Arkadien under uppbyggnad : Bilder av Sápmi och deras användning inom Sveriges koloniseringsprojekt under första halvan av 1700-talet

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this thesis is to examine the images of Sápmi and the Saami people that existed among natural historians during the eighteenth century through the lens of Carl Linnaeus' Lapland journey 1732. It examines how these images were tied to the societal discourses of the time and if and how these images were used during the Swedish colonisation of Sápmi. This was done by doing a close reading of Flora Lapponica, Iter Lapponicum and Diaeta naturalis, noting emerging themes and trying to identify the societal discourses shaping these themes. The thesis finds that Linnaeus' descriptions of Sápmi and the Saami often are heavily mythologising and that Linnaeus, inspired by gothicism and primitivism, liked to use the Saami as didactic examples. However, these idealised descriptions are contradicted by Linnaeus himself. In the same texts he describes the Saami as both the pinnacles of health and as drunken and sickly. Linnaeus was also influenced by mercantilist thought and suggested many plans on how to best use Sápmis natural resources and thereby increase the Swedish states profits. The Saami, viewed as primitive but now without primitivism’s positive connotations, were seen as incapable of correctly exploiting their resources themselves. If Linnaeus' plans had been implemented they would have destroyed the Saami lifestyle Linnaeus claimed to idealise. The thesis concludes that while Linnaeus painted an idealised picture of Sápmi and the Saami in his text he did so knowing that it was at least partially false. He used these theoretical Saami to criticise his own society and as didactic examples for his fellow Swedes, but in practice had no problems with the colonial exploitation of Sápmi.