EMP151: First Norwegian research seminar held - talk on wolf symbolicity given

Friday last week I organised 1st Norwegian research seminar of the research project "Animals in changing environments: Cultural mediation and semiotic analysis" (Stavanger, Norway - December 13th 2013), and presented my paper “The symbolic construction of the Big Bad Wolf in contemporary Scandinavia”. 10 people attended (parts of) the event, which had been advertised in Morgenbladet and Stavanger Aftenblad.

The first half of the day, which was open to anyone interested, was followed by a 4-hour meeting involving the three researchers present (Kristin Armstrong Oma, Timo Maran and myself), and dinner.

Symbolic construction of Big Bad Wolf abstract posted in Minding Animals blog

Today "The symbolic construction of the Big Bad Wolf in contemporary Scandinavia" was posted in the blog of Minding Animals Norway. The text is an abstract for my upcoming presentation at the First Norwegian Research Seminar – Animals in Changing Environments: Cultural mediation and Semiotic Analysis (December 13, 2013 – University of Stavanger, Norway). You can register by sending an email.

The text has already been posted here in Utopian Realism.

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.

Reference for forthcoming book review on wolf conflicts

Some three weeks back I proof-read my book review which is to appear in the Norwegian academic journal Sosiologi idag [Sociology today] this autumn. The review will appear with no title, and no summary (correction to previous post). Reference:

Tønnessen, Morten 2013. Ketil Skogen, Olve Krange og Helene Figari 2013, Ulvekonflikter – en sosiologisk studie, Oslo 2013: Akademika forlag. Book review. Sosiologi idag 43(2): 117-122.

Wolf lecture in Rendalen scheduled for June 6

My lecture in Rendalen (in the Norwegian county of Hedmark, a municipality just outside the wolf zone) has been scheduled for June 6th at 7-9 pm (this replaces a previous note). The topic of my talk is "Hvorfor konflikten rundt ulv og sau har blitt så hissig: Ulv og sau som symbol og realitet" [Why the conflict on wolves and sheep has become so /fierce/heated/: Wolves and sheep as symbol and reality]. Thomas Strømseth of Hedmark University College will give a lecture at the same event, on hunting dogs. The event will take place on Fagertun school, and is arranged by the project ROSAREN, which has been looking into local attitudes to large predators, and opportunities/consequences for local business.

***

Som utmarkskommune like utenfor ulvesonen har Rendalen en sentral plassering i debatten om norsk ulveforvaltning. I dette foredraget er temaet hvordan de mange kulturelle bildene av ulv og sau danner grunnlaget for debatten, og hvordan uenigheten i stor grad skyldes forskjellige natursyn. Både landskapet og opplevelsen av det er i endring i vår tid – og særlig vår endrede opplevelse av landskapet henger for en stor del sammen med utviklingen i norsk landbruk, som skaper frustrasjon og håpløshet i mange lokalmiljøer der småskala landbruk ennå er viktig. I løpet av foredraget skal vi blant annet se på natursynet til folk i Rendalen, og foredragsholderen vil også dele noen tanker om fremtiden.

Talk scheduled for conference on carnivores and grazing livestock

I have agreed to give a talk at this year's Den nasjonale konferansen om rovvilt, beitedyr og samfunn [The national conference on predators, grazing livestock and society] (Hamar, Norway, Oct. 31 - Nov. 1). Last year there were 120 attendants.

My talk will be entitled "Offisiell og 'uoffisiell' rovviltforvaltning i Norge sett med et humanøkologisk blikk - Hva er motivene og handlingene?" [Official and "unofficial" predator management in Norway, as seen in a human ecology perspective - What are the motives and actions?].

The talk has been scheduled for 40 minutes. I have been asked to address the topic of illegal wolf hunting, and will also present my general analysis of cultural symbolism in the Norwegian wolf/sheep strife.

Oslo II - belated report

November 11th I gave my talk 'Ulovlig jakt på ulv' (Illegal wolf hunting) in Kriminalpolitisk seminar in Oslo (University of Oslo), cf. preliminary posts. About an hour - followed by remarks by professor emeritus Nils Christie, and general discussion. There were perhaps 30 people in the audience, and the discussion was engaged and lively, not least since Christie positioned himself - at least initially - as somewhat 'anti-wolf'. He interpreted the 'wolf wars' as a social (i.e. human-human) conflict, and sided with the weak part, which he took to be rural wolf antagonists. Interestingly, Christie accepted my portrayal of the wolf as a symbol for other rural and agricultural hardships - but we disagree on whether or not it makes any sense to 'give the wolf antagonists this victory' (getting rid of the wolf). In my analysis, it wouldn't change the underlying frustration with current developments, and so would be a shallow solution in the sense of Arne Næss' deep ecology; in Christies, "they deserve it". We agreed, however, on the topic of illegal wolf hunting, that it would be a good sign, and further the public debate on wolf management, if those who partake in poaching of wolves could step forward and admit to, and defend, what they do.

In addition to giving the abovementioned presentation, I
* met with eco-criminologists Ragnhild Sollund and Guri Larsen concerning our human-animal relations anthology in-progress
* spent some time at Gentle Actions, meeting with David Rothenberg, David Abram and Per Ingvar Haukeland
* met my colleague in edutainment François Sibbald (our conference concept ARC (Authority - role - communication) - is in progress and scheduled for release early next summer).

I was, that time around, in Oslo Nov. 10-12.