, African and South American immigrants and
refugees will succeed along the same lines as the Saami;
that they will be able to assert their minority identity
while simultaneously becoming integrated into Norwegian
civil society. Perhaps the future will even see an alliance
between Norwegian cultural patriots and Muslim immigrants -
against the onslaught of American mass culture? The outcome
of the current situation of culture contact is uncertain.
The relationship between isolation and contact with others,
or introverted and extroverted tendencies, is highly
ambiguous in Norwegian history. The relative isolation of
the society, which among other things entailed the absence
of a powerful landed gentry, has had substantial effects on
its ideology, social organisation and self-definition. On
the other hand, Norwegians are also proud of their large
merchant fleet (which, it is sometimes claimed, can be
traced back to the Viking age), and during the past century,
Norwegians have been a very extrovert people; they are well
travelled, have recruited many Protestant missionaries in
Africa and Madagascar, and are among the strongest
supporters of the United Nations. Through migration,
Norwegian society has come closer to the rest of the world
in a different way; it has been confronted at home with
customs and beliefs radically different from the endemic
ones. In another sense, too, Norwegian society is much less
sheltered from the rest of the world than it used to be.
This concerns what we may call the globalisation of culture;
the spread, through modern media of mass communication, of
symbols, images and messages which know of no national or
cultural boundaries, and which are virtually identical all
over the world.
The globalisation of culture in Norway
Ours is the era of the jet plane and the satellite dish. The
world has shrunk, and some of its internal boundaries are
vanishing. You may buy clothing from Marlboro Classics in
Nairobi; you may watch Dynasty in Indonesia, and you may
listen to Prince's latest CD in your hotel room in Rio.
Travels which took weeks only two generations ago now take
less than a working-day.
The Norwegian periphery, Utkantnorge, is scarcely that
picturesque, slightly anachronistic kind of place which
tourist brochures try to depict it as - where time has stood
still for a century, where the fisherman still patiently
mends his nets on the wooden pier and the farmer's
working-day follows the sun, where rustic and simple folk
still worship nature and their Protestant god as if NATO and
the European Community had yet to be invented. Surely, these
images are not difficult to come by, if one tries hard
enough. But the picture is more complex. The representation
of "average Norwegians" created by Marianne Gullestad
(1984), who interprets everyday life in a Bergen
working-class suburb, is probably more representative than
the rather exoticising depictions of say, Hans Magnus
Enzensberger. The inhabitants of the outlying districts are
as much consumers of videos, pop songs and colourful weekly
magazines as they are geographically marginal. Former
groceries have been replaced by large shopping malls or by
combined video shops and snackbars. MTV waves and hamburger
outlets are present all along the Norwegian coastline. The
farmers of Gudbrandsdalen travel to the Canary islands in
July, just like everyone else; about forty per cent (my
estimate) of the northern fishermen whistle Bob Dylan songs
as they wait for their catch. - Kjartan Fløgstad, one of the
country's most highly esteemed novelists, described the
country as Media Thule and its inhabitants as mediatullingar
in his book Det sjuande klima ("The Seventh Climate",
Fløgstad 1987) - a pun meaning, literally, "media idiots",
which refers to the presumedly immense power of the mass
media over the Norwegian population. Norway is today a
country whose inhabitants probably eat more hamburgers than
fish balls, where Jackie Collins's novels are more widely
read than Bjørnson's peasant tales, where well over half of
the population can make themselves understood in slightly
broken American English. The country is a more strongly
integrated part of the global ecumene than many Norwegians
prefer to think, but to be fair, it is a local part with a
distinctive local flavour in which Norwegians take great
pride. The impact of the current globalisation of culture is
visible even in remote parts of Norway, where local shops
may have American names and everybody wears jeans although
the climate suggests otherwise. These processes of cultural
change cause a great deal of worry. Some Norwegians fear the
erosion of their cultural distinctiveness; some lament the
appearance of Anglicisms in the local dialect; some worry
about the standardising and alienating effects of mass
culture, American style. When the local coffeehouse is
replaced by an outlet of McDonald's, it is certainly an
occasion for intense nostalgia. A sociologist who has
studied the "Americanisation" of Norway, Steinar Bryn, has
argued that massive change of this kind took place during
the 1980s, and that these changes were largely unnoticed by
Norwegians. According to Bryn, Norwegians try to seem
cosmopolitan and non-provincial through adopting aspects of
American lifestyle and American words. Among the more
curious examples he cites as evidence is a hamburger joint
in some remote parish called "McNoreg" (Noreg is New
Norwegian for Norway).8
Many of the inhabitants of Norway, it has occasionally been
suggested, are lacking in self-confidence on behalf of those
very aspects of Norwegianness which they relish. Norwegian
resistance against membership in the European Community - a
movement unique in Europe - is simultaneously an expression
of such a fear, and an indication of a strong and enduring
cultural self-consciousness. Which other European country
would in the early 1990s prefer to stay outside of that safe
haven of abundance and protection that the EC offers? With
that picture of Norwegian identity which has been drawn in
this chapter in mind, it may be possible to understand - at
least in part - why so many Norwegians (possibly more than
half) stubbornly insist on standing alone, self-reliant,
with as few commitments as possible towards unpredictable
European partners.
National identity and cultural change
In the face of technological change and the fact that
formerly discrete societies have become intertwined, it may
seem that it will be difficult to maintain the idea of
Norwegian culture as an egalitarian, rural "no-frills"
culture. Since processes of cultural homogenisation erase
cultural differences, and since increased geographical
mobility creates a mismatch between territories and
"cultures", one might expect the distinctiveness to vanish
gradually. In one sense, this is doubtless happening. Like
virtually every other ethnic group in the world, Norwegians
nowadays watch Sylvester Stallone and Madonna on MTV; the
pizza has become a local staple;9 an Oslo flat may be
furnished and decorated in the same way as a flat in Milan
or Berlin. In terms of consumption and lifestyle, there is
less and less to distinguish Norwegians from any other
Western European people. However, a main argument in this
chapter has been that social identities are created
imaginatively in a specific political context, and that they
have no imperative relationship to "objective" culture.
If we look at Norwegian identity- the current
self-definitions - we will therefore find a picture of a
highly distinctive people, notwithstanding "objective"
cultural changes. Indeed, it could be argued that modern
ethnicity, seen as cultural self-consciousness, is a result
of an ongoing process of cultural homogenisation. As a
general rule, it is when the carriers of an identity feel
that it is threatened from the outside that it becomes most
important to them. So for the Norwegian farmer of the 1840s,
there was no reason to stress his social identity. He could
take it for granted; probably, he did not even reflect about
who he was. To people living in modern, complex societies,
the situation is quite different. Their way of life is
different from that of their forebears, and that it
resembles that of the neighbouring peoples, but the feeling
of a continuity with the past may still remain important.
They are now constantly brought into contact with people
whom they define as different (foreigners, immigrants,
etc.), and are thus brought to reflect on their identity.
They must be able to explain why they describe themselves as
Norwegians and not as Swedes, Pakistanis, etc. Furthermore,
the shrinking of the world entailed by globalisation seems
to lay pressure on their identity as distinctive: the old
and familiar is replaced by the new and foreign, and
threatens to erase one's uniqueness. In this way, the
pressure from cultural complexity and globalisation is at
the root of the modern identity crisis, where ethnic
identities are often seen as a solution in the face of the
disappearance of boundaries. As Anglicisms enter the
language, new shopping malls with enormous car parks replace
the old family-run groceries, and the video machine replaces
the storytelling grandmother, the individual may react by
reaching towards that which seems constant and secure in a
sea of accelerating change. The outcome is often the
resurgence of ethnic or national identities which may have
lain dormant for a period, and which now assert themselves
with newly found vitality as a form of defence against
perceived cultural change originating from the outside.
As with the ideological creation of national and ethnic
groups, this resurgence of ethnic or national identities has
no clear relationship to "objective" cultural changes or
"objective" threats. It is only if a certain situation is
perceived as threatening to one's identity that it inspires
revitalisation. For example, it could plausibly be argued
that the Norwegian way of life was transformed dramatically
in the post-war decades, following massive US influence in
the political, economic and cultural spheres. These changes,
which entailed the introduction of television, the nearly
universal use of private cars and consumerist ideology, were
seen as threatening to the Norwegian identity only by a
minority - and so Norwegian culture was allowed to change
without its identity being seriously challenged. People felt
just as Norwegian after the introduction of the TV as they
did before. Since the 1970s and 1980s, on the other hand,
the presence of a few thousand Muslims in the country has
been perceived by many Norwegians as threatening to their
identity, and they have taken measures to end immigration.
The Muslims in Norway wield insignificant political and
economic power, and they do not have any control of national
mass media. Their presence is nevertheless perceived as
threatening to some segments of the Norwegian population,
who have responded through an intense glorification of
certain symbols of Norwegianness.
Coda: Whither Norwegian identity?
It is beyond doubt that a Norwegian identity will continue
to be imagined by the overwhelming majority of the
population for the foreseeable future, whatever the
country's relationship to the European Community will be.
This means that people living in the country, and counting
it as their ancestral land, will continue to regard
themselves as distinctive from others - as Norwegians. It
does not, however, mean that the content of such an identity
will remain constant. Although Norwegians - like any
self-defined people or ethnic group - tend to think that
there is a strong continuity with the past, it is a fact
that being Norwegian in the 1990s means something different
from what it meant in the 1950s. But what will it look like
as we approach the coming millennium? We do not know. But we
may hazard the guess that Norwegian identity will remain
proudly Norwegian.
In a comparison between the history curricula of the school
systems of the five Nordic countries, the historian Stein
Tønnesson (1991) found that the Norwegian curriculum is the
most nationalist in character. Whereas the Danes stress the
intimate relationship between their national history and
that of Europe, and the Swedes underscore the importance of
"Norden"10 as a cultural unit; while the Finns and
Icelanders promote general humanistic and intellectual
values instead of glorifying their national identity, the
Norwegian school curriculum is markedly nationalist
(Tønnesson, 1991). It presents Scandinavian, European and
global history from a Norwegian vantage-point, and focusses
extensively on the process of Norwegian nation-building. Can
such an attitude be viable at a time when
"internationalisation" is the big catchword everywhere - in
business as well as in politics and intellectual life? Yes,
but it should also follow from the foregoing that it cannot
be predicted which social identities will be the most
relevant ones for Norwegians in the future.
Acknowledgements
An earlier version of this chapter has been read and
commented fruitfully upon by Anne Hambro Alnæs, Kjetil
Folkestad, Anne Cohen Kiel, Iver B Neumann and Stein
Tønnesson, who also located a number of factual historical
inaccuracies in the first draft.
A comment (in Norwegian) on this article arrived on June 30,
1996.
Notes
1 This is a common characteristic of most nationalisms, see
Gellner (1983).
2 Linguists may regard the four Scandinavian languages -
Danish, Swedish, Standard Norwegian and New Norwegian - as
closely related dialects of the same language. With some
initial effort, a speaker of one of the dialects (or
languages, as they are defined politically) can easily
understand the others. Icelandic and Faroese are more
distinctive, although they are closely related to the
others. Saami ("Lappish") and Finnish belong to a different
language family, namely the Finno-Ugric languages.
3 About 20% of the population use New Norwegian, but 25% of
national radio and TV broadcasts are expected to be in that
language. There are virtually no problems of mutual
intelligibility.
4 Oslo tries desperately to be a big, bustling and
cosmopolitan city, although it fails to convince foreigners
that it is. With friends like this TV journalist, the city
will manage quite well without enemies.
5 P1 at 9 o'clock daily. In the summer, the same programme
is called Reiseradioen ("The pocket radio"), alluding to
Norwegian holiday habits whereby many people stay at some
remote cottage or campsite.
6 An undercommunicated fact of recent Norwegian history
consists in the healthy and vigorous relationship between
Norwegian and German intellectual life, which was abruptly
cut off after World War II. In the 1990s, few Norwegians are
fluent in German.
7 There are also Saami in northern Finland and Sweden, as
well as on the Russian Kola peninsula. The largest community
is the Norwegian one.
8 In Lars Aarønæs's language column in the weekly newspaper
Dag og Tid, inept Norwegians who try to give a cosmopolitan
impression abound. One representative example is The Italian
Pizza Company, which is located at Sinsen, North Oslo. - And
of course, Norwegians, like many other peoples, are liable
to call each other "provincial" when they disapprove of
something.
9 See Lien (1988) for a highly readable study of changes in
the culinary habits of rural Norwegians. The title of her
work speaks for itself. It is called &laqno;From boknafesk
to pizza╗; boknafesk is a kind of dried and salted cod
endemic to northern Norway.
10 Norden refers to the three Scandinavian countries as well
as Finland, Iceland, the Faroe Islands, and sometimes
Greenland. Since Finland has been a Swedish province and
contains a Swedish-speaking minority, Norden is more
important than Scandinavia to most Swedes. See Neumann
(1991) for a comprehensive discussion of the idea of
"Norden".
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⌐Thomas Hylland Eriksen 1993
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