Folk Dancers Cross-Dressed: Performing Gender in the Early Nordic Folk Dance Movement

This article examines the activities of and reception to Philochoros, the first Nordic folk dance association, established in 1880 at Uppsala University in Sweden. For several decades this association had only male members, although most of their performances were partner dances meant for male-female couples. During performances, half of the dancers dressed in female costumes and took on female roles. Philochoros’s performances were extremely popular in Sweden and even in other Nordic countries, and their dances became an essential part of the repertoire of Nordic folk dance groups for almost a hundred years. In this article, I analyze the role of cross-dressing and the construction of gender in discourses related to the activities of Philochoros between the years 1880 and 1910 that appear in newspaper articles, private letters, and other archival documents.