The aim of this masters thesis is to examine the picture book canonization process in pre-schools. To succeed in this I have examined what pre-school staff believe to be the criteria of a good picture book. Together with an observation of the pre-schools current collection, other factors which can influence the collection of the picture book are included. This constitutes the foundation for a description of the pre-school picture book canon. To pursue this goal, I have used the methodology of focus group interviews with staff from two pre-schools in a middle-sized town.

The public libraries were quick to adapt to the changes that the Internet brought on, and today library websites are an important part of the public library. To meet the needs of teens today, the library website could offer a range of contents to make it an attractive place on many levels; both the academic needs as well as social and recreational needs should be addressed.The aim of this thesis is to evaluate public library websites for teenagers in Sweden, and to examine how well the websites address the developmental tasks and needs that teenagers have. The method used is website evaluation, one quantitative and one qualitative. A total of 60 public library sites for teenagers were evaluated, using 11 criteria based on Havighursts developmental tasks. The quantitative evaluation measured how many functions each website had per criteria, and showed that the majority of the sites had one or two functions for most of the criteria.

This Master Thesis aims to study and discuss the occurence of three concepts in some influential cultural policy documents which includes the UNESCO public library manifesto, the Swedish libraries act, the Swedish cultural policy objectives, and a study from the mid nineties which deals with the cultural policy. The questions asked are: -Do the documents mention democracy? In what way? -Do the documents mention the public sphere? In what way? -Do the documents mention information? In what way? -How can we understand the content of the documents through relevant theories about democracy, the public sphere and information? Theories about the information society are used, as well as theories from Jürgen Habermas, Herbert Schiller and Robert Dahl. The way of method is document studies and abduktion, with influences from hermeneutic theory. The analysis deals with the documents through these concepts: democracy, the public sphere and information and puts forward the content, or lack of content, about democracy in the analysed material.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine the identity, competences and professional development of corporate librarians. I have done an empirical study based on semi structured interviews with 11 information professionals who were working at Astra Zeneca at the time of the re-organizations of the company in 2009 which ultimately led to the closing of the libraries. I have also examined the views on competences and professional development of librarians in general, both in Sweden and in Denmark. I have used Thomas Brante?s theories on profession types as well as Anders Ørom?s theories on librarian identities as my theoretical framework.

This Bachelor ?s thesis is about the conversations and meetings that take place in the mobile library. The research questions will try to answer: What do the staff talk about with each other, what conversations do the staff engage in with their users and what do the users talk about amongst themselves? The thesis main question is trying to answer of what is characteristic for the mobile library ?s conversations and meetings. Is the mobile library as a meetingplace any different in comparison with the city library? Focus lies on the eveningtours of the mobile library and excludes those tours that service schools and learning-centers.

In the year 2003 the Swedish ministry of Justice drew up a communication about the incorporation of the European Unions directive about harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the Information Society, 2001/29/EG. The communications name is Ds 2003:35. This study examines the arguments in the communications from some of the copyright organisations in Sweden. For this study we have used five referral statements from organisations who represents different types of originators. We have studied their arguments and how well they argue for their theses.

The aim of this Masters thesis is to identify discourses within the school library field and to analyse which professional identities the discourses result in for school librarians. The empirical data consist of 71 articles from Swedish journals concerning school libraries and school librarians, between the years 2000-2003. The theory and method used is a discourse analysis which is inspired by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. This form of discourse analysis was chosen since it was useful when identity was the focus of study. The analysis is accomplished in three steps.

The aim of this qualitative study is to examine how users of talking books perceive the possibility of downloading talking books from home without visiting the library and how this affects them. Three research questions were formulated:How do talking book users reflect on their library usage?Have the subject's' library usage changed since introduction to the download service?How have users experienced the service?To answer these questions, five semi structured interviews were conducted with five different users of talking books in Sweden. All subjects were currently using download services which they had gained access to from their local public libraries. In analyzing the interviews, a theory established by Henrik Jochumsen and Casper Hvenegaard Rasmussen in Gør biblioteket en forskel (2000) was used.

The aim of this bachelor thesis is to find out how a number ofhospital librarians look at child and youth patients' reading and itspossible role in a mental and physical healing process. We alsoinvestigate the knowledge, strategies and thoughts the librarianshave on bibliotherapy.Qualitative interviews have been used and seven librarians, at twodifferent hospital libraries with children's and youth activities, wereinterviewed during November and December 2011. The analysis isbased on one theory; we use Sten Furhammar?s model whichincludes four different categories of reading.We can see, according to the librarians? answers, that the mostcommon function of the patients? reading can be explained throughtwo of Furhammar?s categories. Our respondents believe that thepatients mostly read to relax from heavy thoughts and situationswhich can be connected to the category impersonal experiencereading.

With the advent of a range of social networks, librarians all over the world have startedto ask themselves how this new technology can be used as a way to market theirlibraries. Today's information websites and search engines are difficult competitors forlibraries and information centers, and are forcing traditional information institutions tomarket themselves in new ways.Marketing theories have traditionally concerned themselves with money transactionsand marketing of specific services and/or products. Relationship marketing theories, onthe other hand, focus more on the relationship between the customer and the companythat produces the product or service. These two parties are seen as co-producers, andrelationship marketing theories tend to focus more on a win-win situation, than on thecompany gaining power of the customer. The relationship is the important thing, and thetheories concentrate to a great extent on how to nourish these relationships.This paper is a discussion about whether Facebook as a social network is a usable toolfor library marketing.

The aim of this thesis is to study how the recent introduction of video games in Swedish public libraries compares to past introductions of other medias, namely music records, sequential art, manga (Japanese comics), and films on video. In what ways does the introduction of video games differ from the other examples of introductions and in what ways are they alike? In what manner have the medias been introduced? How does the librarians views on video games differ from their views on other medias? The purpose of doing this is that by investigating how new medias have been evaluated in the past, we might gain an understanding of how the introduction of video games links into that tradition. Theoretically, this thesis is grounded in Sanna Talja?s theory of the interpretative repertoires of the music library.

The Internet has played an important role for libraries giving them a means of fulfilling their democratic mission of giving equal access to everyone, including people with disabilities. In order to achieve this it is of the utmost importance that they ensure that their web sites are accessible. In this masters thesis we have examined to what extent the web sites are accessible. The thesis is based on theories of human-computer interaction, information architecture, pedagogy and a checklist. The checklist is derived from established international guidelines from W3C, which has been adapted to, and is used by Swedish public authorities to achieve the mission of a ?24-hour authority?.

The aim of this thesis was to study librarians approach upon reference questions and available resources and also to find out if there is any connection between the nature of the reference question and the choice of resource. The purpose was also to give a deeper understanding of the reference work. Nine librarians were given ten reference questions and their reference work was tape recorded. The study was completed with seven interviews sent by email. Some of the reflections were translated under the headlines of form, subject, time, language and availability.

This thesis deals with questions about competences and qualities that librarians inpublic libraries find that they need to be qualified suppliers of literature (books andmagazines).Our aim is to problematize the competence of the profession in relation to promotingliterature, knowledge in literature and reading habits. We want to know what librariansthemselves think about their own competences when it comes to supplying andpromoting literature. Does it have to be a leisure interest or do they get the possibility toread during working hours?What do librarians think it means to be a qualified promotor of literature and how dothey acquire the right competence? Do they believe that their competence correspondswith the occupational requirements? How much of their knowledge about literature andpromoting literature comes from personal interest and commitment?We primarily used the theories about competence by Per-Erik Ellström. One of thetheories is the one of implicit and explicit knowledge.

This study is about fourteen-year-old boys, who are not interested in reading. It deals with what thoughts and feelings some boys have around books, reading and libraries. Further the study investigates the boys' leisure activities and their making of identities. The study is built on interviews among twelve boys in a secondary school. The result is compared to earlier reports and research.