”At tala så det hela wärlden det må höra”: Hur Anna Margareta Momma använde tidskriften "Samtal emellan Argi Skugga och en obekant Fruentimbers Skugga Nyligen ankommen til de Dödas Rjke" (1738–1739) för att möjliggöra politisk agens i frihetstidens Sverige

Abstract

The epoch name of Sweden’s Age of Liberty seems quite euphemistic in our modern society, especially regarding women’s position. During the Eighteenth century, Swedish society was regulated by the Lutheran estate doctrine and the four-estate society, which excluded women from the formal political contexts. The previous research has therefore assumed – since they have only examined historical source material, such as records of the Parliament – that it was impossible for women to have political agency. However, the revolutionary changes in the state and politics during the Age of Liberty resulted in an explosive publishing of journals. One genre that became prominent in this development was the essay press, which essentially dealt with political, religious, philosophical and moral issues and paved the way for a greater majority to express themselves on various issues. During this period, Anna Margareta Momma wrote the journal "Samtal emellan Argi Skugga och en obekant Fruentimbers Skugga Nyligen ankommen til de Dödas Rjke" (1738–1739), which testifies to a discrepancy between the formal power on the one hand and women’s possibility of informal political participation on the other. This study aims to examine how the essay press could be used for agency and to discuss political issues for someone who was excluded from the executive power. By combining a classic rhetorical analysis with theories about epoch-specific concepts such as citizen and publicity, the study shows that the essay press could function performatively and via literary and rhetorical devices create an alternative public and political space. The result of the study is thus that literary sources can show broader and alternative tendencies in terms of who could act as a citizen during the Eighteenth century and that it was possible for people who were excluded from the executive forms of power to have political agency.