Lori Lahlum, associate professor of history at Minnesota State University, Mankato, will present "It's America's fault! Masculinity, Manhood and Changing Gender Roles in Norwegian America, 1840-1920," on Friday, April 16, at 3 p.m. in the Memorial Union Room of Nations. The presentation is part of the NDSU Department of History, Philosophy and Religious Studies Colloquium.
Lahlum will talk about Oline Muus, a Norwegian immigrant and southern Minnesota native, who sued her husband, Pastor Bernt Julius Muus, in civil court in 1879 to acquire an inheritance she received a decade earlier. Bernt, one of the most prominent ministers in the Norwegian Synod of the Norwegian Lutheran Church in America, contended that because he wasn’t a U.S. citizen, Norwegian law applied to the case. Under Norwegian law in 1879, a husband controlled all of his wife’s property.
Lahlum also will address how shifting gender roles and expanded opportunities for women in the United States engendered new constructions of manhood, which threatened some men like Bernt. "As a result, in many ways, Norwegian immigrant men may have found it more difficult to navigate their new social and cultural terrain of America than their wives, sisters and daughters, especially in rural communities," Lahlum said.
A native of Marion, N.D., Lahlum earned a doctorate from the University of Idaho in 2003. She previously taught at Valley City State University. She is working on a several research projects involving the history of Norwegian women.
For more information, contact Dennis Cooley at 1-7038 or dennis.cooley@ndsu.edu .