This chapter argues that movement – the way individuals and groups are imagined to move toward and through the landscape – can be used to understand and problematize the colonization of Lapland in the 1700s and 1800s. It explores how different movements in the texts create a paradoxical place of desolate, wild, and dangerous nature that at the same time is inhabited by the indigenous Sami. The chapter explains the way different groups are described as moving toward and through the landscape in colonial texts is a fruitful way of examining the ideology and mechanics of colonialism. Petrus Laestadius was ordained in 1825 and two year later he entered the service as a missionary in Swedish Lapland. Laestadius took up subscriptions for an upcoming travel narrative based on his work in Lapland in 1828 and the first book was published in 1831 under the title Journal af Petrus Laestadius for forsta aret af hans tjenstgoring sasom missionaire i Lappmarken.

In this article, we take a narrative approach to Swedish media texts regarding farming, forestry, and Sami livelihoods. The main purpose is to illuminate how a master narrative on climate change is shaped, activated, and put into practice in different ways in different settings and contexts. The study discusses the complex interplay between different levels of narratives and the narrative dynamics that influence and shape collective representations of climate change. We discern a narrative level that does not explicitly challenge the master narrative, but operationalizes it in close relation to cultural contexts and specific goals, resulting in what we call conventionalized narratives.