På vandring genom historien - en undersökning av hur förr och natur är kultur

Abstract

Nature and culture are often described as opposites, but at the same time nature is often de-scribed as culture and past. This essay examines how nature and the past are culture. I study how 51 people make shifting distinctions between nature and the past in relation to culture, the present and the future. By using the concept of Orientation of Sarah Ahmed I analyze how the informants direct themselves against nature, past and culture through a questionnaire, ob-servations and walk-alongs. I discuss how their ideas about nature and the past differ with their different starting points and are shaped through their physical meetings with them. But their feelings for nature and the past aren’t random. There are straight orientations that the informants have to relate to and which they often follow. These collective orientations are a crucial part in the shaping of nature and the past.