Var är kvinnorna i litteraturhistorien?
En komparativ studie av hur kvinnliga författare framställs i två upplagor av Svenska Timmar ? litteraturen
This essay examines how female authors are described in the literary canon of two differenteditions of the Swedish education material on the history of literature: Svenska Timmar ?litteraturen. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether the depiction of femaleauthors has changed from the first edition (1991) to the last edition (2012), and how thesechanges correspond with the curriculums Lgy70 and Lgy11.The study is quantitative as well as qualitative. The quantitative part of the study showsthat the percentage of female authors has increased in the 2012 edition. A greater number offemale authors are also portrayed with pictures and headings. This increase is partly explainedby the new curriculum, Lgy11, which demands that female authors should be included in thehistory of literature. This was not the case with Lgy70. The qualitative part of the studycontains a feminist and gender analysis, examining how a ?gender system? produces andreproduces a dichotomy and hierarchy between the sexes, where the male is norm and thefemale deviates from this norm. This section shows that, despite the increased number offemale authors, their portrayal still differs from that of the male authors. For example, theliterary work of women is likely to be categorized as ?female literature?, which signals that itis not considered as general as the men?s work. This is, in my conclusion, a way to reproducethe gender system of the literary canon.