This bachelor?s thesis examines the ideas behind the phenomenon art exhibitions in public libraries. My interest is to see if and how the art exhibitions can support the libraries in being a public sphere in Jürgen Habermas? sense, open for all citizens and their opinions. My study therefore has two purposes.

The aim of this master thesis has been to investigate discussions about public access to Internet in public libraries. Areas of interest were the debate in Sweden as well as in the United States. The approach was qualitative and questionnaires were distributed by e-mail to a number of Swedish public libraries. The results from the survey were then supplemented with a theoretical background and a literature study. The usable questionnaires obtained from 20 libraries showed a rather uniform approach among the Swedish librarians of how the Internet is best provided by public libraries.

This study examines the cultural place and status of video and computer games in the Swedish public library. Using works on popular culture and the theories of Pierre Bourdieu, this study employs quantitative methods, as well as textual analysis, to analyze the results of an online questionnaire with 19 questions focusing on selection criteria, shelf placement, perceived competence, as well as reasoning for having or not having these games in the library. 286 out of the 440 libraries contacted is participating in the study, and the libraries consist exclusively of public libraries in Sweden that are found in the database of the Royal Library.The results of this study show that a larger number of libraries than previously indicated have started to provide electronic games to their patrons. At the same time, patterns in the data and comments suggests that these games in many cases still do not enjoy the same level of cultural recognition as other media. Indicative of this is the way most libraries seem to focus on the medium being exclusively for their young patrons, with seem-ingly very little in the way of investment for adults.

The subject this thesis will investigate concerns the matter of how political ideologies exist within public libraries with a focus on the democratic ideal. Public libraries are part of the political system and we want to show how political ideologies take their shape in public libraries and the possible consequences of this. With the help of three major political ideologies, liberalism, conservatism and socialism we investigate how the democratic ideals of these ideologies are expressed in documents that describes activities the libraries will and have performed. In order to identify these ideologies we use discourses in cultural policy as a bridge between the investigated documents and the political ideologies. As an analytical tool we have developed a model that describes the relation between text, discourse and ideology which we use in our analysis.

Social exclusion is a problem in today?s society that we feel public libraries can help resolve since they are based on the idea of equality and openness. The purpose of this essay is to examine how public librarians think and reason about the concept ?integration? as well as what role public libraries can play in immigrants? integration process. With Jose Alberto Diaz? theory on the integration process, and Marianne Andersson and Dorte Skot-Hansen?s model for analysis of the local library profile as theoretical framework, we analyzed the responses from two qualitative interviews in small groups of 2-3 librarians from two different public libraries.

This study investigates the use of the social network Facebook among 67 Swedish libraries; 27 academic libraries and 40 public libraries. Data is collected through an analysis of the libraries? Facebook pages and through an email survey. To analyze the data, a series of statistical analyses were performed.The results indicate that the public libraries more actively posted Facebook updates than the academic libraries and that the libraries that had a policy for use of Facebook/social media more actively posted updates than those libraries that did not have such policy. The libraries use Facebook mainly to post links and photos and to announce events, provide book recommendations, and to emphasize special occasions.

This thesis examines art exhibitions, literature events and music events in public libraries in Sweden. The aim is to study which event occurs most in the libraries in Sweden. I also examine who takes responsibility for the events, who the libraries engage, how much the events cost, and how often the libraries have the events. I also study Swedish cultural politics in purpose to see if the libraries follow the aims and directions decided by the Swedish government. One aim of the Swedish culture politic is to give every citizen in Sweden the same possibility to experience culture, no matter where they live.

This masters thesis is a study of official political documents in order to discuss privatisation and the Swedish public libraries. In the 1990s public libraries became placed on contractors, and that was said to be one form of privatisation. The main issue for this study concerns driving forces and obstacles for privatisation of public libraries. Another issue concerns advantages and risks. We will also discuss how the future of public libraries will be in this context.

The aim of this Masters thesis is to examine the importance of public libraries for individuals in their everyday life and to study the differences in views between the individuals. Questions posed in this study are: What do public libraries mean to individuals? Which differences between individuals views of the public library are to be found? What is the reason for differences to occur? The analysis is based upon qualitative interviews with six persons, four women and two men between 31 and 55 years of age. The theoretical starting points are Anderson and Skot-Hansens theory of four different roles of public libraries and Bourdieus theory of lifestyle. The study acts on a hermeneutic attitude.

The main purpose of this master thesis is to give the reader a picture of the experience of art and of its room in the public libraries, but above all to examine the phenomenon temporary art exhibitions in public libraries in the county of Östergötland. The study is limited to a specific activity of art, namely temporary exhibitions in libraries. Geographically, the investigation is limited to the public libraries and their branch libraries in Östergötland. Time concentrates on the present situation in 2000 and 2001. Methodologies are partly observations in some libraries, partly qualitative questionnaires to all primary libraries and their affiliates in Östergötland.

The aim of this two years master's thesis is to examine public librarians? views of their pedagogical role towards school children, and to illustrate the relationship between public libraries and schools as a background for the role of the public librarians. The theoretical framework is Carol Cullier Kuhlthau?s theory of the roles of librarians as mediators in reference work (Levels of Mediation) and in education (Levels of Education). The main question of the study is: How do public librarians view their pedagogical role towards elementary school pupils and high school students? Related questions regarding the use of the public library for school purposes, the communication and cooperation between the public library and the schools, the difference between public libraries and school libraries and the librarians? view of pedagogical work are also made.The method used is qualitative interviews.

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.

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.

This bachelor thesis is a study about the change of the classificationsystems in Swedish libraries. The empirical data was collected through four qualitative interviews with both research and public libraries. The data was analyzed by the use of organizational theory based upon Joacim Hanssons book Libraries and identity: the role of institutional self-image and identity in emergence of new types of libraries. The empirical result points to a major change in how libraries and librarians look and work with their collections, it can also be said that the librarians do not seem to think that the users will be affected at all.The analysis was based on these issues: What positive and negative effects introducing DDC will there be on research- reflective public libraries?What will be the effects on the librarysector introducing the new classification system DDC?What will be the effects on the users introducing the new classification system DDC? .

A trend since the early 90?s has been that some public libraries offer a special shelf containing environmental information to the community, but it seems as though the subject has been overlooked by the literature and the science community. The purpose of this bachelor thesis is to study how three independent public libraries work with environmental information that is made available to the community. The following questions were addressed: 1) Which arguments can be found as to why the libraries offer this activity? 2) How does the environmental work at the public libraries look and what does it contain of? 3) Are there any similarities or differences in this work between the three libraries?To answer these questions interviews with librarians were carried out; observations were made to complement the interviews.