Almost half of the population in Sweden suffers from obesity and the cases of eating disorders are increasing. We are exposed daily to the belief that losing weight will make us happier and it will just be through this particular diet. Even if it has been proven that short dieting plans like ?lose 20 pounds in one month? doesn?t give a long-term result, society continues to buy into the idea that they do.Every day 16000 placards are placed around us in Sweden with loud yellow colors and big black letters which make them almost impossible to avoid. Their main purpose is to attract and get as many people as possible to buy single copies.This essay deals with several questions: How diet tips figures on placards and how this has developed through years.

This essay examines the decline of reading comprehension in Swedish schools, and also aims to provide insight into the debate concerning a literary canon and its usage in schools. While some claim that the literary canon is only a list of irrelevant white dead men which only serves to perpetuate feelings of alienation in, for example, female students, others see it as a means to bring society together using the only literature that stood the test of time. This essay will look to studies concerning reading comprehension, and questions regarding reading habits which our own students answered. It will also explain the different viewpoints of both sides of the canon debate.There are several studies that show this decline in reading comprehension, PISA and PIRLS being the foremost of them. They point to a trend where the reading skills of boys are much worse than those of girls, a trend which still has not panned out.Bloom and the different researchers who are the basis for Verhaest's thesis are of the opinion that canonical literature serves a purpose in that it teaches students aesthetic literary values.