In the last few years there has been an ongoing debate concerning the methods of assessing the quality of public libraries and their services. This study investigates the opinions and needs of the users at four different public libraries in Malm : the local libraries in Bellevueg rden, Limhamn, and Kirseberg, and the main library in central Malm . The purpose was to find out whether different user groups display different patterns in their library use and, in addition, to identify what library services they prefer. The data were collected through interviews with users and librarians, and by means of a user survey ccarried out at the four libraries. The results indicate that certain differences in the usage patterns do exist between the main library and the local libraries.

Abstract:According to the curriculum of the Swedish school the pupils should develop their historical consciousness. The aim of this study was to find out which pupils develop this consciousness by listing to an historical novel, talking about that book and writing stories. The study went on for four weeks and the subject of the teaching was the Middle Ages. 28 pupils took part and a variety of methods were used: 1: questionnaire about the lives of the pupils, 2: Making observations of their attitude to the teaching and 3: story writing. The results show that the social background does not influence the development of an historical consciousness.

The aim of the study is to investigate what pupils in grade 1 think about reading aloud, reading alone, the selection of books, and the significance of reading. A subsidiary aimwas to examine the relation between the pupils? experiences of reading in the home andtheir ability to discuss a text they have read. A sidetrack in the study aimed to see whether the pupils? experiences of reading in the home affected their outlook on readingin general.

Current technology offers many possibilities for remotecommunication. Nevertheless, people with cognitive and communicativedisabilities have limited access to common communication technology like textmessaging via a mobile phone. This study is part of the project Text messagingwith picture symbols - a possibility for AAC users and people with cognitiveimpairments. Semi structured interviews were used to investigate three menand four women?s experiences of using Windows mobiles with adaptedfunctions for text messaging.

The increased popularity of e-books in the Swedish publiclibraries started a debate in newspapers and library journalsbecause of the increase in costs, which this popularity hadled to. The main subject of the debate was the businessmodel provided by the e-book vendor Elib, which accordingto some ruins the libraries financially. In this thesis, opinionarticles have been analyzed using a theoretical model ofcultural politics by the Danish Library and Informationscience researcher Dorthe Skot-Hansen. The results of thestudy showed that people from the library field, publishersand authors were the ones contributing to the debate. Theanalysis of the articles showed that the model of culturalpolitics which consists of four general motives: socialchange, education, economic growth and entertainment wasvisible in the articles.

Current technology offers many possibilities for remotecommunication. Nevertheless, people with cognitive and communicativedisabilities have limited access to common communication technology like textmessaging via a mobile phone. This study is part of the project Text messagingwith picture symbols - a possibility for AAC users and people with cognitiveimpairments. Semi structured interviews were used to investigate three menand four women?s experiences of using Windows mobiles with adaptedfunctions for text messaging.

The aim of this master´s thesis is to explore how a library through it´s spatial distribution expresses, and is an expression for, a view of knowledge. This is done by an analysis of the Orkanen library at Malmö Högskola. Questions posed in this study are: What view of knowledge is mediated through the spatial system and in the shelving of books? What view of learning is expressed in the spatial distribution of functions and artefacts?The theoretical framework of this thesis has two fundamental features. One, which focuses on theories of social space, a part that is mainly influenced by the theories of space syntax.

Menopause is a complex, paradoxical totality and every menopausal experience is differentfrom the other. This essay aims to capture some of the experiences surrounding it.The main questions is what it is that the women of the study share about menopause, andhow they talk about it. The material consists of interviews with eight women from the ages 51to 81, all of whom are either in menopause or have come out of it, and narratives collectedpartly on my own website ?Övergången? (?Transition?) and on the Internet via blogs and adiscussion board on menopause.Using Goffmans theories on interaction and roles and theories about gender and age as asocial construction I discovered that it is ambiguous messages that are thrown at the middleaged woman in menopause. Menopause is not always a welcome part of the role as a woman.The menopause is also associated with aging and a woman is expected to experiencemenopause during a certain age and period in the life schedule, often the middle age.

 The aim of this thesis is to examine men's attitudes towards literature, and how social norms affect their book reading, in order to contribute to the knowledge of why men's book reading is decreasing. This is realized through a discourse analysis of literature recommendations in men's lifestyle magazines.Two magazines, King of Sweden and Magazine Café, are examined through critical discourse analysis. Theories of discourse are combined with theories of gender to explore how gender stereotypes affect men's reading habits.The analysis shows that ideals of masculinity have a great influence on the book recommendations. Social norms, associated with gender, also seem to have significance to whether or not a book is considered suitable for men to read. These are, inter alia, norms of heterosexuality and violence.

This thesis explores the position of book blogs in the literary system through Robert Escarpit's socio-literary model of the book market. Simultaneously the thesis serves as a test for Escarpit's theory: by actively applying his theory and model to a very new and contemporary actor on the book market I hoped to reach or confirm new insights into the usefulness and validity of Escarpit's work for contemporary socio-literary studies.Three book blogs were selected for the analysis and interviews were carried out with the authors. The interview questions were formulated specifically for the purpose of extracting the kind of information necessary for an analysis using Escarpit?s theory. As a complement to the interviews, statistics on the type of books reviewed on the blogs were also compiled.

ABSTRACTThe purpose of our study was to examine how four different organizations cooperate on rehabilitation of people to get them back to employment. More specifically our aim was to investigate how different organizations in a project, involving workrehabilitation, looks at cooperation. Our main questions were vague at the beginning of our study, but finally our focus became clear. The questions were formed with help from the research of Hjortsjö (2006) and Fridolf (2000): Which possibilities and hindrances identify the different organizations which cooperate? What does cooperation mean to the representatives from the different organizations which are included in KARB? Our result shows that the respondents mostly think positive of the project KARB.

The purpose of this Masters thesis is to investigate librarians views on reading and reading promotion for young people. The main issue is if activities in reading promotion for people between the ages of 13-19 years can result in inspiring non-readers to actually become readers. To find the answers, qualitative interviews were held with eight librarians. The literature review covers research on the reasoning of young people on reading, a historical review of fiction and reading, a review of arguments on the benefits of reading and finally a chapter which concerns reading promotion activities. The result of this study showed that the conceptions of reading promotion and book talk are very complex and that they each can have different meanings.

This essay investigates and compares the readability in two different schoolbooks: Eko Historia (the primary school grade 4-6) and Epos Historia (the upper secondary school). The questions of the survey are:- Which differences in linguistic and layout can be found between books meant for the primary school and books meant for the upper secondary school?- Are the texts easy to read according to the former research in readability?In order to answer the questions structural dimensions as lexicon, syntax, bounds between sentences and narrative voices have been studied. Also the texts disposition and typography have been examined.The results demonstrate that the book designed for the primary school has a verbal structure with an explicit vocabulary, lots of verbs and short sentences. A clear narrative voice gives an impression of spoken language.

The purpose of this essay was to explore how the concept of gender identity is constructed, by doing a discourse analysis of texts from two different perspective discussing intersexuals, and to define the areas where the discourses doesn't agree. The two perspectives were; feminist- and medical perspective.How are sex/gender identity constructed in the chosen articles?What themes can be seen in the discourses?My method was discourse analysis. A discourse can be described as a way of talking about and understanding a part of the world. The analytics task is to define the discourses, which the world is constructed by.The areas of conflicts have been found.

The purpose of this study is to gain a better understanding of women who have been abused by their partners. The study also examines how violence takes shape in a relationship. Based on a qualitative text analysis of three autobiographies and one novel, we have obtained the material for this study. The three selected autobiographies are; "I have not told you everything" by Jessie Andersson, "The nightmare" by Maria Dahlén and "It would be a pleasure to kill you" by Magdalena Graaf and the novel "Hidden" by Liza Marklund. To gain a better understanding of this topic, we have used the following theories; the process of normalization of violence, gender and masculinity.