Posting by maternal request

[mrissa]

My mother wishes it known that what we are using against the vertigo is persistence, which comes from the Norwegian side of the family, and not stubbornness, which comes from the Swedish side and is totally different. The Swedish side of the family could not be reached for comment.

(There is no one Swedish side of the family. Both sides have ancestors of each ethnicity. Just a lot more Norwegians on Mom's side instead of an even mix. Yes, I know that some of you don't even consider these two distinct ethnicities. You should. Because they are.)

In news that isn't immediately related to intrafamilial ethnic unrest, I have acquired a talent for pulling the buttons off my winter coats this week, the book is doing this coy thing where it's sometimes utterly reasonable to work on and sometimes an utter beast, the beast is pretty much reasonable, and I am feeling distinctly short on brilliance at the moment. But I am fairly steady, and there's baking that needs doing as well as cooking, so I can actually use that remedy for lack of brilliance. Hurrah.

Comments

Ethnicities

[markiv1111.livejournal.com]

It may be just a bit too easy for a lot of people to view two ethnicities as similar because we perceive their languages as similar. But then again, I would like to know more about the reality of the situation. What do Swedes do, as part of their culture, that Norwegians are far less likely to do? What do Norwegians believe, as part of their culture, that Swedes don't? If someone purely of Swedish ancestry, who grew up in Sweden, were to marry someone purely of Norwegian ancestry, who grew up in Norway,what would the cultural conflicts be? I really do want to know. (Also note, though: The entire United States is not composed of one cultural great big blob. There are differences between New England and East Texas, even though their languages are mutually intelligible. I am not really qualified to discuss these differences, but you and I may well know somebody on LJ who is.)

Nate

Re: Ethnicities

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

What do Norwegians believe, as part of their culture, that Swedes don't?

That Swedes are collaborationist scum, for one. This conveniently forgets the black sheep of the Quisling family.

Re: Ethnicities

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, I've never known a Swede or Swedish-American to have a really strong personal reaction to Quisling's name any more than they would to Vichy's: he's just not their disgrace. (And rightly not.)

Re: Ethnicities

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

No, I reckon not. Although I was quite surprised to have a Quisling for a seat-mate on my first flight to Madison. He was on his way home for his grandfather's 90th or summat like that, and grandpa was, if I remember right, the brother or cousin of the Quisling who became a common noun. Madison turns out to have quite a few Quislings, and they are quite big shakes around town. I have to wonder if they aren't compensating for the family shame, or something: they've been such big donors around town that there is/was a clinic with their name on it.

Re: Ethnicities

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I stood in the street with my hand to my mouth just staring at it when I saw it. It was shocking to me to have a building named that.

Re: Ethnicities

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Well. Um.

A certain amount of the differences you see in what I'm talking about here is what Swedes do vs. what Norwegians do. Stuff like akirlu's comment about collaborationist scum does matter; people here who strongly identify with Scandinavian roots do keep track of that sort of thing. From what I can tell in visits and study and conversation with relatives, Norwegians think of themselves as friendlier, and Swedes think of themselves are more focused. There are different foods and songs and like that, but even without all that, I think you could see the difference in pedestrian body language and interactions if you were dropped blind in Oslo vs. in Stockholm, even without knowing which was which. I think you would easily recognize that this was not the same country, or at least not the same set of cultural mores.

But then in my family you also have the layers of the differences in who came to the US from each country, so you have Norwegian-Americans -- as I was telling papersky -- having a much stronger religious motive for emigration, and the skew there is very different from the skew between the Norwegians who stayed and the Swedes who stayed.

[laurel]

Heh (re Swedes and Norwegians).

I'm half German and half Norwegian, on both sides. My Grandma Krahn was Norwegian, Grandpa Krahn was German. Grandpa Olson was Norwegian and Grandma Olson was German.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

My husband would happily corroborate the stubbornness-comes-from-the-Swedes hypothesis. But really, without a Norwegian wife for comparison, it's just bad science.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Many social experiments are woefully short on control spouses, children, etc. Just disgraceful science, really.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, to be fair, I'm sure Hal would be happy to take on a Norwegian control-spouse if an appropriate candidate could be found. It's not for lack of willingness on his part.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I don't know, I think treating her exactly the same as he's treated you in order to get the experimental data would be kind of a pain in the butt.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Hmm. And 20 years of catching up to do. Plus delays for Human Subjects approvals. No, you're right. It's bad experiment design, that's what it is.

[writingortyping.livejournal.com]

Yes, I know that some of you don't even consider these two distinct ethnicities. You should. Because they are.

No kidding. But this is from the girl whose Great-Uncle Nils was fond of reciting the following bit of doggerel:

10,000 Swedes
Running in Weeds
All chased by 1 Norwegian.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

And let's not forget that the question most of us face isn't about the difference between Swedes and Norwegians at all. What most of us are confronted with is the difference between Americans whose family left Norway a century ago, and Americans whose family left Sweden a century ago. Most of them never having been back, and by now not in touch with any family in the Old Country. (I do remember that that's not *your* family's situation.)

Since the ones I meet have mostly been living in Minnesota all that time (or at least nearby), I do in fact consider them essentially identical; certainly far more alike than a Bostonian and a Texan! But I don't abbreviate that to saying actual Swedes and Norwegians are the same, either.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

Oh thank you. I'm always saying this to Americans and having a hard time with it. There are real people still there in those countries your ancestors left!

I think "Scandasotan" is a really good word for that ethnicity you're talking about, the American one.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's a great term, and neatly labels a thing that needs a name.

It first became really obvious to me about the American Irish connection (and some Scotts, too). The fact that my father was born in England, thus putting me *much* closer to my offshore origins (I'm an American) than any of these "Irish" helped too.

Traditional food in my childhood home included chili, spaghetti, pizza, roast beef, meatloaf, and porkchops. Also fondue, and lentil cassoulet.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

There are real people still there in those countries your ancestors left!

Yes, I know. Five of them came to visit us last summer.

"Scandasotan" is a very useful word for my ethnicity in many circumstances, and you will notice that I try to be careful to use it in those circumstances. There are statistically distinct differences in the Scandasotans that came from Norway and those that came from Sweden, and you'll see that in my family. For example, very few of the Swedes who came over came for religious reasons, which strongly affected the way they interacted with the new country, what things they thought were important to keep and pass along, what things fell by the wayside. So while we have to go out to extended family to get to actual Swedes and Norwegians, it certainly doesn't mean that the blended "Scandasotan" always covers it; sometimes "Swedish-American" and "Norwegian-American" actually do matter beyond "Scandasotan."

To take a striking example, I was telling rysmiel just yesterday about one of my cousins who was nearly not confirmed in the old family church because he went to a school dance (and did not dance there -- but just being near dancing was considered too wicked). That was in a Norwegian-American branch of the family. You could predict that easily: that while most Norwegian-Americans aren't like that, essentially no Swedish-Americans are. So saying, "oh, it doesn't matter, Scandasotan is all the same thing anyway," is not really going to reflect reality very well.

[tewok.livejournal.com]

Yes, I know that some of you don't even consider these two distinct ethnicities. You should. Because they are.

I encounter this attitude fairly often with people who think "Celtic" means "Irish". This ignores the fact that there are seven separate Celtic cultures, not to mention various subcultures.

Someone sent me this link recently: http://boingboing.net/images/norway-vs-sweden.gif. It's a Venn diagram showing the intersecting and disjoint sets of Norwegian and Swedish cultures. I am clueless enough about both not to know how accurate or inaccurate it is. Seeing fjords and Thor on Norway's side pulls me in that direction...

... Which is a good thing since that's where I'm going on a concert tour in a few months. After the performances are done, we'll be staying another week for sightseeing. During that week we'll be going from Bergen (last performance) to Oslo (airport.) Any suggestions for cool things to do that we wouldn't otherwise find in a tour guide?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Not particularly accurate. No. Fjords are Norwegian, but -- um. Without going into a treatise about which of the gods had the most visible artifacts of worship in which locations, let's say that Thor and the other Aesir were worshipped in much of the Scandinavian peninsula without regard to current national boundaries.

I'm afraid I'd be much better with recommendations for Sweden than for Norway, since I'm in contact with the Swedish family several times a month on e-mail. Sorry! I loved Bergen, and I remember going to a stave church and to Grieg's home and the Hanseatic museum. But all of that is stuff tour guides know about.

[tewok.livejournal.com]

I might be generally clueless, but certainly not so clueless as to think that a simple diagram could effectively boil down two cultures so succinctly. As a child, I wanted to grow up to be Thor (giant-killing hammer? cool! goat-drawn chariot? cool!), so I'm happy to go just about anywhere in the Scandinavian peninsula.

I assume the Hanseatic museum is related to the Hanseatic League? I remember learning about that in high school, so I'll try to look it up along the way. Thanks.

[skzbrust.livejournal.com]

There are certainly differences between the Swedes and the Norwegians. The Norwegians, for example, have at least one thing the Swedes don't: Good neighbors.

*g,d,rlh*

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

What did the Finns ever do to you?

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

The Norwegians are fine neighbors, aside from the business about sneaking across the border to take advantage of Swedish Allemansrätten (Right of Public Access) to snarfle up more than their fair share of cloudberries.

Which reminds me of another difference between Swedes and Norwegians: Swedes have Allemansrätten and Norwegians don't.

[redbird]

Ethnic distinctions aside--being neither Swedish nor Norwegian myself, I have no strong opinions on this--the difference between persistence and stubbornness is significant. I try to emphasize the former--stubborn is too likely, in my lexicon, to lead to insisting one isn't tired while falling asleep, or that of course I can do X, it's not going to snow, while there's three inches of fresh snow on the ground and more coming down.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, it's not just, "I'm persistent, you're stubborn, that other person is plain damn bull-headed."

[mamapduck.livejournal.com]

Persistence is going up and down stairs on your butt because damnit, you need to get on with your day. Stubborness is trying to walk upright on the stairs when you are in serious danger of toppling over.

If you haven't read Mama's Bank Account (or seen the play I Remember Mama) you totally should. There are Norwegians with Strong Opinions about not being Swedes. It's also a great book.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, I was given those to read from a fairly young age.

[rezendi.livejournal.com]

Isn't there an unsung verse in the Norwegian national anthem that goes something to the effect of "Kill all the Swedes, cut off all their heads"? Or is that apocryphal?

[papersky.livejournal.com]

Not like the verse of "God Save the Queen" about hating the Scots?

A Canadian visitor stated yesterday that Scotland had a Norman conquest too, and I had to say very firmly that in fact it did not and was a totally separate country until the death of Elizabeth I and a fairly separate country for a hundred years after that.

Wales had a Norman conquest, and so did Ireland.

ObThreadRelevance: A little while before that, Normandy had a Viking conquest, I don't offhand know if it was Swedes or Norwegians or even (heaven forbid) Danes.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Uff da, let's hope not for their sakes. We all know what Danes are like.

(Actually nobody knows where Rollo of Normandy was from. The Danish and Norwegians take turns claiming and disclaiming responsibility for him.)