The purpose of this study is to examine the medial depiction of Muslims in the case of Pastor Terry Jones' intention to burn the Quran. Our study is based on theoretical framework regarding an alleged clash of civilizations, how that leads to global conflicts and controls the world politics. It?s also based on the western way of characterize Muslims as violent, irrational human beings, and how mass media have a tendency to depict Muslims as ?the others?. The questions we aim to seek answers to are: How were Muslims portrayed in CNN's and Al-Jazeera's reporting regarding Terry Jones plan to burn the Quran? Which discourses exist about Muslims in each news channel and what are the main differences between them? The qualitative method used is a critical discourse analysis on empirical data consistently of twelve articles.

Sweden is today a country with ethnic, cultural and religious diversity. My aim in this study is to study what view of Islam and Muslims that students at a Catholic school in Stockholm have. The reason why Catholic schools are interesting to study is that previous research has showed that Muslim students around Europe often attend catholic schools as they are regarded as more tolerant towards religion. This study is based on a questionnaire and personal interviews with upper secondary students at the Catholic school in Stockholm. The result is compared with previous research on students of the same age group (12-15 years).

This paper studies three Swedish textbooks for the A-course in religious studies, in the Swedish equivalency of high school, to see if the image of Islam and Muslims presented is diverse or homogeneous and exotic. The purpose of the study is to see whether or not the religious studies can contribute to the forming of islamophobic beliefs in pupils. Studies have shown that islamophobia is widespread in Sweden, therefore it could be interesting to see if the schools play any part in the forming or spreading of islamophobic views. The conclusion reached is that this cannot be excluded as a possibility. There are still some textbooks that present Muslims in a homogeneous and exotic manner to some degree.

This study concerns ways in which Muslims in Sweden construct their identities. The theoretical approach of the study is based on the assumption that people construct their identities through narratives. Circumstances such as time, place, and relationships affect how narratives are told and therefore how we perceive ourselves and the world around us.In the wake of 11th of September 2001, the old colonial narrative of ?the West vs. the East? has become powerful, and makes many question the possibility of successfully integrating Muslims immigrants in Western countries.

This is a sociological study of religion that examines how gender and female Muslim identity is expressed during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan in the swedish paper Dagens Nyheter in the year 1951, 1989 and 2009. The aim is to see who creates the image of Islam and Muslims in general and in particular the image of the Muslim woman and whose Islam is given space in the article material. The picture has changed with the increase in immigration from Muslim countries and that we have gone from a modern to a late modern society in which other patterns shape our identity. The historical summary of the paper Dagens Nyheter illustrates how the Swedish society is formed in relation to Islam and Muslims. It provides a deeper understanding of the problems in the swedish multicultural society today..

There are over 1,5 billion Muslims living on earth and the religion is one of the world´s most increasing. Sweden is a country with a cultural diversity where about 300 000 Muslims lived in 1999. Today, the requirement for knowledge about caring for Muslims and the need of culturally competent nursing care are increasing.The aim of this study was to define cultural factors which the nurse has to recognize to be able to give culturally competent care to the Muslim patient. The method that has been used was a The Sunrise Model, which illustrates Leininger´s theory of culture care diversity and universality, provides a theoretical framework for the study. The results are presented on the basis of Leininger´s three cultural factors; cultural values, beliefs and lifeways.

Previous research shows that Sweden has developed into a segregated society, although it has never been completely homogeneous. A greater integration led to vast number of diverse cultures and religions; therefore the Muslim custom came closer to the Swedish society.The purpose of this thesis is to study how Muslims were portrayed during the incident in Landskrona in March 29 2010 and the bomb threat in Gothenburg in October 31 2010. The study also focused on what Muslims themselves think about the news reporting that followed.We based our study on a qualitative textual analysis and a dialogue with selected people. Six news articles from various newspapers were analyzed and a total of eight persons were included in the dialogues. The study shows that news reporting has been simplified and misleading.During the incident in Lanskrona the newspapers headlined it as a murder even though the accused had not yet been sentenced at the time.

The aim of this paper is to study in which contexts Muslims and Islam are represented in newspaper- articles in the Swedish press. The research questions are formulated as follow: In what contexts are Muslims and Islam represented in Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter during the years 2011-2013 ?Does the newspaper-articles in Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter reflect open or closed attitudes about Islam?  My material compromises twenty-five newspaper- articles from the newspapers Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter during the years 2011-2013. The material became a subject for qualitative content analysis. This resulted in four categories, the categories were formed from the content of the newspaper-articles. The categories are: (1) Violence / Terrorism, (2) Extremist / Fundamentalist, (3) Islamic god´s state / government / Islamism and (4) Others.

The purpose of this essay was to examine the role of religious beliefs, actions and practice in young people's own description of their identity. An additional goal was to examine how young people describe their identity in relation to their primary and secondary socialization. A qualitative method was used with semi - structured interviews and six young people between the ages of 18 and 23 were interviewed.            The interview results show that three out of the six young people think of themselves as religious while the remaining three emphasize that they are secularized Muslims. The results also show that the young people emphasize that the celebration of feasts in the family is the main focus.  Four out of the six young people point out that they are themselves among friends, their families and in the mosque, while the remaining two feel a communion with their Muslim friends and people in the mosque.       Three out of the six young people consume alcohol and eat pork, while the remaining three refrain from this. The young people emphasize that their beliefs are a personal matter between themselves and God, and that their actions don't define them as being Muslims or non-Muslims..

The study should be seen as an attempt to examine how a group of selected Muslims from seven different cities in Sweden relate to Lars Vilks?s drawings of the prophet Muhammed (also called the roundabout dog) and if they feel that their attitude towards the drawings has changed during the seven years that have passed since the first drawing was published in the newspaper Närkes Allehanda in 2007. To understand these selected Muslims? approach, experiences and feelings in regards to the drawings I examine in what aspect they find the drawings provocative. I also examine what consequences Vilks?s roundabout dog-project might have had  for individual Muslims in Sweden.

Muslims and islam are unquestionably a part of European social life. In recent times, however, different events, such as the enlargement of the EU and the fact that Muslims to a higher extent demand their rights, have brought a number of questions to the fore concerning Muslims and islam in Europe. Moreover, we can see an increasing level of islamophobia in contemporary Europe, but also that the EU has launched several programs to increase both the diversity and the unity throughout the Union and to combat islamophobia. However, most of these programs focus on islam as religion and Muslims in general, and such a narrow viewpoint runs the risk of missing important issues.In this new context it would be interesting to widen the scope and ask what place not only the muslim community and islam, but also sharia (an important element in islam), may have in future Europe ? especially when it comes to muslim identity?My main objects are to see how the concept of sharia is constructed in the debates in the European Parliament, how that discourse relates to a social practice ? the increasing islamophobic ideas in Europe ? and what effect this may have on muslim identity in a European context.The results shows that the Parliament constructs sharia as, for example, something archaic, threatening, inhuman and misogynistic.

Muslims and islam are unquestionably a part of European social life. In recent times, however, different events, such as the enlargement of the EU and the fact that Muslims to a higher extent demand their rights, have brought a number of questions to the fore concerning Muslims and islam in Europe. Moreover, we can see an increasing level of islamophobia in contemporary Europe, but also that the EU has launched several programs to increase both the diversity and the unity throughout the Union and to combat islamophobia. However, most of these programs focus on islam as religion and Muslims in general, and such a narrow viewpoint runs the risk of missing important issues.In this new context it would be interesting to widen the scope and ask what place not only the muslim community and islam, but also sharia (an important element in islam), may have in future Europe ? especially when it comes to muslim identity?My main objects are to see how the concept of sharia is constructed in the debates in the European Parliament, how that discourse relates to a social practice ? the increasing islamophobic ideas in Europe ? and what effect this may have on muslim identity in a European context.The results shows that the Parliament constructs sharia as, for example, something archaic, threatening, inhuman and misogynistic.

Research shows that Muslims are often reproduced within the context that reinforces stereotyping of Muslims, see for example Otterbeck and Schielke. They are often regarded as a collective group with no distinct individuals and thereby the Islamic religiosity is portrayed as different and deviant from the more secular and private practiced Protestantism that is a common belief in Sweden.The purpose of this work is to study the already existing representation of Muslim women in a Western context, i.e. Muslim women in Sweden. This is done through an analysis of two ethnographic interviews and observational studies, written by researchers in Sweden (Karlsson Minganti and Sultan Sjöqvist) to investigate the existence of an "us and them" mindset. The two ethnographic studies which are analyzed in this work, deal with different types of Muslims: women who have been Muslims since birth and converted Muslim women.

This thesis examines the Swedish Democrats relationship to an islamophobic worldview. The party developed from the racist party Bevara Sverige Svenskt (Keep Sweden Swedish) and is today the third largest party in Sweden, which gives them a powerful position in the society. It is therefore important to investigate their view on minorities, and in this case Muslims. In this thesis I examine the Swedish Democrat?s material during the election campaign the years of 2006, 2010 and 2014 using Ernesto Laclau?s and Chantal Mouffe?s discourse theory.

The purpose of the thesis is to examine the thoughts and opinions of a selected group of people regarding the terrorist attack that occurred in Stockholm 12/11-2010. This study has been conducted through the method of focus group interview. The study was methodologically and theoretically inspired by Grounded Theory, which simply means that the participants' opinions have formed the theory of the study. As a result of the study, we can see that the main focus of the discussion held by the participants was through a we and them thinking-perspective. Furthermore, the study reveals that the participants tried to include who we (Muslims) are, and to exclude who they (non Muslims) are, while arguing in the discussion. Another definition is the one of here and there, where the participants defined terrorism and what causes it. Finally, media's role was discussed in relation to the creation of the medie-muslim. To explain the participants' perceptive, part of Appadurai?s Fear of small numbers and part of Brune?s Dark magic in the white media was used..