Per Göransson

In my research, I examine the relationship between choirs, place and societal context. The background to this is that Sweden is usually described as one of the world's most secular countries. However, religious elements are still present in society. For example, through religiously coloured cultural activities. It is also visible in different types of social encounters and tensions between religious and secular expressions in Swedish but also in European societies. 

Analysing choirs in a Swedish context is interesting as about six percent of the population regularly sings in a choir. The choir members are geographically distributed all over Sweden in both urban and rural contexts. Choirs also have a long tradition as a Christian cultural expression, which has provided a rich cultural heritage from the long history of earlier choral activities in Sweden. There are also a large number of both sacred (religious) choirs and secular (non-religious) choral activities in Sweden. Choral activities are an example that can highlight the encounter between the sacred and the secular and how it is distributed geographically in a secularised country like Sweden.

My research interests focus mainly on: place, urban, rural, sacral, secular, postsecular, religion, non-religion, GIS and mixed methods.

My teaching activities mainly focuses on the Spatial and Social Planning Programme and the Tourism Programme. In addition, I also teach geography didactic.

I am part of the graduate school at the Centre for Research on Sustainable Societal Transformation (CRS) and a member of the Centre for Geomedia Studies.

Göransson, Per (2022) Mapping the geography of choirs in Sweden. Approaching Religion (12) 1: 77-97. <DOI: https://doi.org/110.30664/ar.111087>. (https://journal.fi/ar/article/view/111087/67978)