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Examining Ethnic Exhibition: The Success of Scandinavian-Language Films at Chicago’s Julian Theater in the 1930s
- Film History: An International Journal
- Indiana University Press
- Volume 25, Number 3, 2013
- pp. 90-125
- 10.2979/filmhistory.25.3.90
- Article
- Additional Information
Throughout the 1930s, Chicago’s Julian Theater screened exclusively Scandinavian-language films to an audience of culturally active Swedish Americans. The theater thrived until World War II, when trade instability and political turmoil irrevocably altered the relationship between Swedish Americans and their native culture. This article examines the confluence of historical forces that allowed the Julian to thrive, including the strong organizational practices of Chicago’s sizeable Swedish population; the existence of a Scandinavian film distribution system in the United States; Sweden’s production of nationalistic, populist films that appealed to working-class diasporic Swedes; and the robust advertising of Scandinavian films in the Chicago Daily Tribune .
Throughout the 1930s, Chicago’s Julian Theater screened exclusively Scandinavian-language films to an audience of culturally active Swedish Americans. The theater thrived until World War II, when trade instability and political turmoil irrevocably altered the relationship between Swedish Americans and their native culture. This article examines the confluence of historical forces that allowed the Julian to thrive, including the strong organizational practices of Chicago’s sizeable Swedish population; the existence of a Scandinavian film distribution system in the United States; Sweden’s production of nationalistic, populist films that appealed to working-class diasporic Swedes; and the robust advertising of Scandinavian films in the Chicago Daily Tribune.
