Proceedings chapter: "The changing imagery of the big bad wolf" - reference; errata

A brief article of mine, "The changing imagery of the big bad wolf", based on a conference presentation in 2009, has been published online (and on a CD) - in 2012, it appears. Abstract is available online, as is the full PDF.

Reference:

Tønnessen, Morten 2012. The changing imagery of the big bad wolf. Proceedings of the 10th World Congress of the International Association for Semiotic Studies (IASS/AIS) (Universidade da Coruña (Spain)), ISBN: 978-84-9749-522-6, pp. 1543–1548. 

Errata:

1. "Morten Tønnessen, University of Tartu, Moscow (Russia)": Not sure where this came from. Tartu, where I took my PhD, is in Estonia.

2. “Rendalen happens to be [Southern!] Norway’s biggest municipality, measured by land area."

Abstract for 13/12 - "The symbolic construction of the Big Bad Wolf in contemporary Scandinavia"

The abstract below was written yesterday, in preparation of my upcoming presentation December 13th at First Norwegian Research Seminar – Animals in Changing Environments: Cultural mediation and Semiotic Analysis.

See also the latest online versions of my CV and bibliography.

***

The symbolic construction of the Big Bad Wolf in contemporary Scandinavia

Morten Tønnessen

Abstract

First Norwegian Research Seminar – Animals in Changing Environments: Cultural mediation and Semiotic Analysis (December 13, 2013 – University of Stavanger)

In this presentation, as background for the case study “Representations (both Problematic and Romanticizing) of Large Mammals, especially Wolves”, I will summarise my work on wolves to date. This includes 8 academic publications (Tønnessen 2010a, 2010b, 2010c, 2011a, 2011b, 2011c, 2013a and 2013b) and 18 presentations at conferences and research seminars:

• 2009
• Wolf Land: The Phenomenal World of Wolves on the Scandinavian Peninsula
• On Contrapuntuality: Semiotic Niche vs. Ontological Niche: The Case of the Scandinavian Wolf Population
• Estranged, Endangered, Extinct: Lessons from the Extinction off the Scandinavian Wolf
• The Changing Imagery of the Big Bad Wolf
• 2010
• The Legality and Ethical Legitimacy of Wolf Hunting in Scandinavia
• En økosemiotisk analyse av norsk ulveforvaltning [An ecosemiotic analysis of Norwegian wolf management]
• Territory vs. Confinement: The Umwelten of Free-Range vs. Captive Wolves
• Ulovlig jakt på ulv [Illegal wolf hunting]
• The Nature View and Worldview of People in Rendalen Municipality in the Region of Hedmark
• 2011
• Bad Dog: An Uexküllian Analysis of Norwegian Wolf Management
• The Umwelt Trajectories of Wolves, Sheep and People
• Wolf History: Agents in Hiding
• Two Global Species and their Age-Old Foe: The Semiotic Eth(n)ology of Wolves, Sheep and People
• Offisiell og ‘uoffisiell’ rovviltforvaltning i Norge sett med et humanøkologisk blikk: Hva er motivene og handlingene? [Official and ‘unofficial’ predator management in Norway seen from the perspective of human ecology: What are the motifs and actions?]
• The Cultural Semiotic of Wolves and Sheep
• 2012
• The Contemporary Symbolic Construction of Norway’s Big Bad Wolf
• 2013
• Animal and Eve: How Representations of Wolves and Sheep are Used to Construct Human Identities
• Plans for Field Work on Predator-Prey Conflicts in Norway involving Video-Recorded Interviews followed by Pico-Scale Analysis

In cultural terms, hardly any animal is as loaded with symbolic value as the wolf. A main finding in my work to date is that the wolf has become a poster boy for large predators in general, and a scape goat for certain societal developments. In consequence, what wolves are taken to signify depends not so much on actual wolf ecology as on these cultural/societal developments, which are, justly or unfairly, associated with the presence of wolves. The wolf’s vivid symbolicity in current times is enforced by the occurrence of conspiracy theories.

In Norway, the wolf as a symbol is particularly associated with the sheep as a symbol. The sheep’s symbolicity is in the Norwegian context grounded in open landscapes, which are typically taken to be intrinsically Norwegian. Sheep symbolicity is thus effectively associated with outer pastures, which have been crucial in Norwegian sheep husbandry but are now under pressure. And so it is that wolves are blamed for overgrowth (gjengroing).

References

Tønnessen, Morten 2010a. Wolf Land. Biosemiotics 3.3: 289-297.

— 2010b. Is a Wolf wild as Long as it Does Not Know that It Is Being Thoroughly Handled? Humanimalia – a journal of human/animal interface studies 2(1) (Fall 2010): 1-8 (available online).

— 2010c. The Legality and Ethical Legitimacy of Wolf Hunting in Scandinavia. Pp. 65-72 in the Research seminar report 52 of the Scandinavian Council for Criminology.

— 2011a. I, Wolf: The Ecology of Existence. In Johannes Servan and Ane Faugstad Aarø (eds.): Environment, Embodiment and Gender, Bergen: Hermes Text, 315-333.

— 2011b. Fra by og land, mann mot mann til visjon 2040 [From city against countryside, man against man to vision 2040]. Kulturverk (online magazine) – published in three parts Nov. 13, Nov. 17 and Nov. 24.

— 2011c. Umwelt Transition and Uexküllian Phenomenology – An Ecosemiotic Analysis of Norwegian Wolf Management (= Dissertationes Semioticae Universitatis Tartuensis 16). Doctoral dissertation. Tartu: Tartu University Press. 232 pp. Introduction available online.

— 2013a. Hvem er villest i landet her? Et ulveliv [Who is wildest in this country here? A wolf's life]. In Sollund, Ragnhild, Morten Tønnessen og Guri Larsen (eds) 2013, Hvem er villest i landet her? Råskap mot dyr og natur i antropocen, menneskets tidsalder [Who is wildest in this country here? Brutality towards animals and nature in the Anthropocene, the age of Man], Oslo: Spartacus Forlag/Scandinavian Academic Press, 79-98. 

— 2013b. Ketil Skogen, Olve Krange og Helene Figari 2013, Ulvekonflikter – en sosiologisk studie, Oslo 2013: Akademika forlag. Book review. Sosiologi idag 43(2) (Special Issue on „Dyr i samfunnet“ [Animals in society]): 117-122. Summary available online.

The work presented here has been supported by EEA Norway Grants EMP151.

Minding Animals presentations scheduled for July 4th

Both of my presentations at the second international Minding Animals conference have been scheduled for the first full conference day, Wednesday July 4th. 

"The contemporary symbolic construction of Norway's big bad wolf" has been scheduled for 14.00-15.30, partaking in the session "Public perception of animals II" (chaired by Jan van der Valk, room: Ruppert Blauw).

"Biosemiotics and animal ethics" has been scheduled for 16.00-17.30, partaking in the session "Animal ethics: New developments II" (no chair announced, room: Ruppert 040).

Each of these papers will be alloted 17 minutes for presentation and 5 minutes for questions from the audience and discussion, I've been informed.

See full programme for the Utrecht conference here.

Abstract accepted for Minding Animals conference: "The contemporary symbolic construction of Norway's Big Bad Wolf"

Today i received a formal notification that my abstract "The contemporary symbolic construction of Norway's Big Bad Wolf" has been accepted for oral presentation at the second Minding Animals conference, which is to take place in Utrecht, the Netherlands, July 3-6.

See also my note on a similar notification concerning another abstract, "Biosemiotics and animal ethics".

***

THE CONTEMPORARY SYMBOLIC CONSTRUCTION OF NORWAY'S BIG BAD WOLF

Morten Tønnessen

Current carnivore management would not have met such hostile resistance from an outspoken minority on the Norwegian countryside, had it not been for some current developments which are all too seldom related to the wolf conservation discourse. Notably, since 1999 one third of all farms in Norway have closed down. In reality the wolves are not blamed for the relatively few sheep they kill — they have come to symbolize the threats, dangers and decline facing Norwegian agriculture. The wolf, in short, has become a scapegoat for certain societal developments.

The symbolic value of wolves and sheep has historically often been juxtaposed, especially in the context of the Bible. In cultural terms, hardly any animals are as loaded with symbolic value as the wolf and the sheep. And the shared importance is no coincidence, since the symbolism of the two animals has frequently developed in explicit opposition to each other. In the Scandinavian context in general and the Norwegian in particular the wolf’s vivid symbolicity in contemporary times is enforced by the occurrence of conspiracy theories. Many of the fiercest opponents of wolf conservation believe that researchers and the authorities intentionally misrepresent the population number of wolves, and distrust official reassurances that the wolf does not pose much danger to people. In result, the human perception of wolves has in large measure decoupled from ecological reality.

This decoupling of perception and empirical circumstances does not only apply to conspiracy theorists. Whenever national Norwegian media cover predation on sheep, for instance, the wolf is typically pictured for illustrative purposes — despite the fact that wolverines, lynx, and brown bears over time all account for a much greater percentage of predation on sheep. The wolf has thus become a poster boy for large predators in general. What wolves are taken to signify, in short, depends not so much on actual wolf ecology as it does on certain cultural/societal developments. These are, justly or unfairly, associated with the presence of wolves, and with governmental conservation policies. What the wolf is taken to represent as a sign — what it is taken to be a sign of — has become the decisive driver in the Norwegian wolf management discourse.

The sheep’s symbolicity is in the Norwegian context grounded in open landscapes, which are typically taken to be intrinsically Norwegian. The idea of the Norwegian nation is built on the memory of an initial clearing and cultivation of the original (pre-Norwegian) landscape. We see this plainly in the two first verses of Ivar Aasen’s “The Norwegian”, which is in effect treated as a national anthem.

The symbolicity of sheep in Norway is effectively associated with the symbolicity of outer pastures, which have been crucial in Norwegian sheep husbandry but are now under pressure, partly due to a general move from extensive to intensive farming practices. The common perception in rural areas is that outer pastures are being devalued, and that traditional Norwegian farming practices are under threat. In visual imagery, this is best expressed by a phenomenon called ‘gjengroing’, imperfectly translated to English as overgrowth. Overgrowth in this sense implies that an originally open, cleared landscape is taken over by forest, weeds and other vegetation without direct agricultural value. Such a landscape, with growing irrelevance (so to speak), reduced utility and (notably, in perceptual terms) an obstructed view, has become a symbol of the hardships of rural areas and Norwegian agriculture. Our thesis is that it is this perception which is at the base of the contemporary symbolic construction of the Big Bad Wolf in Norway.

Cooperator for wolf article on man-eaters reshuffled once again

For quite some time now I have had an agreement with Estonian wolf researcher Ilmar Rootsi which involves co-writing an academic article on canid man-eaters in the next-to-modern history of Estonia, Finland, Sweden and Norway. In mid-October 2011 Nelly Mäekivi got back into that project, replacing Silver Rattasepp yet again as the third co-writer. By now she's a doctoral student (as is he).

Oslo animals

Apropos Oslo - popularly called "Tigerstaden" (City of the tiger) - here's the tiger statue at Jernbarnetorvet (the railway square), photographed in the cosy Northern winter.

And here's the symbol of the state - the lion - in front of Stortinget, the Norwegian parliament. The parliament is routinely referred to as "Løvebakken" (loosely: Hill of the lion).

I expect to touch upon these exotic Norwegian creatures either in "The Cultural Semiotic of Wolves and Sheep" or "The Symbolic Construction of the Big Bad Wolf in Contemporary Scandinavia" (see Article for Signs).

Proceedings

Last week I submitted my contribution to the 10th world congress in semiotics proceedings, "The changing imagery of the big bad wolf".

On site in A Coruña, Spain

I have just arrived in A Coruña (Galicia), Spain, where the 10th world congress of semiotics takes place. It has been a long journey. I have been travelling (first by ferry, and then) by train - more than 3,000 km. It is my first time in Spain. Se my approximate route here.

Friday I will be presenting my talk "The changing imagery of the big bad wolf" - with examples from the Norwegian national election September 14th.

The abstract book of the 2009 world congress in semiotics

... is to be found here.

My contribution (p. 153) ends abruptly, with a word missing.

THE CHANGING IMAGERY OF THE BIG BAD WOLF

Autores/Autors: Morten Tønnessen (UNIVERSITY OF TARTU)

The current work is part of the author’s ecosemiotic analysis of Norwegian/Scandinavian wolf management in the period 1855-2010. In Norway, as in several other countries, wolf management is controversial. For some on the countryside it has come to symbolize the ignorant hostility (and imperialistic tendencies) of the urban elites. There is a wide gap between perceptions on the conservation side and in the antagonistic camp, and the proper role of folklore – which is considered by wolf ecologists as unscientific – has never been agreed upon. Field observations confirm that the political and cultural strife has little basis in actual wolf ecology – sheep, for instance, which play a marginal role in Scandinavian wolf diet, are currently major players in popular imagery (and, ironically, management policies) only. As symbols have grown and developed, cultural representations of wolves appear, at least in part, to have decoupled from ecological reality. In what ways have our conceptions of wolves changed from the extermination campaigns of the 19th century to the conservation efforts of our generation? To what extent have wolves, in modern times as well as earlier, symbolized human traits, religious ideas etc., and to what extent have they represented actual phenomena of nature? By offering a series of examples of animal representations involving wolves – in fiction and popular culture, in myths and in legends – I will inquire into these questions, aiming at approving our understanding of how human cultures has co-evolved not only with wolves, but further with a rich human imagery of these creatures, the infamous ancestors of man’s best

FRIEND.