Kategoria BISAC: History >> Europe - Nordic Countries

The third volume of From American to Norway is the final book of collected letters written by Norwegian American immigrants from the years 1893 to 1914. During this time many Norwegians had left their homeland, traveled to America, and settled in the Midwest. The intended audience for letters home gradually transitioned from the expectation that letters were to be shared and published in local Norwegian communities to their recognition as a private form of communication.

The challenges and opportunities that immigrants faced are described in these letters. The funny, sad,...

During the Cold War, Sweden actively cultivated a reputation as the "conscience of the world," working to build bridges between East and West and embracing a nominal commitment to international solidarity. This groundbreaking study explores the tension between realism and idealism in Swedish diplomacy during a key episode in Cold War history: the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, culminating in the 1975 Helsinki Accords. Through careful analysis of new evidence, it offers a compelling counternarrative of this period, showing that Sweden strategically ignored human rights...

Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden today all enjoy a reputation for strong labour movements, which in turn are widely seen as part of a distinctive regional approach to politics, collective bargaining and welfare. But as this volume demonstrates, narratives of the so-called "Nordic model" can obscure the fact that experiences of work and the fortunes of organized labour have varied widely throughout the region and across different historical periods. Together, the essays collected here represent an ambitious intervention in labour historiography and European history, exploring...

What were the ideas about conflicts and conflict resolutions in the Nordic countries during the Vendel Period and the Viking Age? What role did i.e. gender and power hierarchies play in the conflicts?

All of the contributing texts are, in one way or another, related to the theme 'war and peace'. They present new interpretations of some of the Old Scandinavian texts as well as of archaeological material: the runic inscription on the Eggja stone (Andreas Nordberg), texts about the fight between the god Thor and the giant Hrungnir (Tommy Kuusela), about the valkyries (Britt-Mari...

"To a faithful friend, straight are the roads and short."--Odin, from the Havamal (c. 1000)

Friendship was the most important social bond in Iceland and Norway during the Viking Age and the early Middle Ages. Far more significantly than kinship ties, it defined relations between chieftains, and between chieftains and householders. In Viking Friendship, Jon Vidar Sigurdsson explores the various ways in which friendship tied Icelandic and Norwegian societies together, its role in power struggles and ending conflicts, and how it shaped religious beliefs and...