Academic Café | Swimming, the national custom of Icelanders

Swimming pools are lively public spaces, they are all at once a community center, a gym, a classroom, a playground or a spa. In this lecture we will hear about the culture in Icelandic swimming pools, where guests connect and interact in warm water in a cold country. Steam, chloroform, water from hot springs and a suitable amount of mouldy smell in a dry hot tub (the library), a conversation about the swimming pool culture of Iceland.

Katrín Snorradóttir holds an MA degree in practical folkloristics from the University of Iceland, since 2021.  In her thesis, she looked at the evolution and characteristics of swimming pool culture in Iceland, and last autumn the book SUND was published, with her and Valdimar Hafstein's research of this favourite pastime of many Iclenders.   

Further information:
Katrín Snorradóttir, 
katsno@gmail.com

Sigríður Stephensen
sigridur.steinunn.stephensen@reykjavik.is | 411 6230