Interesting angle on Viking reenactment

[Imperial Dave]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/viking_club_where_men_fight_their_demons

Never went to any of the big Viking shows but the ones I went to in the UK were fun* Used to enjoy the build up and evening entertainments almost as much as the battles

(*exhausting, scary and normally ending up with at least one person being carted off to the local hospital)

[Erpingham]

That's interesting.  I saw a documentary on a big Clontarf re-enactment where they talked to participants about their motivations and recognise one guy here from that.  Its a very male-bonding sort of a take - lots of them seem to come out from football hooliganism or gangs, so this is taking the supportive structure of that and focussing the violence.  Perspectives from some of the women involved would have added a dimension.

I think there's probably an interesting study of Viking re-enactors to be made.  Some seem motivated by history mainly, others the pursuit of some Viking spirituality, and there are certainly some with a white supremacist thing going on.  But others just seem to be out to have fun.

[Imperial Dave]

it was the fun angle for me...the research, the kitting out and the looking forward to battle weekends....the actual fighting was pretty hard going!

[Chris]

There's nothing like that over here. Of course, I could be completely mistaken. (I do not think "cosplay" or the like would count.) Given that there is not comparable medieval or ancient history here (like that in Europe - what with empires and kings and such), the focus or interest seems to be with AWI and Civil War re-enactments.

Probably a thread or two of commonality there (Vikings to Civil War - history, etc.).

Video clip was interesting for the perspective it afforded. Noted the lack of orderly advance, the "stragglers", and the majority of folks sort of standing around while some guys up front hacked and poked, some of these in a rather tentative manner (understanding that it was play-fighting).

Some of those costumes looked heavy!   

Thanks for posting link.

Chris

[Erpingham]

There's nothing like that over here. Of course, I could be completely mistaken. (I do not think "cosplay" or the like would count.)

Chris

You do have the Society for Creative Anachronism.  That maybe what you call cosplay though.

The US also has a strong Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) community.