This essay examines how art could be used to bring forth and clarify the Catholic doctrines of purgatory. The research questions are: ? How are the Catholic Church?s doctrines of purgatory illustrated in art? ? How can the paintings affect the viewer and his/her notion on how to shorten the time in purgatory? How can art itself be used as a tool to achieve that goal? The timeframe of the chosen paintings is mainly 14th to 16th century but an overview of how the purgatory has been illustrated after that time until the present is also given. In order to answer the first research question, a painting from the 14th century has been analysed, using a method inspired by Patterns of Intention - a theoretical framework formulated by Michel Baxandall. A reception theoretic perspective according to Kemp, is used on a painting from the 15th century to answer the second research question. The results show that purgatory is illustrated as fire and the souls are depicted as living people, despite that a spiritual condition is visualized. The viewers at that time found the descriptions frightening, but the paintings also revealed ways of being granted indulgences, that is shorten-ing the time in purgatory. These ways were praying, making pilgrimages and giving alms.

Since the 9/11-attacks several nations have been confronted with a new international threat, its nature traces back to the political- and religious- radical movements of the 20th century Cold War. Ever since, various states have been under threat by terrorist organizations around the world due to mainly participating in worldwide counter-terrorist interventions created by western alliances. In Sweden, amongst other countries, the state took security-precautions that would imply total control of information throughout the territorial borders. The assigned proposition was accepted by the Swedish parliament in June 18th 2008, after this date wild spread criticism was still in effect ever since the Swedish government first publicly announced the proposition in May 8th 2007. This study emphasizes on understanding why the Swedish government chose to present this proposition to parliament, in order to complete this task the study will present the motives and the alleged threats that were the core of the proposition and its value-maximizing goal of creating a new surface for Swedish homeland security.

The purpose of this Master Thesis is to compare two American novel suites for young women, Louisa May Alcott?s Little Women and Good Wives to Ann Brashares series of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. The social status of women and children in the US during the 19th century is analyzed and compared historically and literary with the situation 130 years later.The main question is, what differences exist in the books and is there a connection between the changes in society and literature?The method of this Master Thesis is to make a comparative narratological analysis placed in a historical context.The result shows that the multiple character remains and enhances the identification process. Motherhood in the works of Alcott is prominent, whereas in the works of Brashares, sisterhood replaces motherhood.In Alcott?s US during the 19th century, Christian faith was in the foreground.

In the years between 2012 and 2014, Burma has been shaken by waves of violence against Muslims which has resulted in destroyed mosques and shops, at least 140 000 displaced and 200 killed persons. The person who is said to lay behind this violence is the Burmese Theravada monk Ashin Wirathu. Being the founder and leader of the radical Buddhist movement 969, he has been accused of indirectly motivating violence against Muslims and has been portrayed with titles such as ?The face of buddhist terror?. This essay investigates the relation between Wirathu and the anti-Muslim violence by applying the method of content analysis on a speech of him.

The aim of this study is to examine possibilities and barriers for an introduction of electric vehicles in Sweden. The study has an interdisciplinary approach and thoroughly examines the essential topics which influence the future of the electric vehicle. The study reaches from answering the question on why electric vehicles lost the game to petrol cars in the early 20th century, to sketch how the difference in total cost of ownership will be between electric vehicles and petrol cars for the coming 20 years. Apart from these subjects the main topics of the study are today?s and tomorrow?s situation regarding technology, charging, fuel, market and economic incentives from an electric vehicle perspective.

In a historical view, house prices have developed at the same rate as inflation. In the end of the 20th century the prices on the housing market started to differ from the inflation rate, and today the deviation is strong and the real price increase has been very strong.The financial crisis in 2008, which was a result of a subprime mortgage crisis on the American real estate market, has made several agents on the housing market in Sweden question today?s prices. Robert Schiller, an American economist who predicted the mortgage crisis in 2008, claimed during the Nobel Prize ceremony 2013, that Sweden shows signs of a financial bubble ? "I think that people here in Sweden have an illusion that increasing prices is a lasting trend, but that is more suggestive of a bubble".

The aim of this master?s thesis is to investigate a possible connection between the development of mobile library services in Sweden and the development of cultural policy during 1945-2006. Our main question is: is there a connection between the development of the mobile library services in Sweden, as described in Biblioteksbladet, and the development of cultural policy as portrayed by Anders Frenander and Dorte Skot-Hansen? In order to answer this question, we formulated two secondary questions: - How are the mobile library services described in Biblioteksbladet between 1945 and 2006? - Are there any similarities or dissimilarities between the development of the mobile library services and the development cultural policy as described in our theoretical models? If so, in what way? Our study covers the entire time period since the start of the mobile library services in Sweden in the late 1940s. The final year for our investigation is 2006.

This thesis is a study over changes and similarities of people's activities in Berzelii park, with focus on the second half of the 19th century and present time. As one of the oldest public parks in Stockholm, Berzelii park has been a place for outdoor activity for more than a hundred years. During that time both the park and the society have undergone changes, but people are still using this green area in the city centre in a similar way as generations before have done. It is still a place for social gathering and during the summer month the park invite for optional and social activities such as a pause in the sun and pic-nic with friends. Some customs has disappeared like the 19th century social stroll, but through small changes in rules or design others have become given, like using the lawns as seating..

Christendom has under a long period of time in Swedish history been the central component in legitimating the monarchs' power, a continuous process than can be clearly observed through the customs of royal coronation and baptism rites. However, during the 20th century those close ties between the state and the church of Sweden have been dissolving at a steady rate, alongside a growing societal democratization and modernization process. Officially the monarch still had a clear constitutional power legitimated through the transcendent, but unofficially his power was in reality heavily reduced. How do the Swedish monarchy relate to a rapidly changing society and secularization process? This pilot study investigates this relation by analyzing the news reports of the royal coronation and baptism rites between 1858 and 2012 from two leading newspapers, Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter.

The aim of this thesis is to examine the historical use of "poison cabinets", or restricted shelves, in Swedish libraries. Drawing upon the theories of Mary Douglas and Michel Foucault, it also seeks to sketch a cultural and ideological context of the practice; with the emphasis on social or mental hygiene, and disciplinary aspects. Through qualitative interviews as well as digitalized recordings of librarians active during the first half of the 20th century, actual examples of poison cabinets are presented. A closer examination is conducted of past collections at Lund University Library, and two large public libraries situated in Växjö and Sigtuna. The essay also investigates views on library censorship, controversial literature, and other related subjects reflected in th elibrary press during the period 1916-1979.

 AbstractA walk at Karlstad's cemetery and burial - grounds is like a strolling in an architectural park with trees, bushes and flowers. But these parks are different; they are filled with dead people, their memorial stones and their life stories. This world is full of socially, economically and culture differences from different times from 19th century till today's society. The cemetery - and burial - grounds in Karlstad can tell you about 19th century influences just by looking at the stones and where they are placed. Influences from the religion, the Christianity, which symbols for example is the cross, the birds and the sun that rises or falls, but also phrases that is directing to the bible.

The end of the 20th century brought a dramatic change to the music industry. The then predominant models for music consumption and sales were forever altered when the possibility to distribute music over the internet emerged. It has now become evident that it is virtually impossible to stop the distribution of digital music files. Music has turned into a non-excludable and non-rival product, which in economic terms is described as a public good. Public goods theory serves as a starting point for this study, which explores some of the factors that might explain why some consumers pay for music, while others choose to download music illegally.

This work consists of two studies. One is based on an inquiery to nurseries with production of woody plants, and the other on visits to gardencenters, primarily in Skåne but also in Stockholm. Inquieries where sent to 87 nurseries, 48 of them replied. The purpous of the inquiery was to make a thorough investigation of the ligneous production at the Swedish nurseries, what is produced and in what quantities. Within the inquiery was also a thorough look at the fruit tree production. This to be able to conclude what cultivars that are produced and how large part of that production that is certified according to the Swedish Board of Agriculture (SJV).

The purpose of this study was to analyze recent appropriations of works of art in advertising. Why was art infused into magazine advertisements, how were the works of art tampered with to achieve commercial goals, how well did they function together with the ad copy? What did these advertisements want? What did the artwork contribute to the commercial message? These were some of the questions asked in the study that involved a closer look at four appropriations: one based on a battle painting by the Swedish 1900th century artist Carl Wahlbom, with a commercial message printed on top;  one a collage including an 18th century portrait of Marie Antoinettte by Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun; one advertisement was influenced by Dutch 1700th century still lifes, and, finally, one paraphrased Velázquez?s famous painting Las Meninas from 1655. Companies behind the advertisements featured a Swedish trade journal, a fashion exhibition in Paris, a shop for kitchen utensils in Stockholm, and an up-scale department store in Madrid.The ads, in different ways based on works of art, were evaluated as reasonably successful commercial messages. These ads, however, hardly qualified as works of art in their own right ? if that was the intention.

The object of this master thesis is to study the reading practices offive women as they themselves remember them from theirchildhood and youth in the middle of the 20th century. The study inparticular targets the respondents? reading in relation to the normsfor girls? and young women?s reading at the time. The thesis takesas its starting point the presentation of the respondents´ readingmemories, based on motifs, preferences and experiences. Equallyimportant is the presentation of the relationship between thesememories and the social discourse their reading practices were partof.