Våra förfäder var hedningar : Nordisk forntid som myt i den svenska folkskolans pedagogiska texter fram till år 1919

Narratives of Nordic pre-history are common in textbooks of the Swedish 'folk school'. This thesis discusses them from an ideological critical perspective and analyses them as textbook myths. This analytic concept of myth is constructed and used as a tool for studying ideological expressions in pedagogical texts. It is compatible with a historical materialist, social constructivist and Gramsci inspired perspective towards folk schooling and can handle questions of selection and re-organisation of ancient narrative material. The study shows how a paternalistic ethnic ideology which showed the pupils how their ancestors immigrated and set up society and order is replaced by nationalistic myths where the Swedes are projected on the totality of the past. Idealisation of farmers and expressions that neutralise poverty and legitimates subordination are used continuously throughout the study period. After 1868 a national folk concept is established. Textbook myths with a euhemeristic portrayal of civilisation are replaced by other scientific ways of handling pre-historic religions including elements from nature mythology and evolutionary theory. The myths handle religions both through Christian polemics and theological projections. The results of the analyses are interpreted in the light of the contemporary socio-economic changes where a feudal agrarian society's principles for classifications and hierarchies are challenged and broken by the principles of a class society with a nationalistic ideology. In the concluding chapters the myths are discussed and interpreted in relation to curriculum codes and in a Gramsci inspired perspective as expressions of a passive bourgeois revolution, where intellectuals of the middle class conquered the school and the textbook myths by making alliances with the farming class and trying to neutralise the poor and the working class. The thesis contributes to research in the use of history, representation in pedagogical texts and to research in nationalism