ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the place of aquatic animals in the Icelandic world-view. It explores the correspondence between human society and representations of water beings during the era of household production (from the time of settlement in the 9th century to the beginning of the 20th century), and examines how ideas about the fish world have changed during this century as Icelanders have entered into new kinds of social relationships. I take the theoretical position, following Douglas (1966), Leach (1976) and some others, that some animals, because of their anomalous position, are better to think with than others. Also, I suggest that symbolic expressions should be studied in a context of development over time. Anthropologists have overemphasized a synchronic and static analysis of symbolic systems. In reality, representations obey ‘two kinds of determinisms’ (Lévi-Strauss 1985, p. 104). They respond to the constraints of the present, the social relations of the people who produce them, but somehow they also reflect the traditions of the past.
