Eighty Years of Finnish School: Reflections from the Oral Histories of a Finnish Family Association

Authors

• Niina Koskihaara Turun yliopisto
• Maija Mäki Turun yliopisto
• Eija Schwartz Turun yliopisto

Keywords:

oral history, family association, school culture

Abstract

This article looks at the transformations of Finnish school culture over the past 80 years by examining the childhood and youth memories of members of a Finnish family association. The oral-history material, created by individual and group interviews, provides important school memories in detail and at the same time shows the everyday phenomena of school culture in a larger context. School culture was reflected, for example, in terms of school friends, routes to school, and daily rituals and annual festivities at school. The strict school discipline of past decades was also brought up. In general, the research material depicts school through nostalgic memories, in the ideals of diligence and discipline, and by underlining the pupil’s role as an active subject.