Edit
Håkan Rydving
Photo: Erik Rydving 2023

Håkan Rydving

Position

Emeriti, History of Religions

Affiliation

E-mail
hakan.rydving@uib.no
Phone number
+47 55582447
Visitor address
Øysteins gate 3
5007 Bergen
Postal address
P.O. Box 7805
NO-5020 Bergen
Norway

Håkan Rydving

Position

Emeriti, History of Religions

Affiliation

Short info

Larger writing projects in progress:
Indigenous Sami Religion: A Dictionary of Terms and Names
Tradisjonell samisk religion: ei kort innføring (textbook in Norwegian)
The Concept of Shamanism: A History
Cirkumpolära religioner (textbook in Swedish)
Research
  • Indigenous Sami Religion (source criticism, religious change and continuity, rites de passage, concepts of person, bear rituals)
  • Sami linguistics (South Sami, Lule Sami, North Sami; language variation, personal names and place names, history of the Sami language)
  • Religions in the Circumpolar Area (concepts of person, comparison as method)
  • Jewish and Islamic Philosophies of Religion in 12th century Andalusia
  • Classical Indian Philosophy of Language (Pāṇini)
  • Religion and Aesthetics

Håkan Rydving (b. 1953) is a Swedish linguist and historian of religions, educated at Uppsala University. Since 1995 he has been Professor of the History of Religions at the University of Bergen. As a dedicated academic teacher he prioritizes supervision and finds it important as a professor to give courses for students on advanced as well as on beginners’ level.

In his research he in particular focuses on epistemological issues like problems of conceptualisation in addition to themes like variation and change, source criticism, and the practicability of different approaches as research tools. He emphasises the necessity of a good knowledge of relevant languages for any serious study of cultures and religions.

His main research interests lie in northern indigenous cultures, and especially in Sami linguistics and in the history of Sami religious traditions, but at present he has also taken up his old interests in Islamic and Jewish philosophies and in the Sanskrit grammar of Pāṇini. Rydving has been a visiting professor and lectured at universities and research institutes in Czechia, France, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Russia, and the U.K., in addition to in the Nordic countries, where he is also a fellow of several academies and learned societies:

The Finnish Literature Society (Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura), 2020–

The Royal Society of Arts and Sciences of Uppsala (Academia Regia Scientiarum Upsaliensis), 2013–

The Academy of the Royal Norwegian Society of Science and Letters (Det Kongelige Norske Videnskabers Selskabs Akademi), 2012–

The Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters (Societas Scientiarum Fennica), 2012–

The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters (Det Norske Videnskaps-Akademi), 2009–

The Royal Gustavus Adolphus Academy (Kungl. Gustav Adolfs Akademien), Sweden, 2006–

Festschriften (65th anniversary)

Dīn: tidsskrift for religion og kultur 2018: 1 – Islam og politikk (ed. by Ulrika Mårtensson & Mona Helen Farstad). 183 pp. URL http://ojs.novus.no/index.php/DIN/issue/view/189

Dīn: tidsskrift for religion og kultur 2018: 2 – Openheit / Rabasvuohta (ed. by Hans Geir Aasmundsen, Jelena Porsanger & Bjørn Ola Tafjord). 167 pp. URL http://ojs.novus.no/index.php/DIN/issue/view/190

Journal of Northern Studies 12: 1 (2018) (ed. by Lars-Erik Edlund & Olle Sundström). 129 pp. URL http://www.jns.org.umu.se/JNS_1_2018_fulltext.pdf

Temenos: Nordic Journal of Comparative Religion 54: 1 (2018) (ed. by Stefan Olsson). 117 pp. URL https://journal.fi/temenos/issue/view/5194

Teaching

University of Bergen, History of Religions (1993, 1995–2024)

Example of courses:

  • Sami Religion
  • Sami and Old Norse Religion
  • Judaism (introduction)
  • Islam (introduction)
  • Theory in the History of Religions
  • World Philosophies (together with K.A. Jacobsen & R. Kristiansen)
  • Religion and Politics
  • Religion and Art
  • Religion and Music
  • Religion in World Literatures

Örebro University College, Swedish (1987–94)

Course:

  • Swedish for Immigrant Education

Umeå University, History of Religions (1983–84, 1986–87)

Example of courses:

  • Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Islam (introduction)

Uppsala University, Finno-Ugric Languages (Sami) (1983–94)

Example of courses:

  • Lule Sami
  • North Sami
  • South Sami
  • Sami dialectology

Uppsala University, History of Religions (1977–89)

Example of courses:

  • Old Norse Religion
  • Sami Religion
  • Islam
  • Anthropology of religions
  • Jerusalem (with excursion)
  • The Lule Sami Area (with excursion)
Publications
2024
2023
2022
2021
2018
2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2011
2010
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
1996
1995
1994
1993
1990

See a complete overview of publications in Cristin.

Words and Varieties: Lexical Variation in Saami (Mémoires de la Société Finno-Ougrienne 269), Helsinki 2013: Finno-Ugrian Society. URL http://www.sgr.fi/sust/sust269/sust269.pdf

Perspectivas del norte: cinco textos sobre la lengua y la cultura de los samis (Antropológica 21), eds. R. Martínez & V. Koričančić, México D.F. 2012: Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México.

Tracing Sami Traditions: In Search of the Indigenous Religion among the Western Sami during the 17th and 18th Centuries (Instituttet for sammenlignende kulturforskning, Serie B, Skrifter 135), Oslo 2010: Novus forlag.

The End of Drum-Time: Religious Change among the Lule Saami, 1670s–1740s (Historia Religionum 12), Stockholm 1993: Almqvist & Wiksell International. 2nd ed. 1995, 3rd ed. 2004.

Le chamanisme aujourd’hui : constructions et déconstructions d’une illusion scientifique, Études mongoles et sibériennes, centrasiatiques et tibétaines 42, Paris 2011. URL http://emscat.revues.org/index1815.html

A western folk category in mind? [A critique of the cognitive science of religion], Temenos: Nordic Journal of Comparative Religion 44,1: 73–99, Helsinki 2008. URL http://ojs.tsv.fi/index.php/temenos/article/view/4599/6790