Today, "the digital library" is the common way of describing a managed collection of information, with associated services, stored in digital formats and accessible over a network. Digital libraries have mainly been developed at research libraries, but during the last few years public libraries have started to offer similar services.The aim of this Master's thesis is to study how the Swedish public libraries plan to develop their digital libraries according to their mission statements, and in what way they have implemented them at their web sites. 21 public libraries, the largest in each Swedish county, were investigated.The library mission statements are investigated to find out in what terms the digital libraries are described and to what extent. The library websites are examined with respect to what kind of digital services are offered, to what extent they supplement or replace the physical library, and if there are new digital services not found in the physical library.In most mission statements the digital library is referred to in sweeping terms like "IT activities" and "new media". However, a few of the libraries clearly regard the digital library as an important part of the future operations, speaking of it in well defined and extensive terms.The public library websites are relatively homogeneous when it comes to services supplementing physical library activities, like web access to the library catalogue and links to other library catalogues.

This bachelor thesis explores the library collaboration "HelGe-libraries" goals, guidelines and strategies for their resource sharing of library books and digital resources. The questions asked were: What does the resource sharing look like when it comes to media and services? What goals and guidelines do they have for the resource sharing? What common strategies do they have for the resource sharing? What challenges have they encountered with resource sharing and how have they dealt with them?The theoretical framework consists of Jennifer Rowleys theory of innovation strategies for libraries and Rosabeth Moss Kanters theory on the art of alliances. The method used to collect material was interviews and document analysis. Four informants were interviewed.My study concludes that the "HelGe-libraries" has formulated goals for their resource sharing and that the resource sharing is connected to their goals.

The purpose of this master?s thesis is to investigate children?s access to specific children?s activities at Swedish public libraries 2005. The thesis is based on literature studies and qualitative interviews with children?s librarians, library directors and local politicians at two demographically different libraries in Gothenburg.The sub questions are: What measures exist to promote children?s access to public libraries and children?s activities when it comes to: law and other political statements: different efforts on the state level and different efforts on the municipal level in the direct activity with children at public libraries? What driving forces and needs justify activities for children at public libraries? How will the responsible persons judge that the efforts are sufficient? The result of the study shows that children?s access to library activity has increased in the last couple of years due to reorganization, economic savings with closing down of library affiliates and because libraries have given priority to other things, like IT and new media. Children?s librarians have got new assignments and less time for children?s activity.The conclusion of our investigation is that children?s librarians are ambitious in their work, but unfortunately don?t give children?s library activity adequate resources.

The consumption of alcohol has stabilized in Sweden 2007, after several years of high increase. Despite the stabilization of the consumption the avaliability of alcohol has been raising, which constitute a big and in future years likely an increased risk in health among young people. The aim of the study was to describe how the staff on a secondary school works among pupils with alcohol prevention and promotion. Aquired knowledge are received from litterature, scentific articels and Internet to strength the relevance of the study. The school is an important arena in the work with alcoholprevention among pupils.

This study examines in which way literature is presented in four schoolbooks for the Swedish senior high school of today, compared to descriptions and selections in Swedish universities. The study covers two basic schoolbook categories used in the teaching of Swedish and comparative literature: anthologies and textbooks.The four anthologies structures and their joined canon are presented, and the text canon of 12 common writers is studied and compared to the corresponding text canon in the universities selection of texts to main courses in comparative literature. The four textbooks are analysed by close reading of the presentations of four different writers and their works, where the textbooks for the Swedish senior high school are viewed through the glass of literary guides used in Swedish universities.The study also analyses what literary perspective is present in the Swedish school principles for education in literature and display, through earlier didactic studies, a sketch of the classroom reality of education in literature.The study finds that the examined schoolbooks for the Swedish senior high school tend to, not only shorten the text length and amount of texts but also, simplify the selection and presentation of the writers production. This leads to certain fixed and, in some cases, almost stereotyped ?roles? that are assigned to the writers and limits their production.

The aim of the thesis is to study young peoples, defined as boys and girls between 14 and 16 years old, attitudes to library in two municipalities. Notwithstanding the fact that young people, and children, often is given priority in library work, the reality often seems to be another. Attitudes are founded primarily in childhood and therefore it is of great importance to examine how young people regard libraries. Besides studying former research about young people and libraries that has been performed on library and information science, we also have been using concepts and theories from social science. We give a brief outline of youth research and its development and look at official records and legislation to see if and in what context young people are mentioned.

The purpose of this Masters thesis is to investigate the role of link collections in Swedish public libraries mediation of Internet resources. The study is focusing on the effects on the contents and the structure in the link collections when the target group is immigrant users. This is done through literature studies completed with an examination of two link collections containing multi-cultural and multi-lingual material and qualitative interviews with the two librarians who are in charge of the collections. The major questions raised in this study are: What function do the link collections have for the public libraries? What is the difference in working with traditional, printed material compared to the work with Internet resources? And how are the selection of Internet resources and the structure of the link collections affected when the collection is intended for immigrant users? The main results are that link collections in public libraries can give a concrete form to political guidelines.

The purpose of this masters thesis is to examine the arguments that are being used when closing and establishing peoples libraries. During the 90:ies, in the community of Gothenburg, 4 public libraries were closed and another 3 public libraries were opened. A possible reason for this change lies in the reform from the city Committee that split the community of Gothenburg into 21 pieces; all with one centrally appointed political Committee. The library activity has since the reform was implemented got worse in some areas, foremost in the already neglected city sections, and better in some areas, which where able to establish new libraries. Argumentation analysis indicates that the arguments used at closure where mainly economical and neither the number nor relevance and validity of the arguments where good.

The aim of this master's thesis is to describe the visibility of the university libraries in the strategic documents from the actual universities to which they belong. And also, the image of themselves they send out, are examined. By examining different kinds of descriptions we want to get a clearer picture of how and in what amount the libraries are mentioned in highest level strategies. By doing this we expect to find out the libraries' strategic role in higher education and research. The research questions are: What role and function are assigned to the university libraries in strategies created by the schools' highest administrative levels? How do the libraries present themselves in their own strategies? The approach is cross sectional and the time frame is year 2008.

This masters thesis aims to investigate how upper secondary school pupils experience their information seeking in a school context without access to a school library. It is the pupils own thoughts and opinions about information seeking and criticism of the sources that is the main focus. The literature that has been used consists of material from research concerning youth and different aspects of information seeking such as the information seeking process, information seeking on the web, criticism of the sources and how pupils interact with other people in order to acquire information. The method that has been used is group interviews. Twelve pupils from an independent school without access to a school library have been interviewed in groups of three.

The purpose of this master?s thesis is to study resource allocation among district libraries within Stockholm?s City Library (SSB) on three different occasions ? 1996, 2001 and 2005 ? and to examine whether there exist any inconsistency between the state of the allocation of resources and what might be considered reasonable. During the course of the study, it became apparent that some measurements are more relevant than others when determining whether the allocation of resources is reasonably fair. The most relevant ratio is the share of net cost per capita in relation to population and the population?s composition of children, youngsters and persons with foreign background as a result of relevant political governing documents giving priority to these three groups.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the ancient library organisation in the Mediterranean area. The focus of the study is if they used catalogues, marked their material and their methods for shelving. During the ancient period the people used to write on clay tablets, parchment- or papyrusrolls and codex, which was significant for the organisation. The method, which I use, for the examination is based on criticism of the sources, how the modern scholars has interpreted ancient remains and texts. The study shows that the first evidence for library organisation is from Mesopotamia 2350 BC.

AbstractThe purpose with my study was to find out how students with physical difficulties are treated in school by teachers and other students and also if there are any differences between how teachers and students treat students with physical difficulties. I also wanted to see if there were any prejudices against students with physical disabilities from either students or teachers. If there are any prejudices, I wanted to know what kind it is that exists. When I went to school, I remember that I looked down on the students with physical difficulties because they were different. When I have been working in school as a teacher, I have seen students who pull away from students with difficulties.I chose to do the study at a higher grade school, because I have not been in such a high grade in school during my practice.

The aim of this essay is to examine fan culture?s role in Swedish public libraries. I have interviewed, via email, six librarians who encounter and use fan culture in their daily work. The theoretical elements of my essay are based on a modified set of theories by Dorte Skot-Hansen that identifies six ideal types of cultural political rationalities. My study reveals that fan culture is used in Swedish libraries as a tool in increasing user participation in library activities.

The main purpose of this thesis is to investigate how the societysystem in Austria has influenced the library system. The aim is toanalyse in what way these influences have changed during thegrowth and development of the public library system and how it isdisplayed in each separate library branch. The focus of myinvestigation has been the municipality public libraries in Vienna,and mainly the three libraries in the third district of the city. Themethod I have used is literature studies, examining and analysingsource material from the internal archive of the public libraries inVienna. I have also used the qualitative interview method in orderto examine the situation in the selected libraries Rabengasse,Erdbergstraße and Fasangasse.As there is no common library law, there are significantdifferences in the library structure in different parts of Austria andeach municipality decides how they want to prioritize the libraries.Since the public libraries of Vienna are well organized together inBüchereien Wien, the library structure in the separate librarybranches is coordinated.