I vetenskapandets vardagsrum

Representationer av genusforskning och genusvetenskap i KVT/TGV 1980–2017

Abstract

Academic articles and thereby journals have become more and more important in the everyday life of Academia. Even though the contents of an academic journal depend on numerous factors, an analysis of the archive of a journal can tell us something important about a research field, and/or a discipline. This article analyzes how gender research and “gender studies” [genusvetenskap] is represented in and by a central scholarly journal in the Nordic region: Kvinnovetenskaplig tidskrift (KVT, 1980–2006), later Tidskrift för genusvetenskap (TGV, 2007–). By drawing on theories of representation (Stuart Hall, Gayatri Spivak) the article investigates and analyzes what the almost 700 published articles are about and whom they represent in terms of disciplines and universities, but also how representation and place are related. Based on a content analysis and conversations with previous editors, the study demonstrates that the “what” of representation in KVT/TGV depends largely on the “where” and the “who”. While not unique to gender studies these are material aspects of scholarship that needs to be further acknowledged. Findings also include some important shifts and continuities. The representation in KVT/TGV are increasingly focused on Sweden, on the academy as such, and on gender studies as a discipline (genusvetenskap), while the presence of “women” “sex” [kön] and “feminism” remain strong throughout the period.