NOFRI105 Landscapes, Outdoor Practices and Identities (10 ECTS) 

Course facts

Introduction

Landscapes enable various forms of human interaction, experience, and meaning. The interfaces of ‘material’ and meteorological factors and sociohistorical contexts represent demands, and possibilities (‘affordances’) for innovative explorations of diverse outdoor activities, cultural practices, and identities. For example, in the face of modernity and Norway becoming an independent nation state, ideas of mountains and mountaineering, skiing and winter, along with active outdoor lifestyles were intimately connected with notions of nationality and masculinity. The relevance of this and similar understandings will be critically grounded in empirical studies scrutinizing how human-landscape-interactions and landscape-perceptions vary and transform according to age, gender, social class, ethnicity, and for example, ideas of adventure, education, and health. The concepts of Ecosystem Services and "Allemannsrett", along with the European Landscape Convention and UNs Sustainable Developments Goals are highly relevant.

Even though global networks, innovative technologies and adaptations of landscapes make it possible to practice all kinds of activities worldwide, experiences, notions and ‘imagined communities’ claim certain activities, values, and identities as typical for regions, and/or groups, due to cultural traditions and predominant types of landscape characteristics (forests, mountains, rivers/lakes, Arctic, etc...) and seasons. Demarcation and transgression of such borders, though of fluid and permeable ‘nature’, are expressed through language, actions, activities, equipment, and immaterial signs. Notions are also nurtured by myths, fairy tales, literature and arts; and expressed, reconceptualized, and transformed over time and across place by the stories people tell and how landscapes are managed and practically explored.

Ideas of unsupervised play and free public access to landscapes as typical of Norwegian and Nordic childhood and cultures are other examples that will be critically examined. Intersecting masculinity, landscape and outdoor cultures, and current sociocultural complexities regarding inclusion of women, children and youth, race, ethnicity, physical/mental ability, and more than humans.

Different texts, pictures, artefacts, stories and practices offer a multitude of opportunities to critically research and discuss conceptions of sociocultural borders and transformative ideas of landscapes, outdoor practices and identities. This may include, for example, landscapes being understood as wilderness, a romantic refuge of longing for authenticity, a ‘space’ of healing / spiritual powers, as resources that make life livable, and a homeland to which one belongs and bonds. Further, landscapes may be viewed not merely as playgrounds / thrillscapes to explore and conquer, but also as environments in need of care, healing, restoration, and preservation.

Learning outcomes

Knowledge

• Explain and discuss sociocultural and narrative approaches in studying human–landscape interactions
• Explain and discuss friluftsliv as dynamic and contextualized landscape practices, and identify forms of cultural continuity, diversity, and change
• Thematise, compare, and discuss the relevance of (cross-)national, Nordic and global features and developments 

Skills

• Demonstrate understanding of the significance of sensuous, embodied experiences of landscapes in upbringing, learning and enculturation
• Identify and articulate human-landscape intersections and how outdoor practices, use of technologies, and human identities are formed by, but also forming, landscapes 

Competencies

• Recognize and discuss phenomenological, hermeneutical (cultural analytical) and critical approaches to human’s sensory and embodied experiences of landscapes through outdoor practices
• Analyse interconnections of lived outdoor experiences, practices and meanings as formed and distributed within landscapes, in which sociocultural processes, technologies, digital media and pedagogical ideas are at work 

Learning styles and activities

The topics are elucidated through practical explorations/expeditions, and in lectures, seminars, and through literature studies organized in tentatively five ‘blocks’ of teaching/seminars with time for students’ self-directed studies in between. The individual student is required to be well prepared through ongoing study of core literature and by participation in study groups. Groups of 2-3 students will be responsible for carrying out small-scale research projects and conducting sessions on agreed topics and core literature throughout the course.

Mandatory assignment

The students must have satisfied requirements for attendance and active participation in the seminars and excursions, including the submission of individual/group assignments that will be given the Pass/Fail grade. The number of assignments to be submitted will be specified at the start of the course.

Assessment

For the final exam, each student must write an individual assignment on a chosen theme relevant for the course during the semester, spending approximately 120 working hours.

The written assignment must not exceed a maximum of 3000 words (1.5 line spacing), excluding the table of contents, references, and attachments. All sources must be accurately cited and referenced using the APA 7th edition. The assignment will be due to the end of May in the second semester. Graded A to F.

The individual home exam must be submitted through WISEFLOW. The plagiarism control program Ephorus will scan all assignments.

Core material

It is expected that the students make use of and discuss the core literature provided for the course. In addition, it is required that the students show their ability to identify and make use of research literature and empirical examples (from their own observations, magazines, internet etc.) relevant to their specific self-chosen theme.

CORE READINGS:

1 DIGITAL COMPENDIUM - available as PDF through Canvas:
Gurhold, K. (Ed.). (2021). NORFRI105: Landscape, outdoor practices, and identities: Spring 2022 (Digital Compendium). Norges idrettshøgskole.

Table of contents (reference list), alphabetical in the APA-style, 7th ed.:
The Origins of Friluftsliv: The role of Norwegian Mountain Landscape:
Macfarlane, R. (2003). Altitude: The summit and the view. In R. Macfarlane, Mountains of the mind: A history of a fascination (pp. 137-167). Granta Books.

Slagstad, R. (2008). When the mountains were formed. In N. Messel (Ed.), Oppdagelsen av fjellet [The Discovery of the Mountains] (pp. 151-167). Nasjonalmuseet for kunst, arkitektur og design.

Slingsby, W. C. (1904). Norway: The northern playground: Sketches of climbing and mountain exploration in Norway between 1872 and 1903. David Douglas.
* pp. 1-16, Introduction.

Wærp, H. H. (2017). The Arctic pastoral. In H. Hansson & A. Ryall (Eds.), Arctic modernities: The environmental, the exotic and the everyday (pp. 112-128). Cambridge Scholars Publishers. 

Socio-Cultural Approaches to Human-Landscape Relationships:
Eichberg, H. (2015). Outdoor activities and landscaping: Understanding natures in the plural. In H. Eichberg (Ed.), Bodily democracy: Towards a philosophy of sport for all (pp. 80-101). Routledge.

Olwig, K. R. (2019). The meanings of landscape: Essays on place, space, environment and justice. Routledge. [Reprinted from 1996].
* pp. 18-49, Recovering the substantive nature of landscape.

Examples: Theoretical and Methodological Approaches in Studies of Human-Landscape Relationships:
Gurholt, K. P. (2020). Arctic adventure girls: Television narratives and discourses. In H. Hansson, M. Lindgren Leavenworth & A. Ryall (Eds.), The arctic in literature for children and young adults (pp. 203–216).  Routledge.

Gurholt, K. P. & Haukeland, P. I. (2020). Scandinavian friluftsliv (outdoor life) and the Nordic model: Passions and paradoxes. In M. B. Tin, F. Telseth, J. O. Tangen & R. Giulianotti (Eds.), The Nordic model and physical culture (pp. 165–181). Routledge. 

Gyimòthy, S. (2010). Thrillscapes: Wilderness mediated as playground. In B. T.  Knudsen & A. M. Waade (Eds.), Re-investing authenticity: Tourism, place and emotions (Tourism and Cultural Change) (pp. 254-265). Channel view.

2 CHAPTERS FROM 1 ELECTRONIC BOOK:
Socio-Cultural Approaches to Human-Landscape Relationships:
Beames, S., Mackie, C. & Atenco, M. (2019). Adventure and society. Palgrave Macmillan. 
Please read pages 79-97 and 99-118:
**  This book is available electronic: Click here to download.
*** NB! To open electronic books off campus, you must use the following VPN connection: Click here to download 

21 ELECTRONIC ARTICLES FROM JOURNALS:

NB! To open the electronic articles off campus, you need to use the following VPN connection: Click here to download.

Socio-cultural approaches to human-landscape relationships:
Howard, C. A. (2020). Posthuman anthropology? Facing up to planetary conviviality in the Anthropocene. IMPACT: Tmpact: The Journal of the Center for Interdisciplinary Teaching & Learning, 9(2). http://sites.bu.edu/impact/previous-issues/impact-winter-2017/posthuman-anthropology-facing-up-to-planetary-conviviality-in-the-anthropocene/ 
* This article is available online: Click here to dowload.   

Olwig, K. R. (2007). Norden and the “substantive landscape”: A personal account. Geografiska Annaler: Series B, Human Geography, 89(3), 283-286. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0467.2007.00254.x
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Examples: theoretical and methodological approaches in studies of human-landscape relationships:
Arvidsen, J. (2018). Growing dens: On re-grounding the child–nature relationship through a new materialist approach to children’s dens. Children's Geographies, 16(3), 279-291. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14733285.2018.1425371
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Flemsæter, F., Setten, G. & Brown, K. M. (2014). Morality, mobility and citizenship: Legitimising mobile subjectivities in a contested outdoors. Geoforum, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2014.06.017
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Gibbs, D. & Holloway, L. (2018). From experience economy to experience landscape: The example of UK trail centres. Area, 50(2), 248-255. https://doi.org/10.1111/area.12366
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Gurholt, K. P. & Broch, T. B. (2019). Outdoor Life, Nature Experience, and Sports in Norway: Tensions and dilemmas in the preservation and use of urban forest. Sport in Society, 22(4), 573–588. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17430437.2017.1390938
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Lewis, N. (2000). The climbing body, nature and the experience of modernity. Body & Society, 6(3/4), 58-80. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1357034X00006003004
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Loynes, C. & Gurholt, K. P. (2017). The journey as a transcultural experience for international students. Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 41(4), 532–548. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03098265.2017.1337734
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

O’Brian, L. & Varley, P. (Use of ethnographic approaches to the study of health experiences in relation to natural landscapes. Perspectives in Public Health, 12(6), 305-312. https://doi.org/10.1177/1757913911434895
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Prins, A., & Wattchow, B. (2020). The pedagogic moment: Enskilment as another way of being in outdoor education. Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning, 20(1), 81-91. https://doi.org/10.1080/14729679.2019.1599295
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Ray, S. J. (2009). Risking bodies in the wild: The "Corporeal Unconscious" of America adventure culture. Journal of Sport & Social Issue, 33(3), 257-284. https://doi.org/10.1177/0193723509338863
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Sanderud, J. R., Gurholt, K. P., & Moe, V. F. (2019). “Winter children”: An ethnographic inspired study of children 'being-and-becoming' well-versed with snow and ice. Sport, Education & Society. https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2019.1678124
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Skar, M. & Viestad, O. I. (2013). Recreational use of developed Norwegian shorelines: How ambiguous regulations influence user experiences. Coastal Management, 41(1), 57-74. https://doi.org/10.1080/08920753.2012.749752
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Skogvang, B. O. (2020). Sámi sports and outdoor life at the indigenous Riddu Riđđu festival. Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning, https://doi.org/10.1080/14729679.2020.1838934
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Steigen, A. M., Kogstad, R. & Hummelvoll, J. K. (2016). Green Care services in the Nordic countries: An integrative literature review. European Journal of Social Work, 19(5), 692-715, https://doi.org/10.1080/13691457.2015.1082983
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Venter, S. Z, Barton, D. N., Gundersen, V., Figari, H. & Nowell, M. (2020). Urban nature in a time of crisis: Recreational use of green space increases during the COVID-19 outbreak in Oslo, Norway. Open Access. Environmental Research Letters, 15(10), 104075. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/abb396/meta
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Wall-Reinus, S. (2011). Wilderness and Culture: Tourist Views and Experiences in the Laponian World Heritage Area. Society & Natural Resources, 25(7), 621-632, https://doi.org/10.1080/08941920.2011.627911
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Ween, G. & Abram, S. (2012). The Norwegian Trekking Association: Trekking as Constituting the Nation. Landscape Research, 37(2), 155-177. https://doi.org/10.1080/01426397.2011.651112
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Wesely, J. K. & Gaarder, E. (2004). The Gendered "Nature" of the Urban Outdoors: Women Negotiating Fear of Violence. Gender & Society 18(5), 645-663. https://doi.org/10.1177/0891243204268127
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Zink, R. (2010). Asking 'Who are you?' when going into the wild: Moving beyond an individualized form of outdoor education. Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning, 10(1), 19–32.
* This article is available online: Click here to download.

Änggård, E. (2016). How matter comes to matter in children's nature play: posthumanist approaches and children's geographies. Children's Geographies, 14(1), 77-90. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14733285.2015.1004523
* This article is available online: Click here to download. 

8 ONLINE PUBLICATIONS / REPORTS:
Policy documents on landscape management:
Council of Europe (2000). European Landscape Convention (European Treaty Series; No. 176). https://rm.coe.int/CoERMPublicCommonSearchServices/DisplayDCTMContent?documentId=0900001680080621
* This is available online: Click here to download.

Network of Outdoor Organisations in the Nordic Countries. (2013). Political programme for the Network of Outdoor Organisations in the Nordic Countries. [pdf]. Copenhagen: Nordic Council. https://svensktfriluftsliv.se/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Political-programme-low-res-web.pdf
* This is available online: Click here to downolad.

Network of Outdoor Organisations in the Nordic Countries. (2018). Friluftsliv i Norden/Nordic outdoor life: Recommendations from the project. Copenhagen: Nordic Council. https://svensktfriluftsliv.se/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/2018-01-24-report-from-joint-nordic-project-recommendations.pdf
* This is available online: Click here to download.

Nordic Council of Ministers (2005). Nordic solutions for sustainable cities. Copenhagen: Nordic Council. https://www.hel.fi/static/ymk/esitteet/nordic-catalogue-060612.pdf
* This is available online: Click here to download.

Nordic Council of Ministers, (2012). Nordic Environmental Action Plan: 2013–2018. Copenhagen: Nordic Council. https://doi.org/10.6027/ANP2012-766
* This is available online: Click here to download.

Nordic Council of Ministers (2017). Sustainable development action – the Nordic way: Implementation of the Global 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the Nordic Cooperation. Copenhagen: Nordic Council. https://doi.org/10.6027/TN2017-523
* This is available online: Click here to download.

Nordic Council of Ministers (2018). Tourism, nature and sustainability: A review of policy instruments in the Nordic countries. Copenhagen: Nordic Council. https://doi.org/10.6027/TN2018-534
* This is available online: Click here to download.

Norwegian Environment Agency (2019). Participation in outdoor recreation. Norwegian Environment Agency.
* This is available online: Click here to download.

AND: Students’ self-selected literature (about 200 pages)

Anbefalt litteratur

EXTENDED READINGS:
6 BOOKS:
Krakauer, J. (2007). Into the wild. Pan Books. (Opprinnelig utgitt 1996)
* You can borrow the book from the Library here: ORIA

Macfarlane, R. (2003). Mountains of the mind: A history of a fascination. Granta Books.
* You can borrow the book from the Library here: ORIA

Massey, D. (1994). Space, place and gender. Polity Press.
* You can borrow the book from the Library here: ORIA

Rebanks, J. (2015). The Shepherd’s life: A tale of the Lake District. Penguin.
* You can borrow the book from the Library here: ORIA

Roberts, J. W. (2012). Beyond learning by doing: Theoretical currents in experiential education. Routledge. 
* You can borrow the book from the Library here: ORIA
** This book is also available online: Click here to download.
*** NB! To open the electronic book off campus, you need to use the following VPN connection: Click here to download.

Wattchow, B. & M. Brown (2011). A Pedagogy of place: Outdoor education for a changing world. Monash University Publishing.
* You can borrow the book from the Library here: ORIA