What happened the last time Nordic societies encountered rapid climate change? How did natural and social environments interact during the Little Ice Age (1300-1900), the Late Antique climate anomaly (500-700) and in response to major volcanic events (i.e. the 530s, 1250s, 1690s)? What can be learned from the ways people adapted to challenges that are in many ways similar to the ones we face today?
About the project
The Nordic Climate History (NORCLI) research group studies past climate shifts to help us situate current challenges. It uses a novel socionatural approach that integrates climatology, history, and museology. It does so because to make climate science relevant, its models need to be related to human experience. The past offers a rich repertoire of such ‘lived interactions’. In 2024/2025 the project will team up with a research group on the Nordic Little Ice Age hosted by the Center for Advanced Studies, Oslo.
Key events
- 17 March 2025: Exhibition opening: The Little Ice Age. How did we handle the last climate crisis? (Klimahuset Oslo)
- 28/29 November 2024: Workshop: The Laki Eruption 1783 as a Nordic Event
- 10/11 October 2024: Workshop: The Little Ice Age – Timespan, Boundary Object, Narrative
- 23/24 May 2024: Conference: Nordic Climate History
- August 2024: Start of the CAS-group NORLIA (The Nordic Little Ice Age)
Interdisciplinarity
Climate history is an emerging research field. It is characterized by “big interdisciplinarity” connecting scientists, historians, and societal stakeholders.
The Thematic research group "Nordic Climate history" (NORCLI) is hosted jointly by the faculty of mathematics and natural sciences (MATNAT) and the faculty of humanities (HF). It connects recent top-level research groups across these fields at UiO (CLIMCULT, VIKINGS) and put them in conversation with key researchers across Europe that will take residence in Oslo in 2024/25 (CAS groups NORLIA + CLIMCRIS) as well as regional stakeholders (KLIMAHUSET).
NORLIA will proceed in three steps: (1) reconnecting available data from both the archives of nature (tree-rings, climate model data) and the archives of society (historical records, material culture) with a focus on extreme events initiated by abrupt climate change in the last two millennia; (2) integrating interactions ‘from agriculture to culture’ bringing scientists and historians together at eye-level; and (3) narrating results to a wider museum and societal audience via an exhibition and participatory events at Klimahuset Oslo in spring 2025.
Objectives
The objectives of the project are threefold. It will:
- establish ‘climate history’ at UiO and position the university at the centre of this emerging field
- fill current knowledge gaps by integrating climate change and "lived" human experience
- broaden our societal repertoire for climate adaptation measures.
Cooperation
- CLIMCULT
- VIKINGS
- NORLIA CAS-group (The Nordic Little Ice Age)
- FORCE-VOL
- CollaboratoryCurating Climate
- VICES (Volcanic Impacts on Climate, Environment and Society)
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Adaptations to climate change in the northern Baltic region ca 1500–1900
- The NTNU University Museum
- Klimahuset/The Climate House Oslo
Financing
NORCLI is financed by UiO:Energy and Environment.
