Paper short abstract:

To early northbound travelers, visited Sámi homes represented ultimate alterity. Subsequent commodifications in shows and tourism, demonstrate a striking stability regarding the visual imaginary, all though understandings might have changed.

Paper long abstract:

The paper will present some of the most important early contributions to the formation of an imaginary of what the northern, sub-arctic Scandinavian home looked like. To the early northbound travelers, the homes of the nomadic, reindeer herding Sámi were at the center of their attention. These homes represented ultimate alterity, as the visitors found them deeply connected to nature, animals, and the Sámi's Arctic surroundings. Re-imaginings of these homes soon found their way to book illustrations, folk shows, and museums in the big European cities. When travelling possibilities increased with early tourism to the North, the same imaginaries emerged in promotional material as well as in more or less permanent tourist installations in the travelled areas. This has continued through time into contemporary tourism, with a remarkable stability in the images presented. However, while these commodifications of Sámi everyday life remain relatively unchanged, the understanding of the northern homes as symbols of primitivism, nature bound, and exotic, might have changed when re-imagined in terms of contemporary tourists' understandings of phenomena like new spirituality, ethno-politics, environmentalism, and climate change.