Volume Number Spring Volume Number Spring Volume 4 Number 2 2017 Nordic Journal Nordicof Journal Educationalof History Educational History Volume Number Spring Nordic Journal of EducationalJ History HSPECIAL ISSUE: PHYSICAL EDUCATION HAND THE EMBODIMENT OF THE NATION Edited by Ed ISSN: - http://ojs.ub.umu.se/index.php/njedhDaniel Tröhler, Johannes Westberg & AnneNJ BergH ISSN: - http://ojs.ub.umu.se/index.php/njedh E ISSN: - http://ojs.ub.umu.se/index.php/njedh NJHd Vol. 4, no. 2 (2017), Special Issue: Physical Education and the Embodiment of the Nation TheNordic Journal of Educational History (NJEdH) is an interdisciplinary international journal dedicat- ed to scholarly excellence in the field of educational history. The journal takes special responsibility for the communication and dissemination of educational history research of particular relevance to the Nor- dic region (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and political and geographic entities including the Faroe Islands, Greenland, Sápmi and Åland), but welcomes contributions exploring the history of education in all parts of the world. The publishing language is English and the Scandinavian languages. The journal applies a double blind peer review procedure and is accessible to all interested readers (no fees are charged for publication or subscription). The NJEdH publishes articles as soon as they have been through the peer review and copy editing process, adding cumulatively to the content of an open issue each year. Special issues are normally published as the second issue of any given year. For guidelines on submitting manuscripts, please visit: http://ojs.ub.umu.se/index.php/njedh/about/submissions Special Issue Editors Professor Daniel Tröhler, University of Vienna, Austria Professor Johannes Westberg, Örebro University, Sweden Dr Anne Berg, Uppsala University, Sweden Journal Editors Dr Henrik Åström Elmersjö, Umeå University, Sweden (Senior Editor) Professor Anna Larsson, Umeå University, Sweden Assoc. Professor Björn Norlin, Umeå University, Sweden Dr David Sjögren, Uppsala University, Sweden Professor Johannes Westberg, Örebro University, Sweden (Book Review Editor) Editorial Board Professor Emerita Sirkka Ahonen, University of Helsinki, Finland Professor Astri Andresen, University of Bergen, Norway Professor Emeritus Donald Broady, Uppsala University, Sweden Assoc. Professor Catherine Burke, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom Assoc. Professor Craig Campbell, University of Sydney, Australia Professor Marcelo Caruso, Humboldt University, Germany Professor Ning de Coninck-Smith, Aarhus University, Denmark Professor Emerita Christina Florin, Stockholm University, Sweden Professor Eckhardt Fuchs, Georg Eckert Institute, Germany Professor Ólöf Garðarsdóttir, University of Iceland, Iceland Professor Ian Grosvenor, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom Professor Emeritus Harry Haue, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark Professor Veli-Pekka Lehtola, University of Oulu, Finland Professor Daniel Lindmark, Umeå University, Sweden Professor Emeritus Lars Petterson, Dalarna University, Sweden Professor Jukka Rantala, University of Helsinki, Finland Professor Harald Thuen, Lillehammer University College, Norway Mailing Address Email and phone Nordic Journal of Educational History Henrik Åström Elmersjö (Senior Editor) Department of Historical, Philosophical, [email protected] and Religious Studies +4690 7866816 Umeå University SE-901 87 Umeå Webpage Sweden http://ojs.ub.umu.se/index.php/njedh ISSN (online): 2001-9076 The NJEdH is published with economic support ISSN (print): 2001-7766 from NOP-HS Grant for Nordic scientific journals Table of Contents Introduction The Body Between the Protestant Souls and Nascent Nation-States: Physical 1–12 Education as an Emerging School Subject in the Nineteenth Century Daniel Tröhler & Johannes Westberg Articles The Emergence of Physical Education as a Subject for Compulsory Schooling in 13–30 the First Half of the Nineteenth Century: The Case of Phokion Heinrich Clias and Adolf Spiess Rebekka Horlacher Shaping the National Body: Physical Education and the Transformation of Ger- 31–45 man Nationalism in the Long Nineteenth Century Daniel Tröhler Girls’ Gymnastics in the Service of the Nation: Educationalisation, Gender and 47–69 Swedish Gymnastics in the Mid-Nineteenth Century Johannes Westberg In-between “Swedish Gymnastics” and “Deutsche Turnkunst:” Educating “Na- 71–84 tional” Citizens through Physical Education in Switzerland in the Last Decades of the Nineteenth Century Ingrid Brühwiler Gymnastics between Protestantism and Libertinism from 1880 to 1940: A 85–111 Comparative Analysis of Two Internationally Renowned Danish Gymnastics Educators Hans Bonde Cover photo: Original Swedish gymnastics performed by the Danish Olympic team prior to the participation in the Olympic Games in Stockholm 1912. In the background the leader, Niels Bukh. Source: Niels Bukh’s archive at Ollerup Gymnastics high school. Nordic Journal of Educational History Vol. 4, no. 2 (2017), pp. 1–12 ISSN (online): 2001-9076 ISSN (print): 2001-7766 INTRODUCTION The Body Between the Protestant Souls and Nascent Na- tion-States: Physical Education as an Emerging School Subject in the Nineteenth Century Daniel Tröhler Johannes Westberg Today, physical education is an established part of the curriculum of compulsory schooling. Taken for granted as a school subject, yet considered a minor school ac- tivity whose mastery and excellence are not decisive for the school careers and thus the life chances of the younger generation, physical education has not enjoyed re- search attention as have, for instance, language teaching, history or geography, let alone religious instruction. Physical education is publicly undisputed as a curric- ulum requirement, but it is not really highly valued. The comparatively low public esteem and physical education’s lack of necessity for textbooks – a prominent field of research – make physical education a bit of a Plain Jane in educational discourse. The comparatively low regard in which physical education is held in research1 has its equivalence in the daily practice of school activity. Physical education instructors might react to this neglect by citing—in Latin—the famous phrase Mens sana in corpore sano, “a healthy mind in a healthy body,” indicating that intellectual health (also) depends on physical health. That reaction could, however, trigger reactions from a sophisticated aficionado of the humanities, who knows thatMens sana in corpore sano is an abbreviated version of a sentence from Juvenal’s Satire X in which he was discussing not sports but the value of wishing and praying. In this context Juvenal says, “[…] if you must pray for something […] then ask for a healthy mind in a healthy body, demand a valiant heart for which death holds no terrors.”2 Juvenal was obviously making fun of the body culture of the Ancient Romans, and he saw a need to pray that those who trained their bodies so extensively would care equally for developing a sound mind and a good heart, too. 1 The sports sciences are an exception, for they indeed have historical interest. Interestingly eno- ugh, this particular historical research is somewhat isolated from mainstream history of education. Another exception is research conducted in the field of gender studies. 2 Juvenal, The Sixteen Satires, 3rd ed., trans. Peter Green (London: Penguin Books, 2004), 86. Daniel Tröhler is Professor in Foundations of Education at the Department of Education, University of Vienna, Austria. Email: [email protected] Johannes Westberg is Professor in Education at the School of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences, Örebro University, Sweden. Email: [email protected] Nordic Journal of Educational History 2017. © Daniel Tröhler and Johannes Westberg. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons CC-BY4.0 License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). 2 Daniel Tröhler and Johannes Westberg Against this background, physical education is constantly being a bit discredit- ed—even more so, because at times it was closely connected to un-reflected mascu- linity, military programmes and war preparation; and in some places physical edu- cation policy was and is indeed not domiciled in the ministries of education but in the ministries of defence. Given its commitment to enthusiastically participating in the “educationalization of the world,”3 the several branches of education research are of course much more devoted to finding educational solutions to political challenges and social tensions rather than to helping to train the alleged future killing machines or cannon fodders. To serve anything connected to power and/or war aspirations cannot be located in the moral(istic) realm of education research. One of the tremendous advantages of the history of education is that—potential- ly—it does not need to be so devoted to the moralistic agenda of education in gen- eral, in policy or in research. Quite the contrary, education history precisely fulfils its function when it does not participate in trends of an educationalised world but when it analyses its causes, its intellectual and institutional developments and trajec- tories and its discursive effects in the way that education research is being defined as appropriate and helpful: providing ‘evidence’ for policy, for instance. The fact that this is only rarely done does not mean that its potential does not exist but that the advocates