Paper short abstract:

In this paper, the relationship between walking practices and regional and national identity will be discussed. The point of departure is that ideas of heritage, tradition and identity can be deeply embedded in mundane and taken for granted practices.

Paper long abstract:

Everyday patterns of movement have a fundamental role in structuring and shaping our lives. Everyday walking can, for example, function as a claiming and performing of space. As a bodily practice walking is often a constituent part of memory processes, linking us to specific places and triggering specific memories ("walking down memory lane"…).

In this paper, I want to focus on a few examples of popular walking practices and discern their relationship with a regional, national, as well as a potentially Nordic, sense of identity. My examples cover the expeditions on foot undertaken by early 19th century Finland-Swedish folklore collectors to current phenomena such as Nordic walking (pole-walking), hiking practices and present-day protestant pilgrimage in the Nordic countries.

As it turns out, ideas of heritage, tradition and identity can be deeply embedded in mundane and taken for granted practices.

My supposition is that popular patterns of movement can have an integral role in the processes of creating, representing and negotiating Nordic as well as national identities.