Sanna Ovaskainen is a researcher in the Sustainable Development research group and a member of NPE team at the Arctic Centre and a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Lapland. She is enrolled in the ARKTIS Doctoral Program at the Arctic Centre. Her doctoral study focuses on the ecological way of life in Lapland.
In my study I discuss on the possibilities, constraints and variations of an environmentally oriented way of life in Finnish Lapland. I’m interested to learn how different situations in life affect an individual’s opportunities to act in environmental friendly way, for instance what kind of experiences, situations and events people highlight in the context of their life story, when they are considering the backgrounds and the motivations of their pro-environmental lifestyle choices.
In recent times, much attention has been paid to individuals’ role, actorness and responsibility for addressing environmental problems. For example various climate campaigns, declarations and lifestyle guides are advising people to change their way of life to a more pro-environmental one and to take more responsibility for the environment. Thus in prevailing environmental discussions the ecological way of life is often defined as responsible consumer choices made by rational consumer citizen, such as the use of public transport, compliance of vegetarian diet and buying of green products. However, during the research process I have learned that the ecological way of life is not only about trying to keep one’s ecological footprint as small as possible or to follow vegetarian diet. Instead, the narrative reading of the research material highlights that ‘the Eco Life’ can be approached from several different points of view, each of which is based on the differing perceptions and understandings of nature/environment, and the society.
The empirical data of my research is 20 thematic biographical interviews where the theme was the environment and its role in interviewee’s life. People participating in my study represent different ages, different places of residences and various situations of life but they were all environmentally oriented. By using the biographical method my aim was to bring out the participants’ own voices and to let them freely tell what they feel is important in relation to theme. I ended up using this method because I was interested in how different people outline their life stories in relation to the environmental theme, what kind of experiences they narrate in their stories; what kind of meanings they give to the environment/nature and how these meanings may change and vary.
PS. In my free time I enjoy family life and outdoor activities. When I really want to relax, I watch action movies, especially ones with Tom Cruise as a leading role.