Eva Pinéus, Asta Ekenvall och Rosa Malmström

Their aims were to rescue material from the early women’s movement, to make it easier to find literature about and by women, and to facilitate the publication of women researchers. For these purposes manuscripts and other material were gathered from associations and individual women, literature was collected and indexed, and the publication series “Kvinnohistoriskt arkiv” was launched. They got access to premises of the Gothenburg University Library; however, their work was largely non-profit and funded by a foundation. The collections became part of the Gothenburg University Library in 1971, and the name was changed to Kvinnohistoriska samlingarna (Women’s History Collections]. Proposals to the parliament and the pressure from various women’s organizations resulted in a half-time appointment as Librarian. The activity has developed considerably since then and, in 1977, the Women’s History Collections became a national resource library for women’s, men’s and gender studies. In 2010, the library’s name changed to KvinnSam - Nationellt bibliotek för genusforskning (KvinnSam - National Resource Library for Gender Studies).

Women's studies

In the 1970s, researchers started to cooperate with different parts of the women’s movement in a new way. As for Sweden, Forum för kvinnliga forskare och kvinnoforskning was established in Lund. Corresponding associations were formed in Uppsala, Gothenburg and Stockholm in 1978. In the early years of the 1980s, associations in Linköping, Luleå and Umeå were added. Initially, women’s studies were pursued at existing university departments, especially within sociology, history, and comparative literature. In 1984, the University of Gothenburg was the first to establish a department of women’s studies, and Gothenburg was also the first to hold a chair in women’s history. Gunhild Kyle was appointed the first professor in women’s history. There are at present departments of gender studies at all universities and at several university colleges.

In 1980, the journal “Kvinnovetenskaplig tidskrift” that in 2007 became “Genusvetenskaplig tidskrift”, was founded by a group of researchers in women’s studies in Lund. Ever since then the journal has been the central organ of women’s research in Sweden and in other Nordic countries. Other important journals have been added, e.g. “NORA: Nordic journal of women’s studies” and “Norma: nordisk tidsskrift for maskulinitetsstudier”. “Gråt inte, forska!” (approximate translation: Do not cry, do research!) was the title of a collection of women’s studies published by one of the pioneers in women’s studies, the literary historian Karin Westman Berg. The book, published in 1979 and a great success, addressed questions like: “What does women’s right signify?”, “What is feminist theology?”, and “In what way is language an instrument of women’s oppression?”