Happy new year! - All year around

The New Years brings an opportunity to start agan, to try to ensure that conditions will be better for the next year. This book tells about the history of New York celebrations in Sweden but also about local and regional variations and global themes. It is only according to the Western Gregorian calendar that the new year begins on 1 January. Parallel to this there are other New Year festivals at different times in the year. Some are linked to religion, other to specific countries and regions, and others to different seasons. Some are based on lunar or solar calendars and can have movable dates in the calendar, while others are fixed. In Sweden, partly as a consequence of migration, there are New Year celebrations all year round, and the book also examines these.

Lena Kätterström Höök is an ethnologist and curator at the Nordisc Museum in Stockholm, specializing in the study of traditions and festivals.