United Nations Emergency Force : Svenska fredsbevarande soldaters syn på Orienten och dess folk under 1950- och 60-talet

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this essay is to explore how the average Swedish United Nations Peacekeeper viewed the local population in 1950/60s Egypt during their six-month service in the United Nations Emergency Force. The accounts of five Swedish soldiers will be analyzed. The soldiers in question are Einar Sparrstedt, Olle Brennius, Nils Sköld and Jan Holmlund. They all wrote and published books about their experiences. Bertil “Buster” Reuterswärd’s account is given as well, in an interview published in a book written by Sven-Olov Johansson, who served in the same battalion. Åke Holmberg’s descriptions of Swedish attitudes towards the Middle East as well as Edward Said’s concepts of exoticism and positional superiority are used to approach the source material. The essay arrived at the conclusion that the Swedes generally looked upon the locals with a mixture of curiosity, fascination, sympathy and superiority.