Invited Talk

Swedish Identity and the Literary Imaginary

In the mid-2000s, a new kind of Swedish literature began to emerge.  Written by authors of immigrant heritage who were either born in the country, or who had lived most of their life in it, this poetry, fiction and drama of the "second generation" pushed the boundaries of literary language and national belonging. Works by authors such as Jonas Khemiri, Johannes Anyuru, Marjaneh Bakhtiari and Alejandro Leiva Wenger carved out fictive space for speculative forms of identity against a background of assumed homogeneity. This talk touches on points of commonality and difference between their authorships, and considers as well the ways that their writing differed from their figurative parents (first-generation authors such as Theodore Kallifatides).

This talk was given as a part of Managing Multicultural Scandinavia at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.