Världens skuldbörda, den betydelselösa kvinnan : Ett känslohistoriskt perspektiv på LKPR:s retoriska drag

Sammanfattning: This essay aims to study the Swedish suffrage movement, LKPR from an emotional historical perspective. How did the activists in the early 1900s relate to emotions, in a time in which women were described as “too emotional” to participate on the public stage? What do the emotions that got expressed actually mean and how could this affect the practical actions of the organisation? Do the activists share an emotional language, simply because they share the same restrictions and goals in life? The study will be formed as a discourse analysis, which will show us the importance of understanding that language and practical actions are interrelated. In time, we will see how the Swedish organisation actually used quite an aggressive rhetorical language, which differs from their practical actions. They used words such as unworthy, threatening, guiltand shame, belligerent, etc. And I came to realize just how willing and well the organisation and the actors within this compound actually adapted their language and the emotions that they described depending on the social, religious and political context that they found themselves to be in. The LKPR:s own journal very rarely held back emotions in any way, while actors within the organization that also wrote in other journals adapted to the preconceptions that could be found within those surroundings and readers. And based on this fact, the language of the LKPR:s actors and journal differs quite a lot from other common newspapers that were published at the same time and that discussed the same kind of issues. I would not hesitate tosay that the language of the LKPR actually does remind quite a lot about the english suffragettś rethorics, and therefore, I will argue, that further studies would gain from studying the relationship between the swedish activists and the english suffragettes, how this relationship affected the language and emotions and the practical actions.