Singel Parents in Swedish Media
Illustration: Linnea Blixt
The project explores how the concept “lone parent” gains meaning in Sweden in the twenty-first century. With mediated representations of lone parents (parenthood, parenting) in news media, life writing, film, and television as its empirical basis, the project investigates and theorizes contemporary understandings of this familial phenomenon.
Details
- Period: 2020-01-01 – 2024-12-31
- Funder: Riksbankens jubileumsfond
About the project
Who are single parents, and how are they portrayed in newspapers, film, and other cultural texts? How is life in lone-parent families represented? What happens in the encounter between lone parents and social norms about families and parental couples?
Welcome to the project page for the research project Single parents in Swedish media: Representations of ”lone” parenthood 2010-2020. This project explores how the concept “lone parent” gains meaning in Sweden in the twenty-first century. With mediated representations of lone parents (parenthood, parenting) in news media, life writing, film, and television as its empirical basis, the project investigates and theorizes contemporary understandings of this familial phenomenon.
We are interested in exploring whose perspective and whose voice is centered. Is it those of mothers? Fathers? Or (grown) children? We are also interested in aspects of loneliness, ideas of "the other parent", and definitions of lone parenthood.
Who are lone parents?
Demographic, political, technological, and legal changes in the past two decades have effects on who is a lone parent in Sweden, and under what circumstances. Numbers of lone-parent families depend on, inter alia, social developments as diverse as migration, divorce/separation and re-constituted families, and developments in Assisted Reproductive Technologies.
Currently, twenty-five per cent of all children in Sweden have parents who do not live together. Hence, experiences of lone parenthood are widespread in contemporary Sweden. However, while the lone parent (especially the lone mother) is often seen as part of the “everyday” of family lives in Sweden, they also figure as a “special case” that counters family/couple norms, and in ways that are heavily linked to gender, class, ethnicity, and age.
Interdisciplinary studies yield new knowledge
The project contributes important new knowledge about how lone parents are conceptualized and represented, and how social realities of lone parents gain visibility in different genres in contemporary Sweden. As we move forward with the project we are also able to compare representations of lone parents across genres of text, and see which kinds of lone parent lives feature in them.
The project is interdisciplinary and explores lone parenthood via perspectives from cultural studies, social science, and gender studies.
The different parts of the project
Daily newspapers
Studies that explore representations of lone parents in daily newspapers.
Film, TV, literature
Studies that explore representations of lone parents in film, TV and literature.
Publications and conference papers
Lone, single or solo parent?
In the book Enförälderfamiljer: Om ensamstående föräldrar, singelföräldrar och soloföräldrar the many meanings and nuances, commonalities and uncommonalities, values and emotions inherent in the experiences of being a single parent are made visible. The book also explores depictions of single parents' family life in literature, film, and other media, from groundbreaking novels in the 1930s to complex film narratives and humorous comic book series in the 2000s.
Contributing authors:
Disa Bergnehr · Ulla Björnberg · Ann-Zofie Duvander · Margareta Fahlgren · Elina Nilsson · Josefin Olevik · Lars Plantin · Maria Sveland · Helena Wahlström Henriksson · Anna Williams
The book is published by Makadam förlag.
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Cover illustration: Linnea Blixt
Publications within the project
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena & Disa Bergnehr. (2021). “Reluctantly solo? Representations of single mothers via donor procedure, insemination and IVF in Swedish newspapers.” In Åström, Berit and Disa Bergnehr, Eds., Single parents: Representations and resistance in an international context. London/New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 215-234.
Bergnehr, Disa and Berit Åström. (2021). “Introduction.” In Åström, Berit. & Disa Bergnehr, (eds), Single parents: Representations and resistance in an international context. London/New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 1-28.
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena & Disa Bergnehr, Red. (2023). Enförälderfamiljer. Om ensamstående föräldrar, singelföräldrar och soloföräldrar. Stockholm: Makadam.
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena. (2023). ”Om enförälderfamiljer i Sverige. Levda erfarenheter och mediala skildringar”. I Wahlström Henriksson, Helena & Disa Bergnehr, Red. Enförälderfamiljer. Om ensamstående föräldrar, singelföräldrar och soloföräldrar. Stockholm: Makadam. 7-13.
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena. (2023). ”Att (inte) få bli ensamstående mamma. Amanda Kernells Charter”. I Wahlström Henriksson, Helena & Disa Bergnehr, Red. Enförälderfamiljer. Om ensamstående föräldrar, singelföräldrar och soloföräldrar. Stockholm: Makadam. 87-101.
Bergnehr, Disa. (2023). ”Ett delat eller ensamt föräldraskap? Ensamstående mammor och pappor och deras samarbete i svensk dagspress”. I Wahlström Henriksson, Helena & Disa Bergnehr, Red. Enförälderfamiljer. Om ensamstående föräldrar, singelföräldrar och soloföräldrar. Stockholm: Makadam. 117-128.
Bergnehr, Disa. (2023). ”Katja i Bonusfamiljen: ensamstående mamma, yrkeskvinna och (ex-)partner”. I Wahlström Henriksson, Helena & Disa Bergnehr, Red. Enförälderfamiljer. Om ensamstående föräldrar, singelföräldrar och soloföräldrar. Stockholm: Makadam. 153-164.
Conference papers
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena. “Birthing (as) a single mother in Ulf Malmros’ Min så kallade papa (2014): gendered responsibility and solitude.” Doing Women's Film & Television History conference Maynooth University, 9-10 July 2021.
Bergnehr, Disa. “Representations of single mothers and fathers, the non-residential parent, and co-parenting in daily news.” Sociologidagarna, Uppsala universitet, 16-18 March 2022.
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena. “Single fathers in Swedish Newspapers 2010-2020.” Sociologidagarna, Uppsala universitet, 16-18 March 2022.
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena. “Lone Motherhood in a Life Course Perspective: Peter Handberg’s Den vita fläcken” IABA (International Auto/Biography Association), Turku June 2022.
Bergnehr, Disa. “Single motherhood and co-parenting in the Swedish series Bonus Family.” Motherhoods on screen: global perspectives. Maynooth University, 23-24 September, Ireland.
Wahlström Henriksson, Helena. Participant in a Panel Discussion on “Single Moms in Contemporary European Cinema” Motherhoods on screen: global perspectives Maynooth University, 23-24 September, Ireland.