Rural Norway Research Articles

Of Birds and Men in Rural Norway: Self, Place and Landscape in Vesaas and Lirhus

Abstract Agnar Lirhus’s Nå hogger de (2020) and Tarjei Vesaas’s Fuglane (1957) both feature a main character whose self-narrative is formed through interaction with nonhuman animals and grounded in attachment to place. These characters break with the dominant cultural ontology by attributing agency and intrinsic value to beings who are otherwise ignored or pursued for utilitarian purposes. I consider the ethical implications of their encounters with nonhumans, exploring whether these can be considered social interactions or are better understood as occurring on a spiritual plane. Finally, I show that the choice of outsiders as main characters can function as a literary strategy for questioning the dominant cultural ontology.

Gender, sports, and belonging. The role of sports participation in residential preferences among girls and boys living in Norway's rural peripheries

The gender gap in residential preferences among rural youth has been documented in several studies – and for the most attributed to educational aspirations, employment, and income opportunities. The hereby study adds to this block of research by addressing the role of sports. Sports has been connected to place belonging. As a traditional masculine arena, sports can also be assumed to contribute to the gender gap in belonging. On this background, the study explores the role of sports participation in rural girls’ and boys’ residential preferences. As theoretical framework, feminist theories of gendered space contrasts feminist theories of sports participation, supplemented by elements from poststructuralist theories. Data consisted of school surveys from pupils aged 13–16 years living in Norway’s most peripheral municipalities (N=11,971). The analyses confirmed a gender gap in residential preferences. Boys more often considered living in their native municipality compared to girls. The role of sports was on the contrary more surprising. Rural girls who participated in sports had higher predicted probabilities for preferring to live in the native municipality compared to non-participants, but this was not the case for boys. Findings indicate that for girls living in rural Norway, organized sports represent arenas for positive place relations. This diverges from prevailing assumptions of gendered rural space. Furthermore, the study questions common representations of sports arenas as local hearths for masculine versions of Northern rural identity. New developments in leisure’s spatial and social organization within the rural periphery are discussed as potential reasons for these results. By combining and contrasting different strands of feminist thinking, the study gains new insights into gender, sports, and place belonging in the digital age.

Young refugees’ feelings of belonging? Encounters with rural Denmark and northern Norway

ABSTRACT This paper investigates how young refugees settled in rural Norway and Denmark experience their new places of residence. We find inspiration in the idea of ‘contradictions of space’ (Kinkaid [2020]. “Re-encountering Lefebvre: Toward a Critical Phenomenology of Social Space.” Society and Space 38 (1): 167–186.) in exploring how young refugees navigate issues in rural life from housing, education, work and social life to their material surroundings, including the weather. Which experiences result in feelings of meaning and orientation, and which spur feelings of disorientation and contradiction? The empirical material is based on fieldwork and qualitative interviews with young refugees and local volunteers in rural Norway and Denmark. Despite several differences between rural areas in the two countries, young refugees’ experiences from within show many similarities and common experiences between them. The harsh weather, empty streets, lack of familiarity with the more formal community life in rural areas, long distances from sites of education, etc. create feelings of disorientation and contradiction, while socializing with other refugees provides feelings of community and belonging. Taken together, the two aspects drive their decisions to stay in or leave the rural area.

The political consequences of technological change that benefits low-skilled workers

Abstract Technological change often increases demand for high-skilled jobs, with low-skilled losers turning to the populist right in response. The political effects of technological change that increases demand for low-skilled workers are largely unknown. The growth of the salmon fish-farming industry in rural Norway improved the labor-market situation for low-skilled workers, and we find that support for the populist right-wing party increased in municipalities that benefitted from the industry growth. The electoral change is due to a right-wing shift on the economic, but not the cultural dimension. Our results support political economy frameworks that point to lower demand for state interventions after positive labor market shocks, but raise the question of in what contexts support for populism will decline.

Situating knowledge combinations beyond the factory gate: Examples from two innovation projects in rural Norway

Evolutionary economic geography considers knowledge combinations as key for explaining innovation and regional industrial development. Building on the thesis that knowledge is beneficially combined across adjacent industries, the notions of ‘relatedness’ and ‘related variety’ have spurred prolific research. In these strands of research, focus is on potential knowledge combinations, but less so on how knowledge is actually combined. The latter is primarily explained by research on knowledge bases, contributing to a processual understanding. However, knowledge and its combination processes can be better understood with an eye to its social situatedness too. Thus, we here suggest blending insights from different perspectives in the economic geography literature to provide an integrated understanding of the multi-dimensionality and social dynamism of knowledge combination. We apply this framework by investigating the role of individuals in combination processes within tourism.

Nurses’ experiences with municipal acute bed units in rural Norway

Nurses’ experiences with municipal acute bed units in rural Norway

Overweight children in rural Norway - public health nurses' possibilities and limitations within national guidelines.

Globally, overweight and obesity are more prevalent in rural areas than in urban areas. The purpose of this study was to determine to what extent public health nurses in rural areas in Norway feel equipped to tackle the overweight and obesity epidemic within two sets of national guidelines: The National Guidelines for the Standardized Measurement of Height and Weight and The National Guidelines for the Prevention, Identification, and Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Children and Adolescents. These guidelines are inspired by New Public Management (NPM) logic, which emphasises more market orientation within the public sector to obtain a more cost-effective supply of public goods. The focus is on the weighing of schoolchildren, available resources, inter-agency cooperation and the rural context. The data were collected using a structured questionnaire among 40 public health nurses working with children in rural areas, as well as qualitative interviews with 25 informants involved in the prevention and treatment of overweight and obesity among rural children. The study shows that rural public health nurses worry about the lack of resources for follow-up with children with a body mass index greater than what is characterised as 'normal'. The public health nurses suggested better cooperation between different stakeholders to work around the lack of resources and at the same time be able to see the whole picture, considering that overweight and obesity are complex problems connected to different challenges. They believed that it is an advantage to see the individuals in their local surroundings, to know their family history, their leisure activities and so on. This might be easier in rural areas than in urban areas, as these areas are often more transparent. There was consensus among the public health nurses involved in this study that national guidelines for treating overweight and obesity in children with the principles of NPM, and simplifying and standardising services, adds challenges instead of solutions. Such practices also hinder the use of experience-based knowledge about both the individual and the local context. There is a need for more flexible guidelines that can easily be adapted to the local (rural) context.

Same-sex Marriage Over 26 Years: Marriage and Divorce Trends in Rural and Urban Norway

The trends in marriage and divorce among male and female same-sex couples in urban and rural Norway were compared to different-sex marriages. Norway legalized same-sex living in 1993 and marriage in 2009. Cohorts from 1993 to 2018 were included. The 2009 gender-neutral marriage law appears to have had minimal impact on the rate of same-sex unions and divorces. Moreover, divorce risks are highest in female same-sex marriages, whereas male same-sex marriages have the same divorce risk levels as different-sex marriages. The divorce risk is declining for same-sex marriages in urban areas, while the opposite is observed in rural areas.

Talking together in rural palliative care: a qualitative study of interprofessional collaboration in Norway

BackgroundCaring for people with palliative care needs in their homes requires close collaboration within and between primary and hospital care. However, such close collaboration is often lacking. Transitions of care are potentially unsafe and distressing points in a patient trajectory. Few studies have explored the experiences of healthcare professionals in the community who receive patients from hospital care and provide them with palliative care at home.ObjectiveTo explore how rural health professionals experience local and regional collaboration on patients in need of palliative care.MethodsThis was a qualitative focus group and interview study in rural Northern Norway involving 52 primary care health professionals including district nurses, general practitioners, oncology nurses, physiotherapists, and occupational therapists. Five uni-professional focus group discussions were followed by five interprofessional discussions and six individual interviews. Transcripts were analysed thematically.Results“Talking together” was perceived as the optimal form of collaboration, both within primary care and with specialists. Nurses and GPs had similar perceptions of their worst-case scenario in primary palliative care: the sudden arrival after working hours of a sick patient about whom they lacked information. These situations could be the result of a short notice transfer from secondary care or an emergency presentation after a crisis in patient management locally, the latter often resulting in a hospital admission. Participants missed timely and detailed discharge letters and in complex cases a telephone call or conference. Locally, co-location was perceived as advantageous for crucial communication, mutual support, and knowledge about each other’s competencies and work schedule. Because local health professionals belonged to different units within the primary health care organisation, in some places they had limited knowledge about each other’s roles and skill sets.ConclusionsLack of communication, both locally and between specialist and primary care, was a key factor in the worst-case patient scenarios for GPs and nurses working in primary palliative care in rural Northern Norway. Co-location of primary care professionals promoted local collaboration and should be encouraged. Hospital discharge planning should involve the receiving primary care professionals.

Regional determinants of access to entrepreneurial finance: a conceptualisation and empirical study in Norwegian startup ecosystems

This paper presents hypotheses and a novel examination of the influence of a set of conditional factors concerning regional industries, startup culture, ecosystem collaboration and non-financial investor resources on perceived access to startup finance. We conducted a survey of 131 nascent, early-phase or mature startups and founders associated with entrepreneurial ecosystems in rural and urban Norway. The data were analyzed using structural equation modeling. Two main findings are that (1) startups that open up for outside involvement at an earlier phase experience better perceived access to finance and (2) unrelated ventures in homogenous industrial regions find it harder to attract finance. However, we found only a weak, indirect effect of ecosystem collaboration on perceived access to funding, which was mediated by access to non-financial resources. This study represents a rare empirical contribution to the literature on entrepreneurial ecosystems, and the findings provide empirical support for the feedback loops in ecosystems that have previously been theorized in the literature. These issues should be considered by policymakers who wish to promote ecosystem development.

“… but he stayed up reading”

With an ambition to add new knowledge on early modern reading culture in rural Norway, this essay zooms in on an eighteenth-century East Norwegian parish and conducts a detailed examination of various sources (church records, probate records, auction records, court records) to investigate how reading came into being and took place. Besides supporting previous conclusions about a widespread Scandinavian early modern rural literacy and a preponderance of religious books as owned, sold and bought by the rural population, the essay identifies a rural interest in books far exceeding the religious domain and an attraction to the materiality of books beyond reading. Moreover, court records disclose attitudes and practices related to reading and offer a promising avenue for generating further insights about how and why reading happened.

Carl Wilhelm Sem-Jacobsen: Aerospace Neurophysiology and Deep Brain Stimulation Pioneer.

The Norwegian physician Carl Wilhelm Sem-Jacobsen (1912–1991) was a pioneer in deep brain stimulation and aerospace neurophysiology, but for several reasons, his story has remained untold. During WW2, he collaborated with a renowned military underground resistance group against the Nazi occupants and then had to flee to neutral Sweden. He returned to participate in the liberation of Northern Norway as a Captain in the US Special Forces also working with the OSS (Office of Strategic Services—precursor for CIA) and received a citation from General Eisenhower for his contributions. Sem-Jacobsen then spent several years in the US training in psychiatry and clinical neurophysiology at the Mayo Clinic. He constructed his own medical technical devices, was among the first to develop deep brain stimulation, and made the smallest EEG and EKG recording systems yet produced, also used by the American astronauts walking on the Moon. But he was more an inventor than a researcher, and few of his observations were published in peer-reviewed medical journals. He built his own neurophysiologic institute for neurosurgery, deep brain recordings, and deep brain stimulation in Oslo's main psychiatric hospital, but was sponsored by US military forces and NASA. He knew CIA Director William E. Colby personally, and rumors soon flourished that Sem-Jacobsen conducted secret mind control experiments for American authorities and the CIA. These accusations were investigated, and long after his death, he was officially absolved by a Hearing Committee appointed by the Norwegian Government. Nevertheless, all his personal files were burnt by his family who was still harassed by investigative journalists. Sem-Jacobsen also documented some of his work on film, but the whereabouts of these films have remained unknown. I searched for them for several years and recently discovered numerous films and photographs in an old barn in rural Norway. These films and photographs document in-action neurophysiology recordings in divers, pilots, and astronauts, and they show how Sem-Jacobsen in collaboration with experienced neurosurgeons in Oslo conducted the very first trials with deep brain stimulation in patients with Parkinson disease. He apparently even tried subthalamic stimulation as early as in the 1950s.

Unsettled settlement? Translocal social anchoring and patterns of (im)mobility among Polish families in rural Norway

Whilst the transnational family life of post-accession intra-European migrants has been extensively explored, past studies have rarely addressed its local dimension. The relatively recent international migration patterns to rural areas in Europe provide opportunities to explore this particular aspect. Drawing on ethnographic data from Polish migrant families and young couples in rural Norway, we investigate the relationship between the settlement of the migrants in a specific rural locality and the dynamic of their cross-border and cross-local patterns of mobility. Using notions of translocalism and social anchoring, the article offers insights into how migrants' lives as couples and families become gradually reoriented as they settle in the rural host context and how the conditions for maintaining family relationships in Poland change at the same time. We illustrate how migrants' search for stability in their lives in the host location is associated with the question of family reunion, their position on the local labour market, purchase of houses and development of place attachment. At the same time, the settlement process breeds ambivalence as it requires migrants to adjust to the new life setting and continually navigate and negotiate the family life across home and host context. The ability of migrants to organise their translocal life satisfactorily depends on and reflects their overall level of integration locally and nationally.

Physical activity in Sami and non-Sami populations in rural Northern Norway, the SAMINOR 2 Clinical Survey

BackgroundThe Sami people is an indigenous minority population living in the northern parts of Norway and mainly in rural areas. We lack data of contemporary levels of physical activity (PA) in rural regions of Northern Norway and in the Sami population in particular. We aimed to describe the PA levels and investigate whether PA levels differs between Sami and non-Sami and between coastal and inland areas.MethodsWe used data from the second survey of the Population-based Study on Health and Living Conditions in Regions with Sami and Norwegian Populations – the SAMINOR 2 Clinical Survey (2012–2014) that includes the adult population in 10 municipalities in the counties Troms, Finnmark and Nordland. Participants self-reported on PA, ethnicity and modifiable lifestyle factors. Twelve thousand four hundred fifty-five individuals were invited with a response rate of 48.2% (n = 6004 participants). We tested differences using chi-square tests, two sample t-tests and linear regression models.ResultsAmong 5628 participants, 41.1 and 40.9% of men and women, respectively, were defined as Sami. We found no ethnic differences in PA in men overall. However, Sami men living in Tana, and Nesseby reported higher PA compared to non-Sami men in the same area. For Sami women there was overall lower PA levels compared to non-Sami women, especially pronounced in Kautokeino/ Karasjok.ConclusionThis study showed small differences in PA levels between Sami and non-Sami men. Sami women had lower PA levels compared to their non-Sami counterparts. It is important to identify whether there are differences in various ethnic populations, together with other predictors for PA in future planning of public health interventions.

From Valued Stayers to Working Hands? the Social Consequences of Changing Employment Relations Among Polish Migrants in Farmed Salmon Industry in Rural Norway

Abstract International migrant workers in European rural regions have supplied rural industries with necessary labour, stimulated the demography of host communities and raised questions about the inclusion of migrants. Using the case of Polish post-accession migrants employed in the farmed salmon industry in rural Norway, we explore the social consequences of changing employment relations in rural industries. By using a temporal perspective, we identify a transition from an inclusive employment regime experienced by the migrants who arrived in the locality within the first years after the EU enlargement in 2004, to an increasingly exploitative, insecure and competitive work environment for recently arrived migrants. We emphasise how employment conditions offered to different ‘waves’ of migrants affect the ways they perceive their status and value in rural hosting communities. Ultimately, we reflect on the potential long-term consequences of international migration to rural areas.

‘The Lay Gaze’—Rural Norwegian men’s assessment of others’ health based on pictures

In this article, we explore lay men's understanding of the relationship between other's bodily appearance and health-'the Lay Gaze'. We applied the theoretical concepts of biopower, medical gaze, bodyism and healthism-the ideology where one feature is that a slim body is equivalent to a healthy body-and interviewed 18 adult and elderly men in rural Norway, representing a heterogeneous group regarding age, ethnicity and education. To explore the interviewees' subjective perception or 'gaze', the interviewees were presented with eight pictures of different people. Our main findings were, first, that the sample of a relatively heterogeneous group of adult and elderly lay men in rural Norway talk similarly about body appearance and health and follow the healthism discourse with an embedded association between body appearance and health assessment. Second, we found some variation regarding how interviewees define other standards for the elderly and black people.

Boundaryless boundary-objects: Digital fencing of the CyborGoat in rural Norway

This article describes a case study of virtual herding and digital fencing technology implementation for goats in Norway. With the abolishing of physical fences, the goats can roam free in a physical sense, but in the digital realm, they are controlled by a virtual fence. The virtual fence, or digital boundary, is set by the famers and interacts with a collar around the goats’ necks. The collar first give a sound signal and thereafter a small electric shock if the goats cross a boundary, resulting in the creation of new classifications and orderings of reality. This article focuses on what this disruption means for contemporary goat farming in terms of practices, perceptions and policies of (smart) farming, as well as how the goats themselves are given new meanings and ways of being. We analyze this with the theoretical concept of “boundary object” and see how goats, which contain a multiplicity of agency and autonomy, are transformed by smart-farming technologies. Collaboration and interaction are made possible despite the fact that the actors have widely different goals. Through negotiations between multiple actors, a new type of goat emerges between nature-, culture- and technology. We conceptualize this as “CyborGoat.” This boundary object facilitates new everyday agricultural settings, which brings new benefits and issues for different stakeholder actors involved.

Overweight and obesity among children in rural areas: The importance of culture.

This paper focuses on how social inequality is associated with overweight and obesity in children. There is a lack of research with a focus on an important distinction in social inequality, namely geography. The aim of this study was to reduce this knowledge gap by looking closely at the links between rurality and overweight. The findings in this paper are based on in-depth interviews with school nurses and teachers in rural Norway. The focus was on their experiences with and knowledge about overweight and obesity numbers in rural versus urban areas. We used Bourdieu's terminology to address the challenges related to urban-rural differences, and found that cultural factors connected to tradition, identity and courtesy play an important role in the rural overweight and obesity discourse. Actors and 'experts' working with overweight and obesity and national guidelines need to understand rural contexts and customs and address problems of the countryside on rural, not exclusively urban, premises. Different contexts imply different needs when it comes to reducing the inequalities between rural and urban areas regarding overweight and obesity.

Oncology nurses’ lived experiences of video communication in follow-up care of home-living patients: A phenomenological study in rural Norway

<h2>Abstract</h2><h3>Purpose</h3> To explore the lived experiences of oncology nurses (ONs) during three months of virtual care provided through video conferencing (VC) in the follow-up care for home-living patients with cancer in rural Norway. <h3>Method</h3> An exploratory study employing a descriptive phenomenological approach conducted with a purposive sample of four ONs working in primary health care in three municipalities. Individual interviews based on open-ended questions about the ONs' experiences of VC use in follow-up care were analyzed using methodology inspired by Clark Moustakas. The COREQ checklist was utilized in this study. <h3>Results</h3> ONs provided VC as a quality-promoting supplement to traditional follow-up. Their lived experiences of the phenomenon were described by the following themes: 1) Choice of VC based on care need considerations, 2) Use of VC on portable tablets facilitated contact and frequent follow-up, and 3) Adaption of relevant virtual care in person-centered and goal-oriented practice. <h3>Conclusion</h3> The use of VC may contribute to accessible and frequent quality care and reduce the ONs' travel time for home visits. This study points to a need to individualize and assess the appropriateness of virtual care in challenging cancer situations. Furthermore, there is a need for larger-scale studies on how VC may influence quality care.

Refugees' Encounters With Nordic Rural Areas-Darkness, Wind and "Hygge"!

The paper investigates how refugees settled in rural Norway and Denmark experience and interact with their new rural places of residence. Theoretically, the paper finds inspiration in “phenomenology of practices” (Simonsen, Prog. Hum. Geogr., 2012, 37, 10–26), which emphasizes the bodily and sensory experiences of daily life that spur feelings of, for example, “orientation” or “disorientation”. The empirical material is based on fieldwork and qualitative interviews with refugees and local volunteers in 2016/2017/2019 in small towns in the rural north of Norway and rural Denmark. There are several differences between the Norwegian and Danish rural areas, in relation to distances, climate and population density. Nonetheless, the ways in which the rural areas are experienced from within, by refugees settled there, show surprisingly many similarities. Many of the informants, in both the Norwegian and Danish cases, initially expressed frustration at being placed in rural areas without having any say in the matter. Those who were former city-dwellers especially experienced moments of disorientation, as their encounters with Nordic rural life were experienced as the opposite of their urban backgrounds. Limiting structural conditions very much shape the everyday lives of refugees in the first years, when they do not have a car or the financial capacity to find their own house. They feel stressed, with busy everyday lives made up of long commuting hours on public transport. In these first years of uncertainty, the dark and harsh weather very much adds to the feeling of stress and insecurity. What seem to add “orientation” are social relations with other refugees and local volunteers organizing activities.