Lögberg-Heimskringla - 09.04.2004, Blaðsíða 2

2 » Lögberg-Heimskringla » Friday 9 April 2004
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PHOTO: DAVID JÓN FULLER
Birna Bjarnadóttir is pleased at the high interest in Icelandic courses, and hopes to encourage more interdisciplinary students
to see what the Icelandic Department is all about. Next spring, a course in modern Icelandic literature will be offered.
Across North
America these days,
interest in lcelandic
language classes is
high. But what about
students looking to
take it to the next
level? Lögberg-
Heimskringla’s
David Jón Fuller
catches up with
Birna Bjarnadóttir at
the University of
Manitoba to find out.
David Jón Fuller
WlNNIPEG, MB
The beginning of any
school year is full of promise
— and perhaps a bit of appre-
hension. When you’re new to
the country, the stakes are a bit
higher. For Birna Bjarnadót-
tir, new Chair of the Icelandic
Department at the Univeristy
of Manitoba, it was a whole
new world.
“It was an adventurous
thing, really,” she says. “And
why do I say that? Well, as you
know, a Ph.D. doesn’t guaran-
tee you anything nowadays.”
Birna’s doctoral thesis,
which she defended last June,
was the first major study of
one of Iceland’s brightest liter-
ary lights.
“I had for years been
amazed by the Icelandic con-
temporary writer Guðbergur
Bergsson and his work,” she
says. She decided to do a doc-
toral thesis on aesthetics and
Bergsson’s fíction.
Bergsson recently won the
Nordic Prize for Literature.
Of her defence, Birna says,
“It’s harvest time for the candi-
date. And it was one pf the
most beautiful days of my
life.”
Now she’s bringing her
passion for comparative litera-
ture and aesthetics to Win-
nipeg.
Birna Bjarnadottir was
born and raised in Hafnar-
fjörður, Iceland. She attended
Menntaskólinn við Hamrahlíð
in Reykjavík. She lived in
Berlin for two years, studying
German language, literature
and aesthetics. Returning to
Iceland, she completed her
B.A. in Comparative Litera-
ture.
That wasn’t the end of her
travels. She also studied in
Britain at Warwick University.
Aside from her academic
pursuits, she has also been a
freelance critic for Icelandic
radio and taught at the Univer-
sity of Iceland.
But was she ready to do it
here in Manitoba, in her sec-
ond language? She smiles at
that.
“What I realized, after my
first class in early September,
was that I could do this,” she
says. “I find the students mar-
velous. They are enthsuiastic,
they are engaged... When you
travel to a new country, anoth-
er continent, you can’t know,
you can’t even imagine, how
it’s going to be for you as a
teacher in a classroom.” She
knew it might be difficult, but
after that intial class, she says,
“I got the feeling that I would.
be able to pull through.”
What if she hadn’t? “It
might have been a very, very
long winter!” she laughs.
The age range is wide, par-
ticularly in the Icelandic lan-
guage classes. “And that is a
splendid thing.” she says. “I
know from experience, for I
taught also at the Continuing
Education program at the Uni-
versity of Iceland a few times,
that students who are not nec-
essarily wet behind the ears,
are fantastic students. Their
drive is such a marvelous
drive, and it seems to affect
fellow students. So I can only
hope that people of all age
groups attend courses given by
the Icelandic Department.”
Birna herself teaches
mythology, the sagas, and
Canadian Icelandic literature.
It provides her with a frisson of
comparative literature.
“In the courses I’m teach-
ing,” she says, “the setup is
slightly different, because
these courses are open to stu-
dents not only in the Icelandic
Department, but also the Eng-
lish Department. And I find
that format extremely positive
too, for we are not to segregate
ourselves. Quite the contrary.
“In my view, I myself not
only prosper from it, [but so
does] the subject itself, for we
are studying literature that is
for everyone to explore and
enjoy.”
Next year, the Department
will offer a course on modem
Icelandic literature. Given
Birna’s background, it’s a sub-
ject she is sure to illuminate.
Whatever happens, she’s
glad to be here. Teaching at the
U of M is, for her, a “magnifi-
cent, splendid and marvelous
opportunity for being able to
do both of what I love, which
is teaching and continuing my
research.”
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