Iceland's first Rights of Nature movement
The idea to propose Snæfellsjökull as president of Iceland took hold of me in 2010 while with the glacier. By that time, Rights of Nature movements had commenced; Ecuador encoded rights of nature in their constitution in 2008, and Bolivia legislated the Law of the Rights of Mother Nature in 2010. A Maori community was hard at work acquiring legal personhood for the Whanganui River. With the role of the president one of diplomacy and leadership, who could perform these duties better than a renowned glacier visibly transforming via climate change? What might we learn from the glacier as our elder, as our mentor in interdependent relations?
In early 2024, thirty humans commenced work on a campaign to nominate Snæfellsjökull for the presidency. We puzzled through how to work within a digitised administrative system and legislative framework that was not yet purpose-built to support a non-human entity to have a kennitala. Snæfellsjökull fulfilled the requisite age limit (at least 35 years old) and citizenship (Icelandic); the only thing remaining to establish our candidacy and collect enough nomination signatures to get the glacier on the ballot was a kennitala.
Could we work with a pre-existing organisation that has a kennitala? Should we form a non-profit to acquire a kennitala for Snæfellsjökull? No, it should be a kennitala of an individual as organisations cannot run for president.
And so legal eagles in the campaign team asked if I, as campaign manager, would offer my kennitala as proxy—understanding that I personally do not want to be president. They recommended it would be better if the candidate’s name included Snæfellsjökull so it’s clearly linked to the kennitala in the nomination form.
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As a naturalised Icelandic citizen, I have long desired to mark my identity with an Icelandic name. My long-running relationship with Snæfellsjökull has led me to request that I belong to the glacier through this name change. When I went through cancer treatment eleven years ago, Snæfellsjökull was a primary non-human caregiver in this country. I would go to the glacier for rest, for recovery, for energy.
During a soundwalk in Snæfellsjökull’s lava field in May 2012, I followed the excitations of ravens to the corpse of an arctic fox. Tufts of fox fur, half still winter-white, littered the lava near Svalþúfa. I collected tufts of fur that had blown from the fox’s body into the surrounding rock and crowberry bushes. Then, in June, I returned to Svalþúfa with French visitors. The fox lay, decomposing and bird-cleaned, along the tourist trail. So I did what any wisewoman would do: I hid the fox in a small lava enclave, close to where she’d passed but out of sight from the tourist footpath bound to increase with summer traffic.
The practice of returning to Snæfellsjökull was ritual. In February 2013, I returned to cut my hair in anticipation of losing it during chemotherapy. I removed my winter coat, lopapeysa, long underwear, and surgical bra for the ritual. The fox and I faced each other. Power lines cut through landscape. Tourist paths cut through the lava field. Scissors cut through my hair. Fresh scars cut across my torso. Sunset cleaved the glacier in two. After the braid fell free, I tucked it into the small hole in the moss bed behind the half-decomposed foxhead. Exchange, gift. Left for safekeeping. Left for the benefit of another’s nest.
The significance of this private moment resonated not only with the ecosystem I impacted, but also engaged the cultural lore affiliated with the glacier-covered volcano. Snæfellsjökull was renowned as a healing centre, a meeting place for aliens, and bisected by a major ley line. The glacier had spawned much national literature from the sagas to Nobel laureate Halldór Laxness’ Kristnihald undir jökli, while Jules Verne’s Journey to the Centre of the Earth gave the place additional international intrigue. Even though a private act, my story formed within a web of narratives about Snæfellsjökull.
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Snæfellsjökull taught me how to listen to ecosystems actively transforming through climate change. I practice this listening in my profession as an arts educator and artist, and in my daily life. This year, the book Angela’s Glacier was published by Jordan Scott. This fictionalised story is about a girl who grows up listening to Snæfellsjökull.
Rather than the glacier “belonging” to me, I honour my long-standing relationship with the glacier by being Snæfellsjökull’s Angela. On February 29th this year, the Naming Committee approved Snæfellsjökuls as a legal middle name. On March 14th, my name change was approved. March 15th, we launched a campaign to nominate Snæfellsjökull as next president of Iceland.