Klädekonomi och klädkultur : Böndernas kläder i Härjedalen under 1800-talet

Sammanfattning: The aim of Clothing economy and clothing culture is to explain the changes that occurred in farmers' clothing traditions in the 19th century, both from a cultural perspective and an economic one. The latter is particularly important, as the study of popular clothing traditions mainly has had a cultural approach and especially been carried out by ethnologists. In order to shift focus from clothing traditions to clothing economy, garments have been regarded in the present study primarily as goods and property, which include both economic and cultural values. Thus, the investigation positions itself in the research field of the history of consumption, whereas previous research in ethnology primarily has offered an object-based perspective. The purpose has been to investigate how the clothing owned by the peasants and the peasants’ consumption of clothing both express and, at the same time, constitute a central part of the transformation process that the Swedish society experienced during the course of the 19th century. The study is based on a careful use of information found in probate inventories regarding the clothes owned by the individual and the financial circumstances of the household. The social status of the individual and the financial circumstances of the household has been analysed in relation to local conditions regarding consumption and societal development at the time. In order to analyse people’s varying abilities to obtain and uphold a wardrobe, the study also includes a gender and life-cycle perspective. All things considered, the thesis contributes with important new knowledge on how peasants’ wardrobes and their consumption of clothing both expressed and constituted a central part of societal change in the 19th century, where the closely examined details in the individual case of Lillhärdal, situated in the southern Härjedalen, are connected to a broader development process.