Programme

Keynote lecture

Professor Kate Fisher (University of Exeter): "I couldn’t find myself in history. No one like me seemed to have ever existed." Who needs the History of Sexuality?

See professor Fisher's introduction and lecture abstract.

Chair: Senior Research Fellow Satu Lidman (Tampere University)

Parallel session 1: Methods and sources to cover silences and rumors

Chair: Hannah Yoken

• Tuula Juvonen: Rainbow Dictionary: Accessing queer history through digitized newspapers
• (CANCELLED: Kirsti Salmi-Niklander: Loud silences - studying the controversial life of Kasperi Tanttu (1886-1918))
• Rebeka Põldsam: From myths about homosexuality in Soviet Estonia to historical narrative

Parallel session 2: Gender diversity and trans histories

Chair: Jan Wikman

• Amy Jefford Franks: Double the Burial, Double the Queer: Two Queer Interpretations for the Inhumatio
• Signe Bremer Gagnesjö: In search of community: How the Swedish pornmagazines Raff, Paff and Piff served as trans friendly sites of hope during the 1960ties
• Elizabete Elīna Vizgunova-Vikmane: Perception of trans persons in contemporary Latvia: public opinion survey results

Parallel session 3: Sexual health and authority

Chair: Kaarel Piirimäe

• Miina Keski-Petäjä & Matleena Frisk: The shift to modern contraceptive attitudes and recognition of premarital birth control needs in Finland from the 1950s to 1970s
• Jens Rydström & Lena Lennerhed: When the state won’t do: Self-help groups in the Swedish AIDS epidemic 1982-2000
• Anna Ratecka & Justyna Struzik: The Politics of condoms. Doing HIV/AIDS and sex work activism in post-state socialism

Parallel session 4: Lesbianism, female homosexualities and women’s same-sex affections

Chair: Joonas Säntti

• (CANCELLED: Lene Laitinen: Same-sex affections in Toini Topelius’ novel for girls in the late 19th century)
• Tone Hellesund: The longing for home
• Runar Jordåen: “A case of homosexuality in a woman.” Female same sex desire in rural Norway

Keynote panel discussion: The histories of homosexualities in the Nordic and Baltic countries

Chair: Senior Lecturer Tuula Juvonen (Tampere University)

Panelists

• Associate Professor Andrés Brink Pinto (Lund University)
• Professor Tone Hellesund (University of Bergen)
• (CANCELLED Associate Professor Uku Lember (Tallinn University))

• Senior Researcher In­eta Lipša (University of Latvia)

See speakers' introductions.

Parallel session 5: Sexual desires, sexual knowledges

Chair: Leena-Maija Rossi

• Rune Hjarnø Rasmussen: Queer Ritual Play among Vikings and Afro-Brazilians
• Jenny Sundén: The pull of the recent past: Tracing sexual deviance in Swedish online kink
• Laura Saarenmaa & Susanna Paasonen: Short-lived Play: Trans-European Travels in Sex Edutainment
• Kitti Suoranta: Hidden Intimacies: Traces of Queer in the Social Networks of Older Finnish Men

Parallel session 6: Sexuality, body, and activism

Chair: Rebeka Põldsam

• Varpu Alasuutari: Navigating the Affective Landscapes of Christian Queer Activism in Finland
• Hannah Yoken: Locating Nordic Lesbian Feminism: The Femø Women’s Summer Camps
• Elisabeth Lund Engebretsen: Invisible women in ‘women-friendly’ Norway: The Lesbian Bus Campaign, 1988
• Anna Puhakka: Turning to queer possibilities: A reparative reading of Finnish body positivity

Keynote lecture

Postdoctoral Researcher Julian Honkasalo (University of Helsinki): Desiring gender: care as a radical political concept in 1960s Nordic trans activism

See Dr Honkasalo's introduction and lecture abstract.

Chair: Associate Professor Johanna Rainio-Niemi (University of Helsinki)

13.45 (UTC+3)

Parallel session 7: Negotiating sexual pasts in the present

Chair: Riikka Taavetti

• Heidi Henriikka Mäkelä: The Sex-Related Kalevala-Metric Poetry in the Finnish Media in the 21st century
• Kate Sotejeff-Wilson: Erikoissuomalaiset*: narrating queer history with new Finns
• Satu Lidman: Rooting out harmful attitudes and violence: a training for school professionals

Parallel session 8: From sexual outlaws to model citizens: The intersections of queer sexualities and nationalism at the margins of the Nordics

Chair: Elsi Hyttinen

• (CANCELLED: Ásta Kristín Benediktsdóttir: The Gay Capital of Iceland: ‘Sexual refugees’ in Copenhagen and Danish influence on early identity politics)
• Hafdís Erla Hafsteinsdóttir: Recovering the HIV/AIDS crisis in Iceland in post-AIDS times: Stories of pink sheep, A-bombs, (in)gratitude and more
• Íris Ellenberger: The construction of the gay consumer in Icelandic magazines 1990–2010

Parallel session 9: Round table: Queer(y)ing kinship in the Baltic region: A retrospective on Conversations, contestations, collaborations

With perspectives from and on Poland, Sweden, and Estonia, the panel presents key findings from the project, and offers shared reflections on what has been learned through this collaboration, with the particular focus on (geo)temporality.

Round table discussion participants

• Ulrika Dahl
• Joanna Mizielińska
• Raili Uibo

Parallel session 10: Sexuality and identity in arts and media

Chair: Una Bergmane

• Susanna Paasonen, Mari Pajala, Laura Saarenmaa: Monsieur Mosse: camp, shameless, othered
• Kari O. Silvola: Darkroom; development of portraits of a hockey player, dancer, photo model, and Tom of Finland in a writing laboratory and the predictions of a face recognition algorithm in constructing, representing, and concealing masculinity; A sensitive poetic inquiry utilizing digital data.
• Janis Ozolins & Karlis Verdins: "Men on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown": Embodied Affects of Atis Jākobsons