Preschools are nowadays a big part of almost every childhood in Swedish society and the relationships that are built there are important for the child and the child?s future integration in the world of knowledge and education. The preschool teachers are therefore the first persons the child links to beyond the parent. That?s why the relations between the parent and the preschool teacher are an important and interesting aspect in the cooperation between them.

In order for any society to exist there must be a sense of belonging. In other words "We" need to be made distinctive and differentiated from "the Others". The aim of this thesis is to examine the processes behind the making and upholding of collective identities and the consequences of doing so. Theories regarding stereotypes, enemy images, power over the discourse and glocalization have therefore been applied to an empirical example in the form of a case study.The study is made on the municipality of Laxå in Sweden. Representatives on assumed key positions have been interviewed on their and Laxå's inhabitants views on the asylum seekers in the community between the years 1986 and 2005.Yet another aim of the thesis is to examine the possible connection between the perceived collective identity and the decision to close down the asylum facility in Laxå.

We have studied the effects that blogs have on the society through interviews with influential bloggers, a news director and the founder of Sweden?s largest blogprovider.Existing theoretical work by other researchers have been used as a starting point to our thesis. Via a deductive method we then proceeded to test these existing models and viewpoints on the reality.Through our research we have concluded that blogs, if they co-operate, have an agenda-setting function, and that they can affect newspapers to write about certain topics.We have also discussed blogs role as media watch dogs. Gunilla Sax, news director, questions the blog world?s ability to fully cover all media, and to deliver a systematic and just review of the media.

The purpose of this essay was to examine how childless homosexuals (men and women) were looking at family formation and parenthood. The essential questions were how the homosexuals felt about their own parenthood in the future and about different family constellations. We also wanted to examine how they experienced reactions from the society and what they thought about the current Swedish laws in force of adoption and insemination.We have chosen to work with a qualitative method and interviewed nine childless homosexual men and women in the age between 21 - 39 years to get some answers about the questions above.The main result from the interviews was that the homosexuals had the same thoughts like any other future parent but with a more complicated engagement. Even though they some times felt a resistance in the society against homosexual parenthood it was not a thing that would stop them from getting children..

This essay attempts to examine the discourse of the Sweden democrats in relation to thevalue system of the Swedish national school.To analyse the political texts I use discourse analysis and especially the method and approachconducted by Judith Lee Bacchi. Bacchi focuses on the construction of a problem in variouspolitical discourses. When performing this kind of analysis the main question is (accordingto Bacchi): ?What is the problem represented to be??I find that the Sweden democrats construct the ?migration politics? and the ?multiculturalpolitics? that is guiding the society as the cause of most problems in our society. To solvethe ?problems? they promote a nationalistic and a cultural racist discourse especiallypinpointing the ?Muslims? as being a problem.Since the Sweden democrats are striving to implement their discourse in the society andschool, and since their discourse already are reproduced by solar students in the classroom,I find it important to examine the essence of their particular discourse and contrast it withthe current value system of the Swedish schools.I don´t find the nationalistic and racist discourse of the Sweden democrats to correspond tothe value system of the Swedish school, mainly due to their strive to create alienation, andby labeling individuals in a reductive manner, instead of using apparent differences as asource for democratic discussions in the classroom.

The aim of this thesis is to investigate and increase the understanding of a present function of today´s public library, namely the function of meeting place; here called the social function or social space. Two small town libraries are included in the study, and the questions examined are:How is this function described at the two libraries and what similarities and differences are there between the two? How can one describe the relation between how the library as social space is described in research and at the libraries? The theoretical framework used in examining these questions, consists of three different discourses in culture policy (the discourse of state, market and civil society) and theories on civil society and the public library. A summary of current research makes visible eight different aspects of the public library as a social space. These aspects functions as parts of the theoretical framework as well.

The main purpose of this master thesis is to investigate how six elderly individuals, 65-75 years old, use and perceive Internet in their everyday life. The focus in this study is to enlighten elderly people as Internet-users.In 2010 many elderly people are still digital excluded. In Europe and in Sweden efforts are made to educate citizens to use the Internet, and that benefits of the digital society should be available to all.This study is based on the following questions: what made the informants take an interest in the Internet in the first place? How and for what purpose do they use it? And how do the informants regard to their own Internet usage and its importance in society?We interviewed six people aged 65-75 years old, using semi-structured questions. The data was analyzed by using the theory developed by Hektor concerning Internet and information behaviour in everyday life.

This master thesis is a study of a new electronic library reference service-project called Speak instantly to a librarian and the purpose of the thesis is to investigate a new electronic reference service and how the librarians who work with it experience it. This should be seen from an informational society point of view. The study is conducted from two questions: - What needs do the libraries have and how do they argue for the project and the chat-reference service Speak instantly to a librarian? - How do the librarians experience the personal work situation in the new reference service, and its use of chat technology? Together with interviews of a selected group of librarians from the public libraries of Göteborg, Malmö, Nacka and Stockholm, this thesis includes aspects such as the theory of the informational society by Manuel Castells, as well as literary studies of the history of library reference, the development of electronic reference service and the virtual library, and the background and the beginning of the studied project Speak instantly to a librarian. The thesis also contains an overlook of other similar library projects in the United States of America.

The study discloses unaccompanied children´s socialization in their new society. The purpose of the study is to investigate how unaccompanied children's schooling is an important factor in their socialization and skills development in their new society. For example, we have chosen to illustrate how their school works and if and whether the teachers receive the support they need in order to help children develop their skills so they can find their way in society. The research is based on three different methods. The first method is based on literature research.

There is a lack of consensus within politics on how to deal with the so-called youth problem that exists in vulnerable areas. The politicians' positions are communicated in speech and writing and influence the majority society's attitude to children in vulnerable areas. Children are at the same time a vulnerable group in society. They are dependent on adults and need their guidance and support throughout their upbringing. In vulnerable areas live children whose health is affected by social and economic vulnerability and discrimination from the outside world. By looking into how hegemonic masculinity as norms are formulated in Swedish political documents, in relation to experiences of stigmatization and violence among children from vulnerable areas, this study wishes to examine if children?s right to a life without violence is being respected in vulnerable areas.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how masculinity and femininity are constructed in the magazine Veckorevyn, through a critical discourse analysis of 18 articles from six issues in 2011. This is done by using a variety of theories and previous research results, which is gender theory, the theory of late-modern society and media theory. The analysis shows that Veckorevyn depicts virility and feminine differently. Furthermore, pointing the results from the analysis that a change of manhood and womanhood takes place in the social practice. The selection of articles from the magazine also shows that Veckorevyn seems to promote gender equality. .

The main objective of this paper has been to construct a way to measure the level of social capital in a society. Based on a theory which describes the ideal society have I herein tried to find out to what extent the Swedish and Danish communities correspond to this model. The theoretical foundation consist of several different levels of analysis, and I have indeed found there to be consideral differences between the two nations on these different levels. The paper however conclude that these differences even out to add up to a Social Capital Index that is remarkably similar. A result which is to be interpreted as one nation being about as close to the ideal situation from a social capital point-of-view as the other..

Manzai (??) is a Japanese comedy style similar to stand-up comedy but done by two people in the form of a dialogue. One is the Boke ?Funny man? and the other the Tsukkomi ?Straight man?. This work examines how manzai discourse is structured to create comedy by using the framework postulated by Abe (2006).

The purpose of the essay is to draw attention to my approach in relation to a boy I choose to call Emil, and how I can increase my understanding of his behavior. I explore conceivable reasons for why he breaks down so often, especially when other children are given attention. Is he simply unusually egoistic, and to a large degree only able to see to his own interests, or am I overlooking the real reasons for his actions.In order to explain the reasons for Emil?s apparent frustration in sensitive situations, I explore the significance of attachment theory. I argue about possible effects of Emil?s parents? way of describing and guiding him, as well as how I, and my colleagues, risk fulfilling and amplifying negative expectations.As the prime reason for his repeated sense of unhappiness seems linked to a lack of empathy, I explore different ways of understanding this, as well as how I might contribute to fostering compassion.

Media has the power to influences society. Some call them the third power of a state. Through amongst others, the agenda setting theory and the framing theory, this report seeks to understand how media describes the swine influenza and how it uses its power to influence people to vaccinate. As this report will show, there is no doubt that media has had an impact on the Swedish population of which 60 per cent followed through with the vaccination. Media used an information discourse and attempted to present its articles in an impartial manner and used governmental authorities and experts to support its arguments.