Music and religion are concepts, which have been continually associated with spirituality throughout the history of Western religion. Since the dawn of mankind, it has been considered that music has had a clear function about how individuals grasp their inner emotions to reach the transcendent and comprehend "Self". The aim of this thesis is to gain greater understanding as to how a group of young catechists in the Swedish Lutheran Church feel, interpret and construct their identities through popular music. An exploration as to how this specific group perceives concepts such as the Bible, church, spirituality, and religion was undertaken. The theory forming the basis of this essay is derived from a sociological perspective of postmodernism.

In this thesis I based on Fowler?s method of syntax analysis construct a flow scheme which I then use to make a syntax analysis of former State Secretary Lars Danielsson?s statements, in his autobiography, regarding his responsibility in the Swedish government?s management of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami disaster. The focus of the flow scheme is how grammatical constructions can be used in the interest of rhetoric?s to on the syntax (non-explicit) level of the text indicate and place responsibility with or outside of involved individuals. The main conclusion of the syntax analysis performed is that Danielsson in his autobiography in fact does not use very many of the constructions described in the flow scheme, whereby it can be concluded that the syntax analysis in this case wasn?t so ?revealing?.

This paper intends to examine how two newspapers, one local and one national newspaper, reported the gang-related homicides in Malmo in 2011, and compares these two news reports to see if there are any similarities and differences. Another aspect of this study is to elucidate how these two newspapers constitute Malmo as a city. Fairclough?s critical discourse analysis is applied in this study, where I analyze the two newspapers? news coverage based on their content. The content is analyzed by studying the text?s vocabulary, grammar, cohesion, structure, transitivity and modality. One similarity is the use of objective modalities, where both newspapers have a tendency to make interpretations and speculations as fact.

The purpose with this work is to describe the language that is built around the chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) in Sweden. Our questions are: What does the professional field look like; who writes, about what and for which kind of readers? How do they describe the expressions and the upcoming of CFS? For which reasons can CFS be considered as a medical diagnosis/illness? How can CFS be understood from a social perspective? Our theoretical starting point is a social constructive theory and also Karin Johannisson's theory about medicalization and Foucault?s theory about power. We have from a literature-exposition of Swedish articles from 1989 to 2006, done a social constructive discourse analysis with help from Laclau & Mouffe's discourse theory, and Fairclough's model of social practices. In our textual analysis we found three dominating discourses: A medical discourse, a social/cultural discourse and a general/popular discourse.

This essay contains a comparative analysis of Erik Olin Wrights Marxist class analysis and Michael Hardt and Antonio Negris post-Marxist class analysis as presented in their books ?Empire? and ?Multitude: War and democracy in the age of Empire?. I discuss the shift in analytical focus from state level to global level that Hardt and Negri's analysis represent and the ensuing relevance of this for contemporary class analysis. The essay also address the challenge and implications posed to class analysis by the ever increasing economic globalization, from a material production to an ever growing immaterial service economy and the decrease in state power in controlling capital and labor movement. I propose that analytical understanding of class conflict help us to a better understanding of the mechanisms and dynamics that generate social and economical inequalities and that an updated Marxist class analysis still have much to contribute to our understanding to how these issues not only shape our society but also our capacity to counteract them..

The Swedish museum world is a complex and disputed field. Changes are high on the agenda, but they are neither easy nor self-evident. This master thesis looks at how Swedish museum professionals discuss changes and how they envision museum work for the future. It is also an analysis of the current state of the field. We have made a critical discourse analysis of three recent projects; Svåra saker, Museum 2000, makten.nu and the debate articles from the journal Svenska Museer from 2000 to 2001.

In this two years master?s thesis I examine the library?s representation of research and its influence upon the relationship between the library practice and the research practice. I also intend to find out what controls the representation and if it is possible to see changes in the representation over time. My source material has been texts published in the Swedish library journal ? and social domain ? Biblioteksbladet during the last decennium (2001?2011).

The purpose of this study is to investigate the medial portrayal of Romani people in the newspaper Dagens Nyheter from 2013 and 2014. In the theoretical chapter the concepts of new racism is used to speak of what is considered racist in the Swedish society today. Other concepts that are used are type and stereotype which are used to explain how our context is depending on distinctions to understand what surrounds us. Concepts such as myths and binary-oppositions are other theories that are used in this study.  Six debate articles have been selected to investigate how the Romani people are represented.

The aim of this Masters thesis is to deepen the understanding of how society affects literary criticism by studying the reception of two Swedish dystopian novels and their contemporary anchorage. The questions that we answer here are concerned with how critics have drawn parallels between the novels and events occurring in the contemporary society, and how the critics outlook on the future are connected to ideas about the future in the novels. The first novel, Kallocain 1940 by Karin Boye has been interpreted as a critical statement directed towards totalitarian ideologies. The second novel, After the Flood 1982 by P C Jersild, has been seen as a warning against nuclear warfare. This qualitative study is based on 41 reviews from Swedish daily press.

This masters thesis is a study of how the expression quality literature is used in widespread newspapers and magazines. Wittgensteins idea of language games is used as a theoretical starting point. The analysis of 37 articles draws a picture of five language games that are called; the taking over, the polarising, the example giving, the gender critical and the ironic language game. The expression that quality literature is most often put in relation to is popular literature. The line between the two is sometimes distinctly drawn in the articles and sometimes quite vague.

Communicative recycling, to repeat utterances uttered by oneself or others, is a common phenomenon in all societies and languages. The talk of persons with autism often features recycling. The aim of this study was to identify different forms of recycling in communication involving a boy with autism and to describe its functions. Communication between the boy with autism, who used Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS) to communicate, and his parents and teachers was videotaped. The conversations took place in familiar settings, in the boy?s home and at his pre-school.

The subject of this master thesis concerns the area of change in libraries, with special orientation towards privatisation. Its aim is to investigate how privatisation is portrayed in one of Sweden?s largest library magazines, Biblioteksbladet, in order to gain insight into why these portrayals are what they are, and what consequences they might get. Three theoretical viewpoints create the general base of the thesis; first, Fairclough?s critical discourse analysis (CDA) theory on the relations between text and society; second, Audunsson?s theory concerning how change is dealt with in public libraries; and third, a conceptual framework on privatisation consisting of definitions and perspectives of the phenomenon.

A school should be a safe place for all students. The existence of discrimination, harassment and offensive behavior should according to Swedish school law not exist in the school environment. Since the year 2006, when a law on equal treatment was passed, all the schools in Sweden must have a treatment plan that is revised annually to prevent discrimination, harassment and abusive treatment.In this master thesis, I will examine the equal treatment plan between four different elementary schools in Nynäshamn.The purpose of this paper is to examine how the equal treatment plan exposes the bullying and the types of problems and solutions addressed in the elementary schools equal treatment plans. Based on the purpose, I have formulated two questions:How do the elementary schools in Nynäshamn municipality describe bullying in the equal treatment plan?What kinds of problems and solutions are addressed in the equal treatment plan evaluations?This thesis is based on text analysis and content analysis on the schools equal treatment plans.The study is based on the theories from a norm critical perspective.The conclusion of the study is that all four schools treatment plan see abusive behavior as something serious and preventive.

This study aims to examine play as a phenomena from a phenomenological approach. This I do by discussing a dominant approach to play, an perspective which is reproduced in the context of pre-school and in where the play and learning is in single focus. Using alternative perspective on play, mainly by Gadamer and Bakthtins philosophical thoughts about the feast or the carnival, contents differ significantly from educational or developmental psychology perspectives. I open up for an understanding of what play as ontology can be understood as, and thereby enable second readings. I illustrate this thought by an empirical example from a pre-school context which where created alongside with the children in the study.

The purpose of this study is to examine the medial depiction of Muslims in the case of Pastor Terry Jones' intention to burn the Quran. Our study is based on theoretical framework regarding an alleged clash of civilizations, how that leads to global conflicts and controls the world politics. It?s also based on the western way of characterize Muslims as violent, irrational human beings, and how mass media have a tendency to depict Muslims as ?the others?. The questions we aim to seek answers to are: How were Muslims portrayed in CNN's and Al-Jazeera's reporting regarding Terry Jones plan to burn the Quran? Which discourses exist about Muslims in each news channel and what are the main differences between them? The qualitative method used is a critical discourse analysis on empirical data consistently of twelve articles.