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What did it mean to be Swedish in the United States during the age of mass migration? This thesis addresses that question by examining both form and content in the two largest Swedish-language newspapers in Chicago—Hemlandet and Svenska Amerikanaren—between 1860 and 1920, exploring how “Swedishness” was constructed and negotiated. Using discourse analysis, the study investigates a variety of sources, including newspapers, letterbooks, and works published in both the United States and Sweden.

Drawing on theories of discursive boundary-making, interpellation, and intersectionality, the Swedish-American press is situated within the context of a changing newspaper economy and political landscape in the United States. The thesis argues that these newspapers functioned as ideological apparatuses, articulating Swedishness not only as a cultural or ethnic identity but also through notions of inheritability and race.

This process unfolded across different spheres of social and economic life. It examines Swedes in the Chicago labor market, the evolving newspaper economy, the development of women’s pages, newspaper advertisements, and transatlantic discussions of what it meant to be Swedish American. In these accounts, Swedish male workers were portrayed as “white” farmers and “good” immigrants in contrast to racialized Irish Catholic and Southern or Eastern European “bad” immigrants. Gender also played a crucial role: discussions of Swedish-American female workers—as maidservants or factory workers—revealed how gender and class intersected in shaping the immigrant experience. In the newspapers’ women’s sections and advertising discourse, Swedish-American women were depicted as domestic, middle-class consumers aspiring toward Anglo-American ideals. The newspapers thus Americanized, gendered, and racialized their readers.

The thesis contributes to the history of Swedish immigrants in the United States by showing how the meaning of being Swedish continually drew on notions of race. It also contributes to the history of the Swedish-American press by demonstrating how changes in the newspaper economy shaped both form and content. In doing so, it broadens our understanding of how European immigrants actively reproduced and utilized US ethnoracial hierarchies.