Praxis of Social Imaginaries, Winter Session 2025 – Sigtuna, Sweden

The Praxis of Social Imaginaries. Cosmologies: Othering and Liminality (Circle 3)

Praxis of Social Imaginaries, Winter Session 2025

Location: Sigtunastiftelsen in Sigtuna, Sweden

The Praxis of Social Imaginaries. Cosmologies: Othering and Liminality (Circle 3) continued our work together in attendance at the 2025 Winter Session of the Nordic Summer University (March 2025). 

Our focus for this retreat was the writings of Olaus Magnus, A Description of the Northern People. (I will put description here). The research is a cosmological artistic intervention by artists, activists and researchers from diverse disciplines which includes includes the praxis of reading, listening and the telling of stories. Our work continues in efforts to create a transformational learning environment and study how shifts in awareness and epistemic paradigms may occur.

Medieval travelling accounts often include descriptions of dancing, cultural customs, food, weather, animal and landscape descriptions, etc. Co-facilitators of the study circle Laura Hellsten and Lindsey Drury offered multiple approaches for engaging with the text. This included reading sessions, workshops, visual and performance interpretations. The analysis, interpretation and re-enactment portions of the text were done in myriad manners. An example are:

• Laura Hellsten’s and her co-group participants performing in the round ’crypt’ of Sigtunastiftelsen, imagining and enacting war and fire dances described in the text.
• Lindsey’s exercise of mapping ‘magic practices’ described by the author and attributed to different locations, and interpreting these stories in relation to the group’s understanding by history and lived experience.
• Frank Berger’s presentation on the importance of breath and breathing, followed by an invitation to join him in practicing some voice and listening exercises – including playing a stunning Bel Canto performance.
• Eduardo Abrantes’ writing exercises by hand using various chosen topics as prompts, demonstrating effects of constrictions and opennes in creative work.
• The workshop of Helena Hildur W, combining a Deep Listening exercise (after Pauline Oliveros) with a silent walk along a nearby grove, while nurturing attention by the help of personal notebooks.

Sigtuna, Sweden, was an early center of Christianity and currently ruins remain of several medieval churches, including St. Mary’s Church, a Dominican convent, and the St. Olaf’s Church ruins from the 12th century. 

We gathered in Sigtunastiftelsen. The Sigtuna Foundation started as a private cultural foundation with a principle aim to inspire human thought and reflection. It is a center for education and research, cultural programs and retreats.