Monikielinen periferii vaston ummikkokeskustaa Bengt Pohjasen tuotanossa

Multilingual periphery versus unilingual centre in Bengt Pohjanen´s work This study aims at rethinking the concepts of periphery and centre in terms of the dynamics of multilingual ethni c minority versus unilingual national majority in the context of literature in Sweden. This may be interpreted as an attempt to disprove the belief that what belongs to the centre is the standard and of greater value than what is associated with the periphery. I intend to draw attention to the verbal art and the philosophy of Sweden´s trilingual and amazingly prolific author, Bengt Pohjanen, who has written prose, lyrics, dram a, opera librettos, radio plays, sketches, and other genres in Swedish, Meankieli, and Finnish. His works have had a major role in the ethnic and linguistic revival of Meankieli. His writings are eloquent examples of the strong connection between cultural heritage and collective identity. In this study, I focused on the author´s autobiographic novel written in Meankieli, Jopparikuninkhaan poika, and analysed it in order to deconstruct the picture the Swedish majority has of the Meankieli-speaking minority. The study is written in Meankieli.