Sweden Social Life and Customs

Effective family research requires some understanding of the society in which your ancestor lived. Learning about everyday life, religious practices, customs, and traditions will help you appreciate your ancestor and the time he or she lived in. This information is particularly helpful if you choose to write a family history.

Research procedures and genealogical sources are different for each area and time period and are affected by the local customs and traditions. Those that might affect your research strategies include mortality rate, life spans, apprenticeship customs, and courting and marriage customs that affected the birth rates.

The Family History Library has a few sources about Swedish social life and customs. They are listed in the catalog under:

SWEDEN - SOCIAL LIFE AND CUSTOMS

SWEDEN, [COUNTY] - SOCIAL LIFE AND CUSTOMS

A good book describing many aspects of Swedish social life and customs is: Lorenzen, Lilly. Of Swedish Ways. Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA: Dillon Press, Inc., 1981. (FHL book 948.5 H6lo.)

Swedish periodicals are a particularly good source of information about social life and customs. See the "Periodicals" section of this outline.