Study title

Swedish East India Company in Newspapers 1731-1807

Dataset ID Number

FSD3258

Persistent identifiers

https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:fsd:T-FSD3258
https://doi.org/10.60686/t-fsd3258

Data Type

Quantitative

Authors

• Ruotsalainen, Esa (University of Helsinki. Faculty of Arts)

Abstract

The data consist of four datasets compiled using content coding. The datasets focus on the Swedish East India Company (Svenska Ostindiska Companiet, SOIC) operating from 1731 to 1813. The first dataset comprises newspaper content that mentions the Swedish East India Company (marked with letter A in the data file) and the second contains traffic information on ships in the port of Gothenburg (marked with letter B in the data file). The third dataset has more detailed information on the church notices selected from the first dataset (marked with letter C in the data file) and the fourth consists of church notices in Gothenburg newspapers in 1750, 1754 and 1765. The data were collected for a Master's thesis studying the characteristics of the SOIC in terms of its privileges, newspaper visibility and pamphlet debate. The researcher collected the datasets B-D to complement the main dataset A.

The first dataset containing the mentions of the SOIC in newspapers lists the name of the newspaper, date of publication, excerpt of the text, and the researcher's assessment of the author and text type. The researcher also collected information on how the trading company name was used, e.g. which possessive pronouns were used with it. The data contain 958 excerpts.

The second dataset charts the arrival and departure dates of shipmasters, their names, point of departure, goods imported, next destination, and goods exported. There are 752 entries in the data. The researcher collected the dataset to study the visits of British shipmasters in particular.

The third dataset contains detailed information on the church notices that were collected from newspapers for the first dataset. This detailed information include the name of the newspaper, date of publication, type of notice (banns of marriage or death notice), job title of the person mentioned in it, and the researcher's assessment of who had written it. There are 95 notices in the dataset. The researcher collected the data to study how occupation and employer was described in the notices.

The fourth dataset has the following information on church notices in Gothenburg newspapers: parish, date, type of notice (banns of marriage or death notice), gender of the person mentioned as well as their marital status, job title, employer, name, age, cause of death (for death notices) as well as similar information about the person's relatives. The dataset also contains notices about persons whose names were not stated, e.g. notices about a deceased wife. In such cases, the information is about the surviving relative, e.g. the widower. There are 1,174 observations in the data. The researcher collected the data to examine how frequently the notices referred to employer.

The excerpts from newspapers are only available in Swedish.

Keywords

cargo; communities; companies; freight transport; history; identity; marine traffic; newspaper press; sea transport; ships

Topic Classification

• Humanities (Fields of Science Classification)
• Social sciences (Fields of Science Classification)
• Economic systems and development (CESSDA Topic Classification)
• History (CESSDA Topic Classification)

Series

Individual datasets

Distributor

Finnish Social Science Data Archive

Access

The dataset is (A) openly available for all users without registration (CC BY 4.0).

Data Collector

• Ruotsalainen, Esa (University of Helsinki. Faculty of Arts)

Time Period Covered

1731 – 1807

Collection Dates

2017-04-20 – 2018-04-18

Nation

Sweden

Geographical Coverage

Sweden

Analysis/Observation Unit Type

Organization/Institution

Media unit: Text

Universe

Newspaper content that has some reference to East India trade or the Swedish East India Company; ships arriving and leaving the port of Gothenburg mentioned in the Götheborgs Wecko-Lista newspaper 1755-1756; church notices 1731-1807 containing a reference to the Swedish East India Company and trade; church notices in the Götheborgs Wecko-Lista newspaper in 1750 and 1754 and the Götheborgska Nyheter in 1765.

Time Method

Cross-section

Sampling Procedure

Non-probability: Purposive

A: Newspaper content relating to the Swedish East India Company or East India trade were collected by using the word search of two digital archives, the Digitaliserade svenska dagstidningar and the Svenska Dagstidningar, as well as by conducting browser searches from the Götheborgs Wecko-Lista and Postidningar newspapers from 1731-1759. The researcher also used a specific search where the text was searched for based on existing information. Varying word forms and spellings were used to conduct the searches. B: Information on the ships in Gothenburg were collected by browsing the Götheborgs Wecko-Lista. C: Church notices referring to the East India Company were collected from the dataset A and supplemented with additional information. D: Church notices in the Götheborgs Wecko-Lista from 1750 and 1754 and the Götheborgska Nyheter from 1765 were selected using a keyword search.

Collection Mode

Content coding

Research Instrument

Data collection guidelines: Secondary data collection guide

Data File Language

Downloaded data package may contain different language versions of the same files.

The data files of this dataset are available in the following languages: Finnish.

FSD translates quantitative data into English on request, free of charge. More information on ordering data translation.

Data Version

1.0

Completeness of Data and Restrictions

The original researcher mentions in his thesis that because of a faulty OCR, using the search to collect the first dataset A (mentions of the SOIC in newspapers) did not retrieve all the sections where the search word was actually mentioned. In addition, there was no fuzzy search available. Because of this, the data do not constitute an exhaustive list of instances where the search words are mentioned. The researcher assessed that the best coverage is in the data from 1730-1750.

Variables from different datasets were marked with letters a-d in the data file. Variable bv1 was created to classify observations by dataset. FSD coded some of the string variables into numerical ones to improve their usability. In these variables, the system-missing values comprise observations from the other datasets. Actual missing values in each dataset were given the value of 99 or 999 (empty or not applicable) to keep them separate from observations in other datasets.

Weighting

There are no weight variables in the data.

Citation Requirement

The data and its creators shall be cited in all publications and presentations for which the data have been used. The bibliographic citation may be in the form suggested by the archive or in the form required by the publication.

Bibliographical Citation

Ruotsalainen, Esa (University of Helsinki): Swedish East India Company in Newspapers 1731-1807 [dataset]. Version 1.0 (2019-06-26). Finnish Social Science Data Archive [distributor]. https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:fsd:T-FSD3258

Deposit Requirement

Notify FSD of all publications where you have used the data by sending the citation information to user-services.fsd@tuni.fi.

Disclaimer

The original data creators and the archive bear no responsibility for any results or interpretations arising from the reuse of the data.

Related Materials

Ruotsalainen, Esa (2018). Ruotsin Itä-Intian kauppakomppanian entiteetit 1731-1799. Helsinki: Helsingin yliopisto. Suomen ja Pohjoismaisen historian pro gradu -tutkielma.

Related Publications

Ruotsalainen, Esa (2018). Ruotsin Itä-Intian kauppakomppanian entiteetit 1731-1799. Helsinki: Helsingin yliopisto. Suomen ja Pohjoismaisen historian pro gradu -tutkielma. urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:hulib-201806142664