A diaspora on the edge of modernity? The Jewish minority in Gothenburg in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries

History is often written with the nation as an implicit framework, a notion that life and action take place in the closed, defined spaces of national borders (Beck 1998, 38). In recent years, however, approaches from cultural and global history, as well as postcolonial theory, have challenged this view. One way of broadening the focus is to engage in topics such as migration, relational studies and comparisons between different local societies. In this context, diaspora studies have emerged as a vibrant research area, exploring the dispersion of populations and cultures across different geographical spheres or regions. Diaspora studies enable us to switch between detailed in-depth studies and the big picture.