Turn left for Murmansk: ‘Fourth World’ transculturalism and its cultural ecological framing

• Main Authors: Patrick Dillon, Phil Bayliss, Linda Bayliss
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: University of Lapland 2014
• Subjects: multiculturalism; transculturalism; interculturalism; Nordic countries; Geography. Anthropology. Recreation; G; Arctic; Murmansk
• Online Access: https://doaj.org/article/43603a276e6545da808a29dfe87f296d

In this paper we review briefly histories and ideologies underlying multiculturalism in Nordic countries, highlighting tensions between integrationist and inclusive approaches. We propose a cultural ecological framework through which we discuss the possibility of a transculturalism based on Fourth World engagement with the environment. Cultural ecology is about the reciprocal interactions and transactions between people and their environments. The Fourth World is a circum-global, pan-arctic region which includes the northern parts of some Nordic countries. We argue that whether or not there is a distinctively Nordic version of multiculturalism, Nordic countries have access to Fourth World ways of engaging with the environment which transcend notions of inter- and multiculturalism and the ideological tensions associated with them.