The majority of the interest for Marie-Jean-Antoine-Nicolas de Caritat, Marquis de Condorcet (1743-1794), has been focused on his work in mathematics and political science, especially on his famous method on voting tally. With a background in the French enlightenment, on the brink of the revolution, this essay focuses on his political and philosophical ideas, specially his thoughts on the role of education in humanity?s struggle toward greater freedom. Is it possible to identify a connection between the concepts of education and freedom in his writings? This question is largely unanswered, even though it is fundamental for the understanding of the underlying reasoning of Condorcet.

The teaching of modern foreign languages within Swedish educational system has been a subject of a number of alarming reports in recent years. Several studies have shown that students lack motivation to learn any language but English. Of particular concern is the young males? underachieving and disinterest in foreign languages. In the meantime, a number of international studies and the statistical data from Swedish national agencies of secondary and higher education (Skolverket and Högskoleverket) have indicated that Russian is one of the languages that are favoured by males. The primary goal of my case study was, therefore, to examine students? motivation to learn Russian and their attitudes towards language, community and Russian-speaking people.

Music has a role to play in every country and every culture. Sweden today is a country whith many different cultures, religions and music genres. The purpose of this investigation is to study how immigrants youths profit from music education on the basis of music teachers' perspectives. Questions at issue are: are there immigrant children/ youths who can not take part in music education? Have the students' religions any importance? Do the parents question the offered education? Is there more opposition to some specific kind of music? Are teachers avoiding to present some music? Can music education help the immigrant youths to form their identities? I have used questionnaires and I have made five interviews.

The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate the present importance of liberal education in the Swedish "folkhögskola" by studying its expressions in the teaching of literature and fiction. I have interviewed teachers at four different schools about their opinions of liberal education, literature and cultural heritage, means of instruction, and influence of their students. Liberal education in this thesis is considered as a process. Starting from our own experiences we meet something strange to us and while absorbing this in our experiences we change. But its purpose also is to convey the canon of Western literature.

This study aims to investigate how a number of students who are at the end of a teachers? educations program in social studies, geography, religion and history interpret that the national curriculums states that every teacher is responsible for students language development and should be supportive of language backgrounds. In the light of the curriculums the study explores how the teacher education students feel that the education has prepared them for teaching children with Swedish as a second language. The study also examines how the teacher education students think that the teacher education could improve in matters like preparing future teachers to teach social studies, geography, religion and history to second language children.The study is based on interviews with seven university students and shows that they feel a responsibility to develop their future students? language.

The purpose of this essay is, using discourse analysis, to define how the Swedish society sees sexuality and how this is conveyed to young people. The questions at issue are; How is the term sexuality defined and delimited? How are the young people described in relation to sexuality? Are young people ascribed to different needs and qualities in relation to sexuality depending on their gender?There is previously a lot of research with great multitude about the sexuality of the youth. The research methods vary but text analysis within the subject area is unusual. The material used in this discourse analysis have been published by normative public institutions.

This master's thesis reports on our investigation of how the public librarian's professional identity is formed and what it is formed of. We have considered factors such as: education, competence and daily tasks. In order to fulfil this aim we have used a literature study on concepts such as competence, education, professional identity and profession. We have also carried out an empirical study where we have interviewed nine librarians on public libraries. The method of analysis is qualitative.

AbstractThere is a lot of confusion when it comes to defining Special Education. An example of this appears here by a statement from Assarson (2007) "Special Education initiates a special pedagogy, but contains no innate sense of what is the special component in it" (p. 52, authors? translation). This study is an attempt to clarify the elements of the concept.

The purpose of this Masters thesis is to investigate if gender stereotypes are mediated to children between 0-3 years through books suitable for their age. This thesis concerns books that are available in public libraries. The content will be analysed by using a combination of methods, both content analysis of all the books in our study and a qualitative analysis of a smaller number of these books. With inspiration from both Robert Connell and Yvonne Hirdman and their theories of gender and gender stereotypes, this material was read and we wanted to examine if books for very young children might establish stereotypes. Our analysis showed that many known stereotypes are common in these books.

This paper aims at assessing the relationship between female and male part-time employment and the business cycle in Sweden during the years 1987?2005 using quarterly time-series data and two alternative indicators of the business cycle. It further aims at determining whether the share of women working part-time has changed over time. Key results include that the relationship between the business cycle and female part-time employment is found to be significant and countercyclical. No significant effect is however found for men.

The purpose of this qualitative thesis is to describe and analyse the implementation of an education system in the newly independent state, Timor Leste. One question to be discussed is whether an emergency phase is still going on in the development of a functioning school system, or if Timor Leste already reached a capacity building phase? Via the participant's answers in field observations and interviews, the study analyses the clashes between generations, social classes and different levels in relation to the choice of Portuguese as an official language and the international environment in the country. The thesis concludes that a lot of work remains in creating a fully functioning education system. We enjoyed the writing - and hope you will enjoy the reading!.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine how young women create their feminine gender positions in relation to their reading. Using qualitative research methods the empirical material has been collected through so called reflexive interviews with eight young women aged 15-17. From their statements the empirical material has been divided into five themes that are important to the young women, as well as to the formulation of the problem. This constitutes the model of analysis. The analysis has been conducted through an examination of these themes from a gender theoretical perspective and through the application of theories about reading and gender.

AbstractThere is a lot of confusion when it comes to defining Special Education. An example of this appears here by a statement from Assarson (2007) "Special Education initiates a special pedagogy, but contains no innate sense of what is the special component in it" (p. 52, authors? translation). This study is an attempt to clarify the elements of the concept.

The gender theory of Judith Butler is based on both philosophical and psychoanalytic notions of the self. Although greatly inspired by both early and contemporary psychoanalytic thinking, Butler has also questioned some of its core notions such as the meaning of gender complementarity and conceptions of desire. In a dialogue in Studies in Gender and Sexuality she discusses these and other theoretical and ethical issues with the influential psychoanalyst and gender theorist Jessica Benjamin. The exchange is a unique example of an attempt at dialogue and theoretical reflection between a prominent contemporary gender theorist and psychoanalyst. It reveals disagreements and theoretical difficulties I will show to be directly attributable to radical differences between Butler's and Benjamin's conceptions of the self.

This essay discusses the students? thoughts about the teacher's response to their gender identity. The students discuss their right to have an intergender identity which means that they don?t identify themselves in the traditional sexes, man and woman, and the gender role each category has. They want to be called with a neutral pronoun and not be seen like boys or girls.