Looduse ja kultuuri kohtumised Islandil
The encounters of nature and culture in Iceland

Summary/Abstract: The article attempts to conceptualize changes in Icelandic culture of nature as a series of “encounters” connected to the two turning points in Icelandic history, the settlement in the 9th century and the rise of Icelandic nationalism in the early 19th century. The first of these “encounters” resulted in major ecological problems which continue to excert their influence, as well as transformation of the Icelandic society and culture in order for them to cope better with the new environment. The second “encounter”, at the same time human-initiated and born out of a series of 18th century ecological catastrophies with geological causes, brought along a change in thinking about Icelandic nature and landscapes, which for the first time began to be considered as important constituent parts of the mythology of the Icelandic nation and were also appropriated by many foreigners for the same reason. The example of Iceland is used in order to question the value of common blanket criticism of “the nature-culture dichotomy” as unjustified and arbitrary. Instead, a division is introduced between “nature-civilization” and “nature-culture” dichotomies for the sake of better understanding of how notions such as “culture of nature” might help us along in our quest to attain a more ecological world-view by providing grounds for both description and criticism of phenomena pertaining to the relationship between nature and culture.

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