#18 Muskoxen, reindeer, and performing wilderness in Norway w/Karin Lillevold

In this episode, we speak with Karin Lillevold, a PhD candidate in Cultural Studies at the Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies, and Religion at the University of Bergen. As part of the research project Gardening the Globe, Karin traces relations between three species that are increasingly coming into contact with each another: muskoxen, wild reindeer, and humans. Karin’s interest is in how these relations are managed, as well as the aesthetics and performance of wilderness, in Dovrefjell National Park in Norway. Dovrefjell is a place of great significance for Norwegian national identity, and these days is a site of contested notions of belonging, wilderness, and the right to roam (“allemannsretten”) – a much cherished and legally inscribed norm in the country.

Karin also holds a master’s degree in social anthropology from the University of Bergen where she wrote about visions of nature and national identity in Iceland. Her research interests include rewilding, imaginaries of wilderness, sense of place, tourism, national identity, cultural heritage, human-animal relations, posthumanism, and ethnographic methodologies. Karin has also studied art history, and worked with cultural heritage at various museums. Before embarking on her PhD, she worked as a research assistant at the Centre for Climate and Energy Transformation at UiB where she published on sustainable urban development in relation to cultural heritage. She is part of the Environmental Humanities research group at UiB.

We hope you enjoy the conversation!