Swedish dialect dictionary

The project of publishing a Swedish dialect dictionary which has been
going on for 50 years now has been abandoned after the Swedish
government refused to continue funding it. This might have been an
isolated case; unfortunately there emerges a pattern: the national
antiquities department has been moved away from Stockholm to the
island of Gotland; the Historiska museet has closed its exhibition of
finds of the migration period ('Who wants to compare one arrowhead
with another arrowhead'?, the director said on national TV), instead
they have created a position for a modern arts consultant and
periodically stage contemporary art exhibitions, the installation of
one of which riled the Israeli ambassador. One gets the suspicion
there are plans afoot to abolish parts of Swedish history, given the
stated policy of downplaying the Swedishness of Sweden.


Torsten