Handel och vandel : vardagslivets sociala struktur ur ett kvinnoperspektiv : Helsingborg ca 1680–1709

This dissertation deals with the social structure of ordinary life in an early modern Swedish town as seen from the perspective of women. The questions which are dealt with are: What kinds of social relations, in addition to those inside the family, were women in an early modern town involved in? How did these differ from the relations men were involved in and how did they differ with regards to the woman's social standing? To what extent did a woman's social relations change as a result of her civil status? What other factors could influence a woman's standing in the network of social relations upon which she was dependent, or influence the kind of network she tried to build? The focus of this study is centred on women from the craftsman guild as well as those located lower on the social scale. In order to discover both the differences related to social status as well as the differences related to gender, I have also included women from the upper classes in the analysis. With court records and church records as main sources, a quantitative network analysis has been applied to examine the participation of men and women from different classes in three different kinds of relations: the ritualised social ties between parents and godparents, economic ties such as trade and credit, and finally, conflict-filled relations as reflected by violent actions and defamation of character. The way that these different kinds of relations were connected to each other has also been taken into consideration. Through a more qualitative analysis of the social networks of a few individuals, it has been possible to shed some light on the function of the networks and how they changed over time. The meaning of honour from a gender perspective and women's social roles is also analysed