Höra hemma : : familj och social förändring i svensk radioserieteater från 1930-talet till 1990-talet

Sammanfattning: Among the formats introduced in Swedish radio in the 1930s, the theatre series about contemporary family life has turned out an exceptional survivor. The first family series, ”Ingenjör Björck med familj” (1936-1943), was followed by 22 related series during the rest of the 20th century, each cultivating its own intimate and ritual based bond with the listeners. The dissertation ”Höra hemma. Familj och social förändring i svensk radioserieteater från 1930-talet till 1990-talet” rediscovers this chain of family series broadcasted by the Swedish national radio, taking into special account the joint action of the genre’s aesthetical formation and the changing representations of family life in its expression. The series are analyzed in chronological order as cultural practices involving the authors of the series, the editiorial staff and production teams of the Radio institution, the contemporary radio listeners and – not of least importance – the fictive characters of the series. In other words the performance of a (fictional) history of the family in late modernity is outlined. It is observed that the radio families are depicted and perceived as active in the process of social change. Many of the series relate to journalistic aesthetics and pursue a social mission, such as raising the awareness of the housewife’s labour in the 1940s, or criticizing neoliberalistic individualism in the 1980s. In the late 1950s the series ”Hällebäcks gård” caused debate due to the depicted family repudiating current agricultural policy. Less socially engaged series – like those leaning on an aesthetic tradition from New Comedy or from confessional literature – still often contain grains of reflexion, necessary for reforms in the sphere of personal relations. The henpecked husband Lilla Fridolf, for instance, is analyzed as a forerunner of a revised masculinity, filling a need of its time in the mid-fifties. Generally the gender roles put forward in the family series depart from the cliché of woman-as-weak and man-as-active. Instead, most of the couples continue the comedic tradition of the sly and earthly woman and the lazy and unworldly man. In addition, this kind of series at large presents the domestic sphere as relevant and important for female and male listeners alike. The dissertation hence argues for a view on the family series as interesting from a feministic viewpoint.