"No state lines existed when New Sweden attained its full size, and Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania became separate colonies..."--Introd. New Sweden lasted from 1638-1655.

"Although it was the first permanent European settlement in the Delaware River valley, the New Sweden colony has long been ignored by American colonial historians. To right this omission, and to mark the 350th anniversary of the founding of the New Sweden colony, the University of Delaware sponsored an international conference, "New Sweden in America: Scandinavian Pioneers and Their Legacy" in March of 1988. This event brought together twenty-eight scholars from Sweden, Finland, and the United States who represented several fields, including history, anthropology, and geography. The conference papers, collected in New Sweden in America, present the first look at the New Sweden colony since the advent of modern historical methods." "The essays in this volume examine the economic and social lives of a political entity, as well as its political structures. The topics discussed include an examination of the European environment from which the colonial venture came, the colonists' relations with the Native Americans, and the Swedish and Finnish settlers' adaptation to colonial life. The essays depict seventeenth-century Sweden as it emerged from its traditional ways and isolation into the dynamic world of Western European international politics and trade, and the failed attempts to bring European mercantilist policies to New Sweden." "The fascinating stories of the trade between the Swedish and Dutch settlers and the Susquehannock and Lenni Lenape Indians, the development of pidgin languages to facilitate the trade, the devout Lutheran religious observations of the colonists, and the introduction of Finnish construction methods (especially the log cabin) are all described in this volume. To encourage further scholarship in this field, the contributors identify topics for future study and delineate where original colonial documents may be found on both sides of the Atlantic."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

This book "is based upon the 1693 census of the Swedes on the Delaware, a census taken to document the colonists' argument to Swedish authorities that there remained a sizable group of Swedes in America who were worthy of help in the form of new pastors for their churches and new religious books in the Swedish language" -- Intro.

Reframing Swedish–American relations by focusing on contacts, crossings, and convergences beyond migration Studies of Swedish American history and identity have largely been confined to separate disciplines, such as history, literature, or politics. In Swedish–American Borderlands, this collection edited by Dag Blanck and Adam Hjorthén seeks to reconceptualize and redefine the field of Swedish–American relations by reviewing more complex cultural, social, and economic exchanges and interactions that take a broader approach to the international relationship—ultimately offering an alternative way of studying the history of transatlantic relations. Swedish–American Borderlands studies connections and contacts between Sweden and the United States from the seventeenth century to today, exploring how movements of people have informed the circulation of knowledge and ideas between the two countries. The volume brings together scholars from a wide range of disciplines within the humanities and social sciences to investigate multiple transcultural exchanges between Sweden and the United States. Rather than concentrating on one-way processes or specific national contexts, Swedish–American Borderlands adopts the concept of borderlands to examine contacts, crossings, and convergences between the nations, featuring specific case studies of topics like jazz, architecture, design, genealogy, and more. By placing interactions, entanglements, and cross-border relations at the center of the analysis, Swedish–American Borderlands seeks to bridge disciplinary divides, joining a diverse set of scholars and scholarship in writing an innovative history of Swedish–American relations to produce new understandings of what we perceive as Swedish, American, and Swedish American. Contributors: Philip J. Anderson, North Park U; Jennifer Eastman Attebery, Idaho State U; Marie Bennedahl, Linnaeus U; Ulf Jonas Björk, Indiana U–Indianapolis; Thomas J. Brown, U of South Carolina; Margaret E. Farrar, John Carroll U; Charlotta Forss, Stockholm U; Gunlög Fur, Linnaeus U; Karen V. Hansen, Brandeis U; Angela Hoffman, Uppsala U; Adam Kaul, Augustana College; Maaret Koskinen, Stockholm U; Merja Kytö, Uppsala U; Svea Larson, U of Wisconsin–Madison; Franco Minganti, U of Bologna; Frida Rosenberg, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm; Magnus Ullén, Stockholm U.

The first book-length study of Swedish-Indian encounters in the New Sweden colony on the Delaware River focuses on land, trade and culture from the founding in 1638 until the 1680s, and compares these relations with Swedish interaction with Saami people.