In the early 20thcentury, homosexual acts were illegal in Sweden. During this time, “homosexuality” did not exist as a concept. Instead, the Swedish law referred to homosexual acts as “unnatural fornication”. In 1907 a man named Nils Santesson was arrested and sentenced for committing unnatural fornication with another man. The case was brought to the attention of the press, which for the first time began to use the term “homosexual” in headings and articles. The purpose of this study has been to analyse how homosexuality was considered and defined in Sweden during the early 20thcentury, by studying the reporting of Nils Santesson’s court case and his self-image. The analysis is based on the categories: crime, illness and morality, and to achieve the purpose of the study, a qualitative text analysis has been implemented as a method. Also, the study was based on the theory of a masculinity hierarchy that subordinated homosexuals, and one version of queer theory. The result shows that homosexuality was considered as an act rather than an integral part of someone’s character or identity. The society regarded homosexuality as obnoxious, indecent and unnatural, which was a direct consequence of the Swedish criminal law 18 § 10. Homosexuals were portrayed as sickening from three aspects: as a morbidly deviant phenomenon from heterosexuality, as contribution to mental illness and as carriers of sexually transmitted diseases. Morally, homosexuals were considered sexually licentious and constantly in search of seduction. Heterosexuality was upheld as a dominant system which placed homosexual men in a masculine subordination as homosexuality was regarded as a criminal act, immoral and were associated with disease.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hj-44683 |
| Date | January 2019 |
| Creators | Lindkvist, Rebecca |
| Publisher | Högskolan i Jönköping |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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