The Norwegian department is excited to announce that between now and December 2025 we will be hosting and sponsoring 25 ways to engage with 2025, the commemoration of 200 years of organized migration from Norway to North America.
Just as our students are navigating their paths forward in life, so too did the Norwegian immigrants who founded the college. The year 2025 presents an opportunity to celebrate the college’s strong ties with Norway—an opportunity to remember what it means to take great risks and embark on new journeys and find new senses of belonging and home.
Note that our events seek to commemorate rather than to celebrate the past uncritically. Our intention is to educate the community on the profound impact of Norwegian-American immigration to the US, and simultaneously do so honestly.
Join us over the next year and a half as we engage in a wide range of topics related to this history, ranging from the movement of peoples, to colonialism and its consequences, to identity formation for both Norwegians and Norwegian Americans.
1) Norway: A Thousand Years of Migration
Aug 4 – 16
Alumni & Family Travel Trip to Norway. More info
2) Bernt Julius Muus Quiz
What do you know about the man with the shiny nose?
September 13th
The community was welcomed to join Professor Kari Lie Dorer from the Norwegian Department for an interactive quiz filled with “uffda’s” and “Um Yah Yah’s” in Tomson Hall 280. Prizes were given to both the best score and randomly to those who participate. After the quiz, all were welcome to celebrate Dorer’s publication, Muus vs. Muus: The Scandal that Shook Norwegian America.
3) CURI Fall Showcase
St. Olaf College King’s Dining Room
October 4th
Amongst others, Norwegian Department scholar-students will be presenting research that they have conducted within the Collaborative Undergraduate Research & Inquiry program of the College
4) Podcasts interview / reading guide
October 3rd
More info TBA
5) Uff da: His-tories of St. Olaf’s founding
October 4th
Professor Kari Lie Dorer will give a “lightning talk” on the histories of St. Olaf’s founding in Viking Theatre from 4:30 – 4:50pm as part of Ole Talks during St. Olaf Homecoming & Family Weekend.
6) Colonial Heroism? The Story of Christian Krohg’s Leif Erikson Discovering America (1893)
talk by Øystein Sjåstad (a Professor in Art History at the Department of Philosophy, Classics, History of Art and Ideas at the University of Oslo)
October 17th, 4-5pm
Did Krong’s much-loved painting of the famous Viking explorer represent the colonial ideology of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago? Created specifically for the exposition, Krong’s painting was meant to challenge Columbus’s status as the “true” discoverer of America.
It was displayed in the main exhibition area, known as the White City, while non-white cultures were segregated into a separate section that featured so- called “human zoos,” where Indigenous peoples, including several American tribes and the Sami, were put on display.
Sjästad traces the painting’s journey from Norway to the US and back again and also critically examines what Leif Erikson has come to symbolize.
7) Sesqui Knitting Pattern
October 25th
More info TBA
8) Southern Minnesota as a borderland: Immigration, Homesteading and the US-Dakota War of 1862
Talk by Dr. Caitlin Sackrison (an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Norwegian, Nordic Studies and History at St. Olaf College)
November 7th, 4:30pm – 5:30pm
Viking Theatre
9) A Doll’s House Theatre Performance
Oct 17 – 20
By Henrik Ibsen
Adapted By Amy Herzog
Directed by William Sonnega
Play will take place in Haugen Theatre, St. Olaf College
More Info
10) Theatre Department Talk on Henrik Ibsen
TBA
Stay tuned…
11) Sesqui Mitten Patterns release day!
November 1
Stay tuned…
12) Timeline
November 6
More info TBA
13) Minnesota at the time of the founding of the college
Talk by Dr. Caitlin Sackrison (an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Norwegian, Nordic Studies and History at St. Olaf College)
14) Norwegian Department Chapel Service & Talk
December 2nd
More info and Streaming Link TBA
You must be logged in to post a comment.