Building the lan Vital of the Finnish Nation: Ivar Wilskman's Ideology of Gymnastics

摘要

If an ideology is a way of thinking that has prescriptive implications for politics, then Ivar Wilskman's (1854-1932) views concerning the value of gymnastics form an ideology. He was a pioneer of the Finnish gymnastics movement promoting physical exercise as a national duty for everyone. This article examines how Wilskman argued for gymnastics as the method to fitness and analyses the political lessons he drew from them. He based his doctrines on a mechanistic notion of bodily functions: To combat degeneration one had to be almost constantly in motion in order to accumulate lan vital which strengthened 'will-power', the source of collective, national power. Consequently, indolence bordered to crime. Wilskman also toyed with ideas of racial hygiene; although he did not advocate eugenics he demanded exercises - as an everyday substitute for gymnastics chopping of firewood would also do - to make 'the small Finnish race' survive in the era of imperialism.