This chapter analyses representations of cleaners in contemporary Western culture. It draws on theories of intersectionality (Krenshaw, McCall) and representation (Hall, Spivak) and reads narratives where the cleaner is the protagonist and cleaning is in focus: the Swedish award-winning biography of the Swedish writer (and cleaner) Maja Ekelöf (Jag har torkat nog många golv, 2022); Ekelöf’s award-winning bestseller Rapport från en skurhink (Report from a Scrub Bucket, 1970); the French Le Quai de Ouistreham (2010) as well as the film, Ouistreham (Between Two Worlds, 2022); the American television series The Cleaning-Lady (2022); and the Canadian bestseller The Maid. A Novel (2022). It argues that there has been a change in the representation of cleaners, and cleaning, and that it is now possible to talk about two dominant discourses: one old and one new. The old discourse is underpinned by the idea that cleaners work hard for their money under precarious conditions but are unable to represent themselves. The new discourse promotes the cleaner as a strong and admirable protagonist who undoubtedly can represent herself as well as others. Cleaning as a practice has also become more interesting to represent—the art of cleaning—and has the narrative function as Proust’s madeleine.

In an analysis of the Swedish satirical magazine PUSS (1968–1974) this article explores what is considered as improper rhetoric and aesthetic in the public sphere. It draws on theories of representation and the culture of carnival laughter and the grotesque as well as research on the Swedish folkhem and satire and democracies. I coin the concept demogrotesqueatic in order to capture how PUSS, by using comics, grotesque bodies and carnivalesque, improper rhetoric and aesthetics, makes visible fundamental challenges to democratic societies. I argue that the magazine’s representational practices highlight the function of what is often considered ‘filth’ in the public sphere and the central role the gro-tesque body plays in upholding – and breaking – boundaries of propriety. I interpret this as important democratic work, and demonstrate that while the satire in PUSS is situated in a specific time and place, it is also part of a longstanding literary and artistic tradition.

Academic articles and thereby journals have become more and more important in the everyday life of Academia. Even though the contents of an academic journal depend on numerous factors, an analysis of the archive of a journal can tell us something important about a research field, and/or a discipline. This article analyzes how gender research and “gender studies” [genusvetenskap] is represented in and by a central scholarly journal in the Nordic region: Kvinnovetenskaplig tidskrift (KVT, 1980–2006), later Tidskrift för genusvetenskap (TGV, 2007–). By drawing on theories of representation (Stuart Hall, Gayatri Spivak) the article investigates and analyzes what the almost 700 published articles are about and whom they represent in terms of disciplines and universities, but also how representation and place are related. Based on a content analysis and conversations with previous editors, the study demonstrates that the “what” of representation in KVT/TGV depends largely on the “where” and the “who”. While not unique to gender studies these are material aspects of scholarship that needs to be further acknowledged. Findings also include some important shifts and continuities. The representation in KVT/TGV are increasingly focused on Sweden, on the academy as such, and on gender studies as a discipline (genusvetenskap), while the presence of “women” “sex” [kön] and “feminism” remain strong throughout the period.