The purpose of this paper has been to examine various ethnic stereotypes in two Swedish film adaptations of Astrid Lindgren?s character Pippi Longstocking. I have used a semiotic content analysis and postcolonial theory to investigate: 1) how the ethnic groups are represented in the different materials, 2) if there is a hegemonic relationship between the foreign group and one?s own group, 3) whether there has been a "decolonization" during the twenty years that separate the two films. This study has shown that, in the 1949 adaptation, primarily Africans were produced in a negative light and as biologically inferior in relation to the whites.

AbstractTitle: Dragshow on the seven seasNumber of pages: 51 (56 including enclosures)Author: Therése PlastrougiTutor: Ylva EkströmCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Fall 2007University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala UniversityPurpose/Aim: My main purpose with this paper is 1) to study how film as a media can subvert traditional gender constructions and 2) study the character of Elizabeth Swann in the trilogy Pirates of the Caribbean through four dimensions; Gender performance, Class, Desire and Power.Material/Method: My main material is the trilogy Pirates of the Caribbean. I have studied Elizabeth?s character based on semiotic and narratological methods.Main results: Film as a media possesses the full potential to change traditional gender roles, but the full subversion is denied due to the heterosexual matrix. Elizabeth?s character almost completes her subversive journey throughout the trilogy, but since she too is a victim of the heterosexual matrix, a full subversion is not possible.Key words: gender performance, class, desire, power, sex/gender, subversion, narratologic, semiotic, queer, feminism, pirates of the caribbean, intersectionality, parody.

Title: Women's best beautiful will never be good enough: a rethoric and semiotic analysis of four advertisements for beauty products.Because of the medias central role in peoples lives in the modern society we today live in, they have become a reference in peoples processes of making sence of their subsistences and environments. Commercial companies also want to present an as good image as possible of them towards the recipients through their marketing. Both parts can lead to a distorted picture of the real och everyday and norms and ideals easily form, for example about the correct way a woman should act and be, as the media affect which references should be made available for society.The purpose of this thesis is to examine how four advertisements for beauty products produce ideals and norms of beauty as well as construct and reconstruct femininity through the ways women are represented. The study will also contain the question about how rethoric and semiotic tools are used to strengthen the messages and sell the products. The following questions will be answered within this study:How is femininity being represented in the advertisements?How can the advertisements contribute to the creation of ideals and norms of beauty? How do the companies use rethoric and semiotic tools in the four advertisements to sell their products and/or strengthen their brands?The study will be executed with a qualitative rethoric and semiotic analysis and the theories applied to it are Mediatization theory, Envisionment theory as well as a theory about gender and femininity.   The foremost results of this study has been that women are represented as constantly striving towards a better beauty to be able to also feel better about themselves, gain better self-esteem and to have more fulfilled and successful lives.

Title: The representation of gender: A semiotic study of Tom Ford's Gucci campaign 2003 and Frida Gianninis Gucci Campaign 2013.Number of pages: 73 (79 including enclosures)Author: Sara AndréassonTutor: Anne-Marie Morhed Course: Media and Communication Studies D (2IV091) Period: VT 2013 University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Informatics and Media, Uppsala University.Purpose/ Aim: The aim of this study was to examine the representation of gender in advertising that has both men and women as the primary audience. The aim of the study was to investigate how Gucci has chosen to represent men and women in their advertising campaigns 2003 and 2013.Material/ Method: A semiotic analysis was performed by using three images from Gucci's spring/ summer campaign for Tom Ford in 2003, and three images from Gucci's spring/ summer campaign for Frida Giannini in 2013.Main result: The results showed that there was a clear difference between Ford and Gianninis ways of representing women and men in the two advertising campaigns. The women in Fords campaign 2003 are presented as sexual objects and represented by the male pornographic imagination and portrayed as sexual eye-catchers while the men are portrayed as addicted to sex. Frida Gianninis advertising images is a contrast of Ford pornographic portrayal of women. Giannini presents women as confident individuals while the man is represented as feminized and androgynous in his appearance. .

The purpose with this thesis is to analyse images in the confirmationbook Via Mystica from a gender perspective. By using two different ways to analyse the pictures, a content analysis and a semiotic picture analysis, the result was as follows: The pictures of men an women fortifies the construction of gender. The girls in the pictures are represented as caregivers and comforters, while the boys are represented as strong and tough. The four pictures from the semiotic picture analyses showed how easy it was to categorise the men and the women in the photos in opposing stereotypes. The women are percieved as weak and submissive while the men were either strong criminals or a strong hero.

The phenomenology of Gaston Bachelard holds that readers, or viewers, relate to spatial imagery through the use of age-old archetypes. These archetypes form a collective image-memory that is employed when reading space. One such image is the house. The house for Bachelard is, however, never solely an image, but constitutes a familiar space that becomes inscribed in our bodies through the repeated physical contact with this domestic space. The house teaches us to interact with space, and comes to inform the way that human beings understand images of space.

Studies among parents of children with disabilities have shown that they experience a higher level of parenting stress as well as a lower degree of wellbeing, compared to parents of children without disabilities. However, there is a need to further explore parents? experience on this matter within a Swedish context. The aim of the current study was to examine how parents of preschool children, with and without disabilities, in Västerbotten, experience the impact of their child. A sample of 67 parents of children with disabilities and 134 parents of children without disabilities took part in the questionnaire study.

Modern societies are generally becoming increasingly capitalist in nature and economies of these societies are thus likely to become more focused on consumer consumption. Advertising plays a vital role in contemporary society where we, as consumers and citizens, are surrounded by it everywhere we look and everywhere we go. This puts pressure on advertisers to become more creative and to explore new ways of marketing their products and services in an already saturated environment. We believe that the added pressure and the already established role of marketing in society make advertisements an interesting and telling object for analysis. This is particularly the case with regards to the concept of selling and marketing products that have qualities that are known to be less than beneficial for our health.This paper analyzes four commercial advertisements marketing beer; a product that we argue has qualities that can be seen as potentially bad for the health of individuals and for societies.

The purpose of this study is to see how men, women and children are made ??in the Ikea 2014 catalog, this from a gender perspective. It will also examine if gender stereotypes are seen and how equal the people in the images is produced.This essay is studied on the basis of gender theory and theories about stereotypes and how men, women and children are prepared in advertising and commercials. The method that was used during the analysis process was a qualitative semiotic method. The analysis tool that was used from the semiotic method was denotation, connotation and metonymy.The result of the study shows that the major part of the pictures that was analyzed was gender stereotypical and that a few of the pictures showed some kind of equality between men and women, both between grow ups and children.

Studies among parents of children with disabilities have shown that they experience a higher level of parenting stress as well as a lower degree of wellbeing, compared to parents of children without disabilities. However, there is a need to further explore parents? experience on this matter within a Swedish context. The aim of the current study was to examine how parents of preschool children, with and without disabilities, in Västerbotten, experience the impact of their child. A sample of 67 parents of children with disabilities and 134 parents of children without disabilities took part in the questionnaire study.

The purpose of this study is to investigate how homosexuality and homosexual adoptions are manifested in children's comic "Bamse" and study the result in the light of a brief background about the western society and gay history. The study has a historical gender perspective and focus homosexuality primarily in modern times. Drawing on critical theory and semiotic analysis, the study shows how ideas and ideology surrounding same-sex relations and parenting are negotiated in the ?Bamse? comic. 2010 was the year when the Bamse cartoon took a step into the gender debate and introduced two gay rabbits who adopted an infant.The study shows that despite the obvious intent to anchor homosexuality as normal and integrated in the society there are hidden ideologies that reveals homosexuality as abnormal and excluded.

Studies among parents of children with disabilities have shown that they experience a higher level of parenting stress as well as a lower degree of wellbeing, compared to parents of children without disabilities. However, there is a need to further explore parents? experience on this matter within a Swedish context. The aim of the current study was to examine how parents of preschool children, with and without disabilities, in Västerbotten, experience the impact of their child. A sample of 67 parents of children with disabilities and 134 parents of children without disabilities took part in the questionnaire study.

This paper sets out to investigate how companies can create advertisement that focus not only on selling but also on entertainment. The research is based on seven TV-commercials produced by the Swedish food chain ICA. The commercials were analyzed according to the methods of discourse analysis, semiotic analysis and rhetorical analysis. Furthermore, the research compares the analysis made with the thoughts and ideas of Tobias Karlsson, Head of marketing and communications development at ICA to find out how the comprehension of the commercials correlate with the original intentions made by the company.The study shows that ICA creates a commercial that contains the perfect mix of rhetorical approaches, communication strategies and entertainment mixed with gravity. The study also shows that ICA fails with its primary goal which is to sell selected products; however, by producing the entertaining commercials, they manage to strengthen their brand.

This study examined by content analysis and semiotic picture analysis how gender equal the UK newspaper The Times, the U.S/Iranian nespaper Iran Times International and Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet were May 1st 2009 and May 8th 2009. The study had a foundation of feminist theory about patriarchy and gender theory with a contribution of research about race and its impact on patriarchy.None of the three papers were fully gender equal. Even though Svenska Dagbladet was found to be the most gender equal when it came to the number of women represented all of the newspapers examined showed patriachal structures since women more often than men were described as victimes, trivialized, incompetent and inferior.  People with a race other than white were in minority but patriarchy seems to be a stronger form of oppression than racism. White men were in majority and were less opressed than other groups and were because of that most in favour of the newspapers symbolic powers..

Today there are several generations who have grown up watching Disney?s films. Disney has become a central storyteller in our society with children and their families as their main audience. Disney's storytelling is often with the children from an early age and they get to learn about right and wrong, good and evil through the films. A picture of how the world looks and how you should and should not behave is presented in Disney's films.