There is also another point to be made here about national culture. The Mexican team came to the World Cup in shirts referencing the Aztecs, while the Japanese men’s team is nicknamed “The Blue Samurai.” Egyptian fans often attend their team’s games dressed up as pharaohs. For the intellectuals who have been critical of the Viking aesthetics of the Norwegian national team, this seems to be entirely unproblematic. Which is strange, taking into account that the Aztecs, the Samurai, and the Egyptian pharaohs were every bit as violent as the Norse Vikings.
The concept that the cultures of other nations are immensely valuable and intriguing, while one’s own is tacky and potentially right-wing extremist, is not new in the Nordic countries. Swedish Social Democratic leader Mona Sahlin is still quoted frequently for saying, back in 2002, that she “couldn’t say what Swedish culture is. I think that’s why Swedes are so jealous of immigrants. You have a culture, an identity, something to tie you together. And what do we have? Midsummer’s eve and that kind of stupid stuff.” Four years later, she was one-upped by her conservative rival Fredrik Reinfeldt, who said that “the only thing that is quintessentially Swedish is barbarism. Everything else came from abroad.”
At the heart of sentiments like these lie not only a fear of national chauvinism but also a contempt for the common people. While the footballing fans of Mexico, Japan, and Egypt are at a comfortable distance, the Norwegian and Swedish fans are uncomfortably close to home. It is no coincidence that the critique of the Viking theme of the Norwegian men’s team has been half-aesthetic and half-political. The very same people who are politically concerned by the use of Viking symbolism also happen to find the same symbols, not to mention the people who wield them, both tacky and vulgar. The original meaning of vulgar, of course, is common. In this way, the skepticism toward the whole Viking thing mirrors a classical anti-populist sentiment common among elites who distrust any form of organized mass movement, be it a labor union or a fan fest, as the first step toward totalitarianism.
The concept that the cultures of other nations are immensely valuable and intriguing, while one’s own is tacky and potentially right-wing extremist, is not new in the Nordic countries.
In Norwegian political history, the national movement has deep progressive roots. For over four hundred years, Norway was a part of Denmark, subjugated to an absolutist king in Copenhagen. From 1814 to 1905, the country was part of Sweden. During the struggle for independence, especially in the 1800s, Viking history was instrumental in building a national identity enabling us to free ourselves from the Swedes. This movement of national romanticism was deeply entwined both with the farmers’ movement and the populist struggle for democracy. Later, the labor movement also joined in on what should be regarded as a more inclusive and progressive form of nationalism than that of the old European colonial powers.
Nevertheless, this national history has always been distrusted by an important part of Norway’s urban elites, who not only seem to believe that the country is too small for them but also are distrustful of the country’s populist history. It is no coincidence that the skepticism of the national team and their Viking aesthetics often overlap with more elitist, pro-EU sentiments. As the political editorial of Norway’s largest newspaper, the liberal-conservative and staunchly EU-friendly Aftenposten (a paper that supported the “union” with Sweden up until six months before the national referendum of 1905), recently wrote: “The whole World Cup thing is just ‘too much Norway.’”
