Mission and Cosmopolitan Mothering: Saving Armenian Mothers and Orphans, 1902-1947

This article discusses and analyzes mothering that crosses boundaries of care in spite of differences of nationality, culture and religion. Swedish missionary Alma Johansson was one of a remarkable number of women missionaries who volunteered as relief workers during the Armenian refugee crisis. These women missionaries were often seen as mothers who were ‘saving a whole generation’. The article shows how Johansson acted as an external mother and created transnational bonds of solidarity between Swedish and Armenian mothers. The close relationships became a foundation for Armenian children and women to help themselves. However, in this mothering were also ambivalences.