From Backyard to Light: urban environment, nature, and children in a Finnish short film from the 1940s

ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on an urban environment, nature, and children as visualised and presented in the Finnish short film From Backyard to Light (1940). The film depicts children’s play and playgrounds that a city’s Child Welfare Committee implemented in the surroundings of the capital city, Helsinki. This paper concentrates on how the film constructs the imagery of children in an urban environment and the representations of urban green spaces, e.g. parks and playgrounds, intended for children’s well-being. The third aim of this paper is to discuss the representations of children’s play and the gendered nature of sports and play.

KEYWORDS:

• Visual sources
• urban environment
• nature
• children
• playgrounds
• gender

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹ Title: Takapihalta valoon (From Backyard to Light). Release: 1940, 15.27 minutes, black and white. Release format: Shortfilm. Manuscript: Reino Tenkanen. Producer: Suomen Filmiteollisuus (The Finnish Film Industry). Distribution: The FinnishTemperance Societies, non-commercial distribution (Elonet database. The Finnish filmography. The National AudiovisualInstitute. https://www.elonet.fi/fi/elokuva/104338) Current availability: This short film production by SuomenFilmiteollisuus (The Finnish Film Industry) is owned by Yleisradio (The Finnish Broadcasting Company, YLE); the shortfilm is available to the public through the open access archive Ylen Elävä arkisto (https://yle.fi/aihe/artikkeli/2006/09/Q208/takapihoilta-valoon).

² Paul Warmington, Angelo Van Gorp, and Ian Grosvenor, “Education in Motion: Uses of Documentary Film in Educational Research,” Paedagogica Historica 47, no. 4 (2011): 457–72. See also e.g. Inés Dussel and Karin Priem, “The Visual in Histories of Education: A Reappraisal,” Paedagogica Historica 53, no. 6 (2017): 641–9; Lynn Fendler, “Apertures of Documentation: Reading Images in Educational History,” Paedagogica Historica 53, no. 6 (2017): 751–62; Catharina Martins, Helena Cabeleira, and Jorge Ramos do Ó, “The Other and the Same: Images of Rescue and Salvation in the Portuguese Documentary Film ‘Children’s Parks (1945),’” Paedagogica Historica 47, no. 4 (2011): 491–505.

³ Marta Gutman, “The Physical Spaces of Childhood,” in The Routledge History of Childhood in the Western World, ed. Paula S. Fass (New York: Routledge, 2013), 249–66.

⁴ The concept of green space reflects the prevailing idea of nature as constructed and controlled by people. Many scholars refer to nature as one of the most controversial terms due to its biased emphasis on culture. A key point is that changing societal views towards nature are reflected in the layouts of cities as well as the uses of green spaces: Matti O. Hannikainen, The Greening of London: The Development of Public Green Spaces in Camden and Southwark from the mid-1920s to the late 1990s. Historical Studies from the University of Helsinki XXXV (Helsinki: University of Helsinki, 2014), 27; Katri Lento, “The Role of Nature in the City: Green Space in Helsinki, 1917–60,” in The European City and Green Space: London, Stockholm, Helsinki and St Petersburg, 1850–2000, ed. Peter Clarke (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), 188–206.

⁵ Victoria A. Cook and Peter J. Hemming, “Education Spaces: Embodied Dimensions and Dynamics,” Social & Cultural Geography 12, no. 1 (2011): 1–8.; Taina Sillanpää, “Muistetun lapsuuden maantiede – Päiväkotimuistot lapsuuden maantieteen ja muistitietotutkimuksen leikkauspinnassa [Geography of Reminisced Childhood: Kindergarten Memories in the Cross-Section of the Geography of Childhood and Oral History],” Kasvatus & Aika [Education & Time] 11, no. 3 (2017): 70–9; Marjo Nieminen and Minna Vuorio-Lehti, “Menneisyyden kasvatustodellisuuden lähetysmistapoja ja tulkintamahdollisuuksia,” [‘Approaches and Interpretations of the Education of the Past’] in Kasvatushistoria nyt. Makro- ja mikrotutkimuksesta marginaalisuuden, sukupuolen ja tilan analyysiin, [History of Education Now. From Macro- and Microhistory to the Analysis of Margins, Gender and Space] ed. Minna Vuorio-Lehti and Marjo Nieminen (Turku: Finnish Educational Research Association, 2003), 11–34.

⁶ Gutman, “The Physical Spaces of Childhood,” 249–66; Gary Cross, “Play, Games and Toys,” in The Routledge History of Childhood in the Western World, ed. Paula S. Fass (New York: Routledge, 2013), 267–82; Ning de Coninck-Smith and Marta Gutman, “Children and Youth in Public: Making Places, Learning Lessons, Claiming Territories,” Childhood 11, no. 2 (2004): 131–41. See also e.g. Sarah Mills and Peter Kraftl, “Introduction: Geographies, Histories and Practices of Informal Education,” in Informal Education, Childhood and Youth: Geographies, Histories, Practices ed. Sarah Mills and Peter Kraftl (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 1–18; Simon Bradford, “Managing the Spaces of Freedom: Mid-twentieth-century Youth Work,” in Informal Education, Childhood and Youth: Geographies, Histories, Practices, ed. Sarah Mills and Peter Kraftl (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 184–96; Sarah Mills, “‘A Powerful Educational Instrument’: The Woodcraft Folk and Indoor/Outdoor ‘Nature’, 1925–75,” in Informal Education, Childhood and Youth: Geographies, Histories, Practices, ed. Sarah Mills and Peter Kraftl (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 65–78.

⁷ Gutman, “The Physical Spaces of Childhood,” 249–66.

⁸ Cross, “Play, Games and Toys,” 267–82; Kevin Brehony, “A ‘Socially Civilising Influence’? Play and the Urban ‘Degenerate,’” Paedagogica Historica 39, no. 1 (2003), 87–106; Open-air education, see, e.g. Hester Barron, “‘Little Prisoners of City Streets’: London Elementary Schools and the School Journey Movement, 1918–1939,” History of Education 42, no. 2 (2013), 166–81; Geert Thyssen, “The ‘Trotter’ Open‐Air School, Milan (1922–1977): A City of Youth or Risky Business?,” Paedagogica Historica 45, nos 1–2 (2009): 157–70.

⁹ Håkan Forsell, “Die Großstädtische Kindheit,” in Kindheiten in der Moderne. Eine Geschichte der Sorge, ed. Meike S. Baader, Florian Eßer, and Wolfgang Schröer (Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, 2014), 190–225.

¹⁰ Aimo Halila, Helsingin kaupungin sosiaalitoimen historia [History of Helsinki’s Social Service] (Helsinki: Helsingin kaupunki, 1977), 185–6; Lento, “The Role of the Nature in the City,” 188–206.

¹¹ Halila, Helsingin kaupungin sosiaalitoimen historia, 185–6, 208; Lento, “The Role of the Nature in the City,” 188–206; Sari Näre, ”Nuorisotoiminta sodan aikana [Youth Work During the War],” in Sodassa koettua. Uhrattu nuoruus [Experienced in the War. Sacrificed Youth], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, (2008), 40–63. Katri Lento notes that although Finland was still a very rural country at the beginning of the twentieth^h century, the local government of Helsinki and voluntary associations saw a growing problem in the urban environment, especially concerning children’s spaces.

¹² The Mannerheim League for Child Welfare was established in 1920 by Sophie Mannerheim (General C.G.E. Mannerheim’s sister, a head nurse in the surgical hospital in Helsinki, who studied nursing in the famous British St Thomas hospital in London), Counsellor Erik Mandelin of the National Board of Education and paediatrician, professor Arvo Ylppö (whose work significantly decreased child mortality), General C.G.E. Mannerheim and 12 other influential members of the social and charitable fields.

¹³ Aura Korppi-Tommola, Terve lapsi – kansan huomen. The Mannerheim League for Child Welfare as a Builder of Society 1920–1990 [Healthy Child – People’s Tomorrow] (Helsinki: Mannerheimin lastensuojeluliitto, 1990), 58–83.

¹⁴ The city’s child welfare was mainly concentrated on orphans and children who were taken into care.

¹⁵ Kertomus Helsingin kaupungin kunnallishallinnosta 1940 [Report on the Local Government of Helsinki 1940] (Helsinki: Helsingin kaupungin tilastotoimisto, 1943), 89–108; Halila, Helsingin kaupungin sosiaalitoimen historia, 128, 185–6, 208.

¹⁶ Warmington, Van Gorp, and Grosvenor, “Education in Motion,” 457–72.

¹⁷ In 1963, the CEO of Suomen Filmiteollisuus (The Finnish Film Industry) sold the company’s feature films and short films to Yleisradio, which still owns the rights to the short films. Kari Uusitalo, Suomalaisen elokuvan vuosikymmenet. Johdatus kotimaisen elokuvan ja elokuva-alan historiaan 1896–1963 [The Decades of Finnish Films: Introduction to the History of Domestic Films and Film Productions 1896–1963] (Helsinki: Otava, 1965), 23, 67; Jari Sedergren and Ilkka Kippola, Dokumentin utopiat. Suomalaisen dokumentti- ja lyhytelokuvan historia 1944–1989 [Utopias of Documents: History of Finnish Documentaries and Short Films 1944–1989] (Helsinki: SKS, 2015), 39.

¹⁸ Jari Sedergren and Ilkka Kippola, Dokumentin ytimessä. Suomalaisen dokumentti- ja lyhytelokuvan historia 1904–1944 [In the Core of Documents: History of Finnish Documentaries and Short Films 1904–1944] (Helsinki: SKS, 2009), 109–13.

¹⁹ Elonet database https://www.elonet.fi/fi/elokuva/104338. The film was also broadcast on television in 2000.

²⁰ The Winter War was a military conflict between the Soviet Union (USSR) and Finland, beginning with a Soviet invasion of Finland on 30 November 1939, three months after the outbreak of World War II, and ended three-and-a-half months later with the Moscow Peace Treaty on 13 March 1940.

²¹ The Continuation War was a military conflict between Finland and the Soviet Union (USSR) from 1941 to 1944, during World War II. Finland and Nazi Germany were co-belligerents and, for Nazi Germany, was a part of its overall war efforts on the Eastern Front.

²² Sedergren and Kippola, Dokumentin ytimessä, 321, 354, 359, 365, 380–1, 408.

²³ Kari Uusitalo, Ruutia, riitoja ja rakkautta. Suomalaisen elokuvan sotavuodet 1940–1948 [Gun Powder, Quarrels and Love: The War Years of Finnish Films 1940–1948] (Helsinki: Suomen elokuvasäätiö, 1977), 223, 229, 233, 235, 240, 262, 271, 280; Sedergren and Kippola, Dokumentin utopiat, 366–70.

²⁴ Fendler, “Apertures of Documentation,” 751–62.

²⁵ See also e.g. Helena Cabeleira, Catharina Martins and Martin Lawn, “Indisciplines of Inquiry: The Scottish Children’s Story, Documentary Film and the Construction of the Viewer,” Paedagogica Historica 47, no. 4 (2011): 473–90; Paul Warmington and Ian Grosvenor, “A Very Historical Mode of Understanding: Examining Editorial and Ethnographic relations in the Primary (2008),” Paedagogica Historica 47, no. 4 (2011): 543–58; Fendler, “Apertures of Documentation,” 751–62.

²⁶ Uusitalo, Ruutia, riitoja ja rakkautta, 218; Sedergren and Kippola, Dokumentin ytimessä, 358–76.

²⁷ Uusitalo, Ruutia, riitoja ja rakkautta, 13–17, 213–18.

²⁸ Josephine May, “A Field of Desire: Visions of Education in Selected Australian Silent Films,” Paedagogica Historica 46, no. 5 (2010): 623–37. See also e.g. Peter Cunningham, “Moving Images: Propaganda Film and British Education 1940–45,” Paedagogica Historica 36, no. 1 (2000): 289–406.

²⁹ See also e.g. Cunningham, “Moving Images”.

³⁰ See Warmington and Grosvenor, “A Very Historical Mode of Understanding,” 543–58.

³¹ Ibid.

³² Sedergren and Kippola, Dokumentin utopiat, 14.

³³ See also e.g. Marjo Nieminen, “Regulated and Liberated Bodies of Schoolgirls in a Finnish Short Film from the 1950s,” Paedagogica Historica 54, nos. 1-2 (2018): 96–113.

³⁴ May, “A Field of Desire,” 623–37.

³⁵ Cabeleira, Martins, and Lawn, “Indisciplines of Inquiry,” 473–90; Cunningham, “Moving Images”.

³⁶ Anna-Maria Åström, “Helsinkiläisten muistot, paikat ja kiinnekohteet [Reminiscences, Places and Points of Attraction of Residents of Helsinki],” in Kaupunkilaisten Helsinki. Helsingin historia vuodesta 1945, [The Residents’ Helsinki. History of Helsinki from 1945], ed. Anna-Maria Åström and Laura Kolbe (Helsinki: SKS, 2016), 13–444.

³⁷ Sodassa koettua. Haavoitettu lapsuus [Experienced in the War: Wounded Childhood], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2007); Sodassa koettua: Uhrattu nuoruus [Experienced in the War: Sacrificed Youth], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2008).

³⁸ See also e.g. Juhani Tähtinen, “Moraali ja terveys kansalais- ja koulukasvatuksen polttopisteessä [Morals and Health in the Focus of Popular Education and Schooling],” in Valistus ja koulunpenkki. Kasvatus ja koulutus Suomessa 1860-luvulta 1960-luvulle [Enlightenment and School Bench: Education in Finland from the 1860s to the 1960s] (Helsinki: SKS, 2011), 184–216; Gutman, “The Physical Spaces of Childhood,” 249–66.

³⁹ Åström, “Helsinkiläisten muistot,” 63–6.

⁴⁰ Sari Näre and Jenni Kirves, “Lapsuus sodan keskellä [Childhood in the Middle of the War],” in Sodassa koettua. Haavoitettu lapsuus [Experienced in the War: Wounded Childhood], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2007), 8–29.

⁴¹ The voice-over of the film uses an old-fashioned Finnish word (“urheilijaneit”) that combines two words: athlete and damsel.

⁴² See also e.g. Gutman, “The Physical Spaces of Childhood,” 249–66.

⁴³ Näre and Kirves, “Lapsuus sodan keskellä,” 8–29.

⁴⁴ Cabeleira, Martins, and Lawn, “Indisciplines of Inquiry,” 473–90.

⁴⁵ See Gutman, “The Physical Spaces of Childhood,” 249–66.

⁴⁶ Halila, Helsingin kaupungin sosiaalitoimen historia, 185–6.

⁴⁷ Ibid.

⁴⁸ Näre and Kirves, “Lapsuus sodan keskellä,” 8–29.

⁴⁹ Jussi Turtiainen, “Liikunta nuorison kasvattajana [Physical Education as an Educator of Youth],” in Sodassa koettua: Uhrattu nuoruus [Experienced in the War: Sacrificed Youth], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2008), 180–211.

⁵⁰ Näre, “Nuorisotoiminta sodan aikana,” 40–63.

⁵¹ Turtiainen, “Liikunta nuorison kasvattajana,” 180–211.

⁵² Ibid.

⁵³ Ibid.

⁵⁴ The voice-over refers to a car that passes by and interrupts boys playing football in the film.

⁵⁵ Hannu Itkonen, “Nuorisourheilun muuttuvat käytännöt, tavoitteet ja merkitykset [Changing Practices, Aims and Meanings of Youth Sports],” in Nuoruuden vuosisata: Suomalaisen nuorison historia [The Century of Youth: The History of the Finnish Youth] (Helsinki: SKS, 2003), 327–43; Aimo Halila, Suomen kansakoululaitoksen historia 4 [History of Finnish Elementary School 4] (Helsinki: WSOY, 1950), 194–5; Asetus oppikoulujen lukusuunnitelmista sekä valtion oppikoulujen oppiennätykset ja metodiset ohjeet. Oppikoulujen lukusuunnitelmista kesäkuun 13 päivänä 1941 annettu asetus, opetusministeriön valtion oppikouluja varten kesäkuun 19 päivänä 1941 vahvistamat oppiennätykset ja kouluhallituksen kesäkuun 26 päivänä 1941 vahvistamat metodiset ohjeet [Act on the Curriculums for Secondary Schools and Targets for the State Secondary Schools and Methodological Instructions] (Helsinki: Valtioneuvosto, 1944), 133–8.

⁵⁶ Asetus oppikoulujen lukusuunnitelmista sekä valtion oppikoulujen oppiennätykset ja metodiset ohjeet, 140–1.

⁵⁷ Joan Tumblety, Remaking the Male Body: Masculinity and the uses of Physical Culture in Interwar and Vichy France (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 99–105.

⁵⁸ Tuomas Tepora, “Sota-ajan leikit ja koulu [Play and School during Wartime],” in Sodassa koettua. Haavoitettu lapsuus [Experienced in the War: Wounded Childhood], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2007), 30–67.

⁵⁹ The voice-over refers to the rallies, which were arranged in Eläintarha, 1932–1963.

⁶⁰ Tepora, “Sota-ajan leikit ja koulu,” 32–38, 44–45.

⁶¹ The women’s patriotic organisation “Lotta Svärd” had an organisation for girls, “Little Lottas”, designed for 8- to 16-year-old girls. Being a Little Lotta was a popular play role for girls younger than 8 when children played war games.

⁶² Tepora, “Sota-ajan leikit ja koulu,” 32–38, 44–45.

⁶³ Ibid.

⁶⁴ Jenni Kirves, “Pikkulottien ja lottatyttöjen vaativat tehtävät [Demanding Tasks of Little Lottas and Lottagirls],” in Sodassa koettua. Uhrattu nuoruus [Experienced in the War: Sacrificed Youth] ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2008), 89–137; Sari Näre, “Sotilaspojat ja poikasotilaat maansa puolesta [Soldierboys and Boysoldiers on Behalf of their Country],” in Sodassa koettua. Uhrattu nuoruus [Experienced in the War: Sacrificed Youth], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2008), 138–79.

⁶⁵ Tepora, “Sota-ajan leikit ja koulu,” 36–38, 44–45.

⁶⁶ See Turtiainen, “Liikunta nuorison kasvattajana,” 180–211.

⁶⁷ Tepora, “Sota-ajan leikit ja koulu”.

⁶⁸ Aura Korppi-Tommola, “War and Children in Finland during the Second World War,” Paedagogica Historica 44, no. 4 (2008): 445–55; Jenni Kirves, “Sotalasten siirretty lapsuus [War Children’s Transferred Childhood],” in Sodassa koettua. Haavoitettu lapsuus [Experienced in the War: Wounded Childhood], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2007), 102–37.

⁶⁹ Approximately 406,800 people were evacuated from Karelia after the Winter War.

⁷⁰ Atte Oksanen, “Evakkolasten kadotettu koti [The Lost Home of Evacuated Children],” in Sodassa koettua: Haavoitettu lapsuus [Experienced in the War: Wounded Childhood], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2007), 68–101.

⁷¹ Sari Näre, “Sotaorpojen mykkä ikävä [The Silent Longing of War Orphans],” in Sodassa koettua. Haavoitettu lapsuus [Experienced in the War: Wounded Childhood], ed. Sari Näre (Helsinki: Weilin + Göös, 2007), 138–67.

⁷² Halila, Helsingin kaupungin sosiaalitoimen historia, 185–6, 208; Korppi-Tommola, Terve lapsi – kansan huomen, 58–83.

⁷³ Ibid.

⁷⁴ See Turtiainen, “Liikunta nuorison kasvattajana,” 180–211; Henrik Meinander, Towards a Bourgeois Manhood: Boys’ Physical Education in Nordic Secondary Schools 1880–1940 (Helsinki: Suomen Tiedeseura, 1994); Tähtinen, “Moraali ja terveys kansalais- ja koulukasvatuksen polttopisteessä,” 184–216.

⁷⁵ See Tepora, “Sota-ajan leikit ja koulu”.

⁷⁶ Ibid.

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Marjo Nieminen

Dr Marjo Nieminen is a senior lecturer in the Department of Education, University of Turku, Finland, and earlier worked as a researcher at the Centre for Research on Lifelong Learning and Education (CELE). Her recent empirical studies have covered the history of education from primary schooling to the upper secondary and university levels, and have included methodological reflections on various historical sources, such as archives, written narratives, and visual sources.