This article focuses on archival collections relating to so-called “tattare” and “zigenare” (roughly translated as “tinkers” and “gypsies”) created by Swedish folklore scholars during the twentieth century, and how these scholars influenced politics and interventions regarding these categories. It addresses questions regarding the production of knowledge about these categories and the contexts, structures and actors that have created the basis for these kinds of collections. Special focus has been placed on works by the folklore scholars Carl-Martin Bergstrand and Carl-Herman Tillhagen, and collections at the Institute for Language and Folklore, Department of Dialectology, Onomastics and Folklore Research and the Nordic Museum. By unfolding the networks of Bergstrand and Tillhagen and following the traces of their work to other archives, the article highlights some of the political and monitoring dimensions of archival practices in relation to minority groups in Sweden.

This article examines an audio recording with a Roma family made by the collector Arvid Andersson in Sweden, in the early 1950s. The aim of this article is to unfold this jointly constructed conversation between the collector and the Roma family members. The analysis of the conversation shows a delicate interplay between the Roma family and the interviewer, and we especially stress the agency of the family in the process of negotiating belonging, challenging a discourse about the Roma as a passive group merely subjected to discrimination and stereotyping. The foreignness of the Roma was continuously stressed, while the Roma opposed being positioned as foreigners and tried to clarify that they did belong in Sweden and contributed to society. 

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There are many Viking Age weights in Scandinavia, and not least in Swedcn. A few of the sphrrical weights with flat poles, which were used for weighing silver in trading situations, display so-called pseudo-Arabic inscriptions, i.e. writing which resembles Arabic but which is mostly illegible. Why did some people put Arabic-like writing on their weights, and what did they hope to achieve by this? These questions are discussed together with positive aspects of trade, interaction and encounters with foreigners, visual aspects of weights and weighing, as well as personal choices in the presentation of self-image.

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