This thesis applies a discourse theoretical approach in order to examine in whatways and with what possible meanings the library at KVINFO participates in the overall gender discourse in society. This means that our reading takes place at a metatheoretical level, focussing on the library as a constructor of meaning in relation to society's gender discourse.Besides the actual reading, the thesis argues for the fruitfulness of using both a discourse theoretical and a feministic perspective in the field of Library and Information Science. By looking at libraries in general through a lens provided by these perspectives, libraries are staged as battlegrounds for competing discourses,that attempt to promote its particular knowledge claim on how reality should be perceived.The reading shows that it is possible to perceive the library at KVINFO as amaterial articulation that takes shape by and is part in a feministic counterdiscourse against the masculinistic hegemonic discourse, which throughout ?hisstory? has positioned women as ?the other?, and established men as the normative category in society, including the libraries. Through its practise KVINFO has contributed to a change in the collective identity ascribed to women.

The purpose of this essay is to examine the everyday beliefs about mental illness surrounding the disease and how these are expressed and affects the sick life and identity. The focus is on the sick perspective, where a concept of norms, normalization and taboo forms a basis in the use of materials, which here consists of qualitative interviews and Internet forums. This is analyzed and then discussed with the help from structuralism and poststructuralism approach, where I mainly refer to the social anthropologist Mary Douglas, ethnologist Lars-Eric Jönsson and philosopher Michael Foucault. In the discussion vented even historical aspects of the subject and how these might have followed in our time and how beliefs about mental illness is created and maintained by the norms within a society / culture including the sick..

Sonja Åkesson is one of Sweden?s most well known poets. Her most productive period was from 1957 to 1977, and besides poetry she wrote novels and drama. Today, Sonja Åkesson is famous for criticizing society, mostly in a feministic way. But she was not aware of her critical approach until she became successful among her feministic readers in 1960, with poems like ?Äktenskapsfrågan? and ?Självbiografi (replik till Ferlinghetti)?.This essay examines professor Yvonne Hirdman?s theory about women?s inferior position in relation to men?s between 1930-1960 in Sweden.

AbstractSouth Africa is a country where apartheid has created a segregated population and the countrys cultural traditions affects the human situations in a unique way. Equalities between gender, class and ethnicity is a main focus for female activists in their work to give the exposed population tools and knowledges to stand up for themselves to cope with the unbalanced structure. This examination paper is done in a qualitative case study in South Africa. The content consists of thourough descriptions of how the society is percieved by four different people, explained by feministic theories and former research that is connected to the papers purpose and question formulations. The purpose of this paper is to examine how Sikhula Sonke, a women´s movement in South Africa looks at the female?s situation in the society and how they are going about their work to improve social equality.

AbstractThis paper is a study in press reception with the intent to examine how twelve female actionheroes have been portrayed in Swedish media between 1974 ? 2006. The purpose is to discern patterns and differences in how the female movie character is received by their contemporary journalists and to relate their views to social and gender related theories. The female actionhero is an independent and brutal character, often alone and without a mother or a child. This separates her from typical female roles, which historically been characterized by passivity, fear and dependency on the male characters in the movie. The female actionhero as a character opens up for complex reception. One perspective in the research identifies the independent woman as a feministic icon.

This thesis highlights starting points underlying the notions of two feminist utopians, Christine de Pizan and Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In approaching their texts, it focuses on the notions central to understand their writings. These would be historical, social, and cultural contexts. Defining concepts as utopian in its varying forms and feminism has been of significance. A feministic approach grounded in Simone de Beauvoirs philosophical phenomenology in the study of feministic utopia's visibility, has contributed to the understanding of the power structures to which women are tethered. In order to understand the way women are presented, it has become obvious that The Book of the City of Ladies and Herland are literary works that are related not only by their authors? background and personality but by the society in which they lived. Through their engagement in the contemporary intellectual debate on all social planes, both authors contributed to shifting the focus of their own contemporary notions of a woman to the notion of a woman equal to men. Woman, in Christine de Pizans utopia, is given specific properties and through themes of issues given meaning. She is not free in the sense that Simone de Beauvoir says.  She has a broader repertoire than was historically assigned, but her freedom is not arbitrary, contingent, and temporary and judged by her actions.

AbstractThe purpose of this essay was to study women?s and men?s place in the room, the public room or the private room, in the five best sold picture books written by Astrid Lindgren and the analysis was done with a feministic perspective. A lot of children read Astrid Lindgren?s picture books and therefore this might influence what?s female and masculine. The five best sold picture books written by Astrid Lindgren is: 1) Känner du Pippi Långstrump 2) Den där Emil 3)Visst kan Lotta cykla 4) Nils Karlsson-Pyssling flyttar in 5) Kajsa Kavat hjälper mormor.

My aim with this essay is to examine the relationship between identity positions and spatial positions in Jean Rhys novel Wide Sargasso Sea (1966). Through this I wish to show how Wide Sargasso Sea problematize the analytical cathegory "women", as well as classic western canon, and feministic eurocentric readings of the novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte to which Wide Sargasso Sea correspond..

The goal of this essay is to analyse how women belonging to a right wing political discourse talk about feminism and equality. This analysis will be used to determine if right wing feminism exists. The analysis is based on Laclau and Mouffe´s  discourse theory as the primary base. The focus is articulation, antagonism and hegmony; the central terms of Laclau and Moffe´s theroy. The material consists of five interviews with representatives of women wings of liberal political in Sweaden; Liberala kvinnor, Centerkvinnor and Moderatkvinnor.The study shows that there are different opinions regarding feminism in the liberal political discouse, and that those opinions have an antagonistic relationship.

This thesis sets out to examine how feminist struggle can be negotiated, defined and motivated. By using Oral history as a theoretical and methodological framework, three persons narrative are being constructed, explored and discussed throughout the thesis. All the interviewees define themselves as women and feminists and have all practised music in different separatist rock and pop-groups from 1970 to present. Themes as music as political action, and separatism for persons who define themselves as women are discussed. The tree informants agree about some feministic goals such as equality and the right to be able to play and perform music regardless of gender identity, although the means to reach these goals are formulated differently. .

The goal of this essay is to analyse how women belonging to a right wing political discourse talk about feminism and equality. This analysis will be used to determine if right wing feminism exists. The analysis is based on Laclau and Mouffe´s  discourse theory as the primary base. The focus is articulation, antagonism and hegmony; the central terms of Laclau and Moffe´s theroy. The material consists of five interviews with representatives of women wings of liberal political in Sweaden; Liberala kvinnor, Centerkvinnor and Moderatkvinnor.The study shows that there are different opinions regarding feminism in the liberal political discouse, and that those opinions have an antagonistic relationship.

I syfte att undersöka om, och i så fall hur, förskollärare arbetar med djuretik som en värderingsfråga undersöks (1) förskollärares tolkning av läroplanens skrivning om ?respekt för allt levande?, (2) hur förskollärare arbetar med värderingsfrågan djuretik och (3) vilken hänsyn de tar till läroplanens krav på saklighet och allsidighet i detta arbete. Empirin bygger på kvalitativa intervjuer med sex förskollärare varav 3 är vegetarianer. Analysen baseras på poststrukturalistisk teori och teori om den dolda läroplanen. Informanterna anger att de arbetar med djuretik i ringa omfattning men visar också att förskollärarna förmedlar omedvetna budskap om djuretik.

In this essay a conclusion about the way female characters are portrayed in fantasy novels will be attempted through an analysis of one selected female character from each selected novel. The works that have been chosen are; J.R.R. Tolkien?s The Lord of the Rings, Robert Jordan?s The Eye of the World and A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin.The analysis will be done with the help of examples and theories from both feministic criticism and gender studies.

The aim of this thesis is to examine how five works of fiction about anorexia and bulimia have been received in Swedish daily press reviews. The investigation is based on 60 reviews, which are analysed with a qualitative method consisting of close-reading and where a feministic perspective is used. The main question concerns how and to which extent the basis of valuation in the reviews is effected by the fact that the books describe a primary female world of experiences. The investigation shows, among other things, that many reviewers consider the books about eating disorders to be too many. They categorize the books about anorexia and bulimia as a genre of its own and place the books into the literary system principally by referring to other books about anorexia and bulimia.

The purpose of this essay is to analyse how medial representations in a specific cultural debate expresses thoughts about gender, power and speech. The debate in question took place in Sweden 2010 and was about an inspection of sexual harassments in the Swedish acting area, made by Sveriges Radio, Ekot. This essay examines the made representations of the debate, with a feministic point of view and concludes that a male gaze shapes the form of speech and gives the debate a discourse sort of reasoning about gender. The special discourse formatted in the examined area contains a certain conception of power and the structure of power, which is also explained by the male gaze and the meaning of post-feminism..