För framtids segrar : Om nationalism och tävlan i svensk skidlöpning 1897-1924

Sammanfattning: This paper is about skiing and Swedish nationalism during the late 19th century and early 20th century. The aim is to investigate why skiing was considered so eminently suited for the incorporation of certain ideals in the national fellowship. The paper accounts an analyse of texts and documents about Swedish skiing from 1897-1924. Skiing was a nationalistic concern from the very beginning of this period. It was connected to heartfelt feelings towards the Swedish nature, the patriotic upbringing of the youth, as well as the health of the nation. Over the years skiing also became an increased object of sportification. The competitions were popular, and the nationalistic propagandists saw the contests as means to popularize the sport. Thereby they also hoped to attract attention to the national ideals which skiing was associated with – deep feelings for the nature, a strong youth suitable for military service, and a healthy population. Reserachers interested in the history of Swedish sport, often understand the sportification as a gradual dissociation from the nationalistic ambitions. They admit that sports, especially skiing, was influenced by patriotic ideas. But when skiing became a larger object of competition, an ideology of competition gradually replaced the nationalistic strivings. This paper understands skiing as an invented tradition, according to Eric Hobsbawm’s The Invention of Tradition. An invented tradition shows a formalization and ritualization of a practice. The healthy skiing in the magnificent Swedish nature, is in this paper understood as the ritualized part of the tradition, while the competitions are seen as the formalized part. By understanding skiing as an invented tradition, this paper shows that an increased interest for competitions, and the establishment of an ideology of competition, by no means replaced the efforts influenced by a nationalistic ideology. Nationalism and the ideology of competition did not exclude each other. They both existed within the same tradition, a tradition which reflects the strivings of this historic period. Skiing was eminently suitable for the incorporation of certain national ideals in the national fellowship: Skiing communicated the ideals of the nation, and the competitions gained interest for this sport and the ideals it was associated with. The increased interest for competitions represented an increased efficiency in the nationalistic strivings.