The purpose of this thesis is to examine the Swedish Plymouth brethren?s relation to contemporary technology. What types of technology are considered acceptable and where do they draw the line? Due to the brethren?s separation from the parts of the world they believe leads people away from God, such as the entertainment industry, immoralities etc., they reject use of television and radio. These two are viewed as uncontrolled types of technology since the user does not have control of its contents.

ABORT ?n GO is a design project within the crossing boundaries of Critical Design and IndustrialDesign.The contemporary discourse on abortion is problematic, and infected by double norms. Thesenorms may cause feelings of guilt and shame in women who have an abortion. The abortion rightis built upon conflicting standpoints; one is that women have right to have an abortion, withoutbeing questioned. Second is the notion that abortion is something that should be avoided, implyingthat you?ve done something wrong if you have had an abortion.With this project and physical product I want to explore and discuss the contemporary discourseon abortion in Sweden.

This work represents a first attempt to articulate my practice as a composer. Through a phenomenological perspective and with the support of the philosophical concept 'Weak Thought', I approach the idea of music as meaning in itself, beyond language. My exploration of these ideas is developed through three perspectives: partly through analysis of my own work, partly through a brief presentation of the concept of 'Weak Thought', and lastly through a series of subject-specific reflections..

The purpose of this thesis is to form an idea about the qualitative value and meaning of reading fiction in a psychological perspective and over a lifetime. Seven women, 68-79 years old, were interviewed about their reading habits of fiction in their lifetime. The material is presented as life stories. I use an inter-nordic research project called the SKRIN project which looks upon reading habits from an individualistic and psychological perspective. I also refer to an American study which focus on reading development with roles readers take in different ages of life written by J A Appleyard.

This case study examines the new media presentation system in Alby public library. The aim is to explore if the contemporary Zeitgeist, wich according to the sociologist Zygmunt Bauman, could be described as liquid modernity, has affected how the system was formed. The purpose is to find out how that would affect users and staff of public libaries of the contemporary. Interviews were conducted with the library staff, and plans and documents concerning the media presentation system was examined.The empirical part of this thesis starts with a study of the process that resulted in the new presentation system while the second part examines the system as such. I discovered that both the media presentation system, and the process which preceded it, contained aspects that could be traced to liquid modernity.

My intention with this study is to evaluate, as a singer and a voice teacher, a number of routines for daily vocal practice through practical application. Seven different routines are presented, five of them originating from interviews with Swedish vocal teachers and singers and two chosen from literature. These routines are then tried out and evaluated. Using the results of these evaluations as a basis, I make an attempt at formulating my own personal practice routine, optimal for my own needs. I will also try to address motivational issues related to practice with hints acquired through the interviews.

This research study constitutes a critical stand, which departure from the increase in welfare, and decrease in quality of life, and is further directed to the sphere of consumption. Contemporary consumers appear to seek for components to construct their self with through consumption, consumerism has become a sphere of life, and has consequently also become a victimizing force steering the identity and self construction of consumers. The alarm bells however are echoing in Western society, and consumers are experiencing dilemmas such as fragmentation, powerlessness, uncertainty and meaninglessness.In this respect we have presented spiritualism as an applicable path of escape or alternative to the scheme of the material oriented consumption sphere. We intend to broaden the scope of the interplay between spiritualism and consumerism in the act of yoga, and we have therefore been researching: what yoga is doing to consumers, and what consumers are doing to yoga. The study is based on an existential epistemology paradigm, which emphasis on the meaning of the yoga experience attained from the subjects of research; the yoga practitioners, and therefore we have carried out three focus group discussions.

AbstractThis research is about how some swedish teachers in high school choose literature in schools. The purpose is to underline the reasons for how some teachers think about selection, canon, classic and contemporary literature. Two survey methods were used to find the answers, wich consisted of interviews and questionnaires. The letter methods was used to obtain informations about student´s views on literature.Previous research shows that there are different opinions in what kind of literature the pupils should read in school. The results of literature, questionnaires and interviews also showed that the underlying reasons for the choice of literature, varied among those interviewed further forward ofthe students also prefer to read books during lessons, and that they prefer reading books by popular contemporary writers..

Until recently, the art market has expanded for several consecutive years. The primary art market is characterized by an unclear pricing mechanism and an infinite as well as limited supply. Previous business studies have so far primarily focused either on art as an investment or on the gallery?s activities. This thesis takes an explorative approach and aims to shed a light on the art collector?s behavior on the Swedish market for contemporary art.

The paper discusses the problems contemporary Swedish art criticism faces when judging performance art and interactive art. Problems include among others that performance art is collectively ignored in Swedish newspaper art criticism. This prevents art critics from fair contextualising of contemporary performance art. Down in the rabbit hole, performance by Tris Vonna-Michell and its reception exemplifies these problems. Performance and interactive art seems to be disturbing art critics.

The purpose of this thesis is to deepen the understanding of our contemporary description of digital literacy using the perspective on knowledge from the Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle. I have chosen to deal with the problem using a hermeneutic approach. The method of inquiry is based on close reading of the selected literature. The selection itself has been made after a strategic selection regarding perspective on knowledge and digital literacy. It appears in the thesis that there are substantial differences but also similarities between our contemporary description of digital literacy from Recommendation of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 December 2006 on key competences for lifelong learning and the perspective on knowledge from the Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle.Still, the result has been possible to use for the purpose of the thesis since the problem has an answer and a deepened impression of the understandings of digital literacy..

The purpose of this essay is to further the understanding of contemporary management theory by conducting an analogy-study of the source to many of the terms today used in knowledge-intensive companies. The way a football club deals with knowledge work differs from how a conventional company deals with it. However, many of the terms, such as teamwork and coaching, are shared by the two types of organization. By using the analogy-method we hope to create a wider understanding for the shared concepts. We have used a hermeneutic perspective throughout the essay, which first and foremost means that we focus on understanding and explaining social phenomenons.

The following study is a comparative analysis on the usage of history in Ridley Scott?s epic Kingdom of Heaven. Based on the thesis that this movie has a lot to say about contemporary political values, it compares the theatrical version from 2005 with the 45 minute extended Director?s Cut, which came out on DVD in 2006. Firmly based in the popular-cultural context I tried to evaluate whether these changes related in any way, to matters concerning the current gender debate and post-colonial theory.

The secularization theses has over the last decade been a central issue within the sociology of religion. The two classic theses has been criticized for being one-sided and only focus on the change from traditional to modern society. The intention of this study is to evaluate this critique and to discuss what is defendable in the early secularization thesis in our contemporary world.This essay?s primary purpose is to compare the secularization theses Weber?s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism and Durkheim?s The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. I use two analytical models, posing three levels and three categories of secularization, in order to make the comparison explicit.

The way we socialize today is radically different from how it was only twenty years ago. Since the arrival of the Internet more and more of what we know about the lives of our friends comes from text-based social networks, or blogs. This means that we all, more or less, have become authors of our own life stories and that the reality we live in have become fictionalized. In this paper I explore what effects this postmodern process of dissolving boundaries has had on the autobiographical genre, where the line between fiction and reality is traditionally stressed. By analysing Carina Rydberg?s (b.