The following study was undertaken in the spring of 2005 in Helsingborg, Sweden.It presents a study of the experience and values six young couples have related to parenting and gender equality. Twelwe people, six women and six men, were interviewed about the above mentioned topics related to their new found role as parents. How did these women and men choose to assign or elaborate their role as parents in terms of household chores and parental leave? Did they consider their parenthood to be equal or did they feel that their role as parents had already been assigned based on their gender? What were the decisive factors, if any, that determined their parenting roles?Although this study is relatively limited, the results are compatible with other published studies and indicate that young parents of today, without consideration to their gender, have a traditional view on parenting. The study also indicates that the attitudes seem to be established by traditional values, norms as well as sexualgender.

This research aim was to examine the relationship between the choice of lunch dish, level of education, gender and age of the participants. The understanding of diet and it´s influence on health was also of interest to the research, as was cooking interest and travel habits. The goal was to demonstrate how these factors affect the adult individuals in their choice of lunch. A questionnaire was filled in by 99 guests in a chosen restaurant. The results show that many of these factors influence the choice of dish, especially those related to gender.

A carnival can not be stopped! A design pedagogical study of children and norms In Basel, the only Protestant carnival in Europe takes place. The carnival is called Fasnacht. For three days, there is a wild and uninhibited play with tradition, crossing borders and social criticism.The aim of this thesis is to expand the understanding of the concept of the carnival, and how to use it for an educational purpose. Three children from Basel have been involved in an workshop where they designed and talked about norms and power structures through the carnivalesque principle. The study is based on the questions: How can you use the carnival as a starting point for designing and talking about norms and power structures together with children? And; How can the design process support such a project? To spot this, I made arrangements for a design educational project.

Income support is granted to those who are not by themselves or in any other way able toachieve a decent standard of living. Assessment of entitlement to income support is based onan individual evaluation and equal treatment (Kjellbom, 2009). Administrators of economicaid should therefore not judge clients differently depending on, for example, gender. The aimof this study was to commence from a gender perspective in understanding howadministrators of economic aid think of equality and inequality between the sexes whenheterosexual couples apply for income support. Based on this objective we arrived at twomain formulations of questions; how administrators of economic aid deliberate aroundequality and inequality between sexes in connection to applications for financial support, aswell as which variables in organisations sustain or discourage inequalities between genders inaid management.

Even though discrimination of gender in schools and general workplaces is prohibited by Swedish law, there are reports and witness accounts that suggest that discrimination, such as sexual harassment, still exist in Swedish schools.The main purpose with this essay is to look into how questions concerning gender related issues and equality between the sexes is treated in the schools governmental directives, and in textbooks, such trying to examine in what way these questions are addressed in schools. I will answer the following:In what way and to what extent do the governmental directives bring up questions concerning gender related issues and equality, and how are the teachers governed into teaching these matters?Has there been any change concerning these matters between Lgr-80 and Lpo-94?What is written in textbooks in social studies about gender rôle and equality and to what extent do they follow the curriculum?Is there any visible change in textbooks written after Lgr-80 and Lpo-94?In order to answer these questions I will analyze the curricula, Lgr-80 and Lpo-94, and textbooks in social studies written on the basis of these curricula.The study showed a more evident governing towards an active teaching and mentoring the students to equality between the sexes, in Lgr-80 than in Lpo-94. The textbooks followed above all Lgr-80 in three of four cases and in the fourth case the curriculum was not followed at all..

The purpose of this study was to examine how girls and boys are described by social workersin psycho-social assessments in child and adolescent psychiatry. The questions at issue wereif girls and boys are described in different ways and if gender related patterns could be found.The study was both qualitative and quantitative. I used textual analysis as a method anddiscourse analysis as theory.Results: Sexes were generally described differently. Girls are depicted from how they are andhow they look and boys are described by what they do and their behaviour. The mother isdescribed as the person who is most responsible for children of both sexes.

This study shows how social workers reason about the concepts of gender, gender roles and equality and if these arguments reinforce heteronormativity that could affect the ability of same-sex couples to adopt children. The reasoning regarding equality indicates a difference between heterosexual couples and same-sex couples. What emerges in the study is that the social workers reasoning can be explained with that they have been imbued by heteronormativity. Heteronormativity becomes a contributing part of how same-sex couples are seen in the adoption process. Arguments for equality, which erase stereotypes, do not apply in the same way for same-sex couples as for heterosexual couples.

The thesis explores representations of fatherhood in the Swedish blog 'Hemliga pappan' ('Secret/Anonymous Daddy'). The purpose is to identify three themes in the blog material; The Father, The Son and The Partner. I have performed this study using discourse analysis as methodological tool and Critical Studies on Masculinities and Fatherhood as theoretic approach. The theories are Social Constructionist and consist of sociologists and socio-psychologists as Connell, Hearn and Johansson. Important theoretic concepts are the presence and absence of the father as well as hegemonic masculinity.

This qualitative study aims to highlight if there are any gender difference in social workers reasoning about a particular case. To achieve a deeper understanding we had to explain and understand our respondent?s answers, primarily from a gender perspective, but also from a power perspective. Our questions were: how does social worker reasoning about a particular case? How can we understand the social workers answer from a gender- and power perspective? The method consisted of a construct case and of semi-structured interviews.

Rules on parental leave have over the years been the subject of several gender debates. The big question has particularly been whether a further individualization of the days should be established. Sweden is a relatively equal country but differences still exist between men and women in the labor market, such as differences in wages. A fact that is considered encouraging for this is the uneven distribution of parental leave between men and women. It has now been nearly 40 years since the introduction of the first parental insurance but we have still not achieved gender equality in working life which was the main purpose.The main purpose of this essay is to study the motives for the proposal of individualized parental leave, and in addition examine how this change of rules could impact on gender equality in the work place.

The purpose with this thesis was to study the special pedagogical perspectives that stood out in documents written by the special teachers in preschool. In order to maintain the thesis research questions a text analysis was carried out on the document ?Handledningssamtal? that was used by the special teachers in their contact with the teachers in preschool. The documents were analyzed based in the special educational perspectives and the results and measures from the analysis were divided into three levels; individual, group and organizational level. Finally a study of the connection between the analysis and the measures was carried out and the result was reported in a typology schedule inspired by earlier research.

Abstract The purpose of the study is to examine how children perceive the relation between play and sex and analyse it from a gender perspective. This by answering the questions: "Is the children?s choice of place, materials and company in play dependent on gender?" and "Is there a significant difference between the sexes and/or ages?" The study was done through twelve focusgroup interviews with three children in each group except two groups of two children in each. Eight boys and nine girls of six years old and nine boys and eight girls of nine years old were interviewed. Boys and girls were interviewed in separate groups and the questions were open ended and followed up.

The purpose of this Masters thesis is to examine how gender patterns are described in the modern picture book. Focus is on the description of men and women and their emotions and living conditions. Do the descriptions follow stereotypes in the form of binary opposites strong/weak, active/passive etc. in which one component of the pair, often associated with masculinity, is privileged or are there examples of breach of normative gender? The analysis is based upon forty of 149 picture books that are presented in a children's book catalogue published by The Swedish National Council for Cultural Affairs Statens kulturråd, in the year of 2000.

Alcohol and drug abuse is something that undoubtedly exists in our society today. Our interest in this area was inspired by an earlier study of the influence of socialization on these dependencies. From this we developed new hypotheses concerning men and women?s drug and alcohol abuse. The main purpose of this study was to highlight the experiences and reflections of six women and seven men on their own alcohol or drug abuse.

Scientists argue that gender affects foreign policy and security policy, that ideas of gender are inconstant and that there is a lack of feminist perspectives in International Relations. The changes seen in the global security context may have challenged the way politicians and scientists understand war and its impacts, and led to increased gender awareness.Using securitization theory and feminist international relations theory, the aim is to examine how women and men are being spoken of in the Swedish foreign policy discourse regarding participation in the UN-led stabilization mission Minusma in Mali. By applying a feminist perspective on the securitization process, the intention is to increase the knowledge of whether there is gender awareness in this context.The result shows that there is limited gender awareness. There is minor consideration for the conflict?s different implications on the situation for women and men.