ABSTRACTIn this study I have analyzed, throughout a gender perspective, two textbooks Den levandelitteraturen and Upplev litteraturen which are purposed to be used as teaching materials inSwedish schools in the subject of Swedish when teaching the history of literature. The intentof this study was to provide a gender analysis of two textbooks and the focus was on thepresentations of female and male writers, because they have not been studied earlier. In thisstudy, a qualitative text analytic method was used to achieve the best results as possible.Theories used in this study were Yvonne Hirdman?s and Raewyn Connell?s theories. Hirdmanclaims that there are differences between men and women at different levels in the societywhile Connell believes that this is a myth because, according to her, men and women arepsychologically alike.

The purpose of this study was to investigate if female and male reporters and interviewees get the same amount of time in the news feature in the Swedish news programs TV4-Nyheterna and SVT 1 Rapport. The aim of this study was also to investigate if there is a breakdown of the reporting lines between male and female reporters, that is, if they are reporting on various topics. In our study we also determined if the two television channels in any way are different when it comes to gender.Our main theory was that men are overrepresented both among reporters and interviewees and that they are dominant in both hard and soft news. We thought that SVT 1Rapport would have a better gender balance than TV4-Nyheterna because SVT 1 has been working on gender issues for a long time.We were using a quantitative content analysis to examine the 19:30 news on SVT 1 Rapport and 22:00 news on TV4-Nyheterna for two weeks in November 2010. We examined domestic and foreign news and determined how much time each sex got.

The aim of this Master's thesis is to examine the user discourses that can be identified in the public library field. Questions posed in this study are: what discourses can be found, what characterises them, how are users categorised and what does this categorisation imply. The theoretical starting-point is Ernesto Laclaus and Chantal Mouffes discourse theory. The method is text analytic. 62 articles from three library journals - Biblioteksbladet, Bibliotek i Samhälle and Ikoner are analysed through a model in four phases.

In this essay, I make a queer feminist analysis of four novels written by the Swedish author Sigge Stark. The novels are: Uggleboet, Manhatareklubben, Cirkus Demonio och Baskerflickan. Using Judith Butler's theories I examine the relations between sex/gender and sexuality in the four books and show how the construction of gender is performed and the heterosexual normativity is jeopardized. I also examine whether, and if so how, Sigge Stark uses the romantic and the gothic genres to include transcending gender identities and sexualities in her work. The essay also includes a contextualisation of her prerequisities as an author and the necessity in performing a critical analysis of mass produced romantic literature..

This study is conducted from qualitative research with interviews as a basis, where I have interviewed four teachers from elementary school?s early ages (year 1-3). The aim is to highlight the teacher?s perspectives and experiences of reading aloud, and how they connect the activity to gender.The questions at issue that have been answered in this paper are how the teacher?s reflect to gender and reading aloud in a school environment; do the teacher?s reflect over the gender perspective when choosing reading aloud literature? When reading aloud, which attributes are important to highlight for girls and boys according to the teachers? Which books do the teachers consider "good" gender literature?The paper is based on the theoretical grounds of social constructivism, gender as construction, gender conscious pedagogy and reading aloud. In previous research the focal point has been Kåreland?s study on gender in literature in pre-school, and on how children are being portrayed in children?s literature today, from a gender perspective.The teacher?s that have been interviewed in this study all agreed on the fact that reading aloud is a very important part of education and are used by most teachers on a daily basis.

Youth unemployement in Sweden is at an all-time high, a fifth of all university and college students live in poverty and the number of young on welfare is increasing. This study attempts to answer the question of how youth deprivation has been made possible as a consequence of political action, focusing on youth unemployment. I critically examine the role of the Swedish government, the Swedish Labour Organisation (LO), and the various government departments through text analysis, in order to answer the question of how the current discourse on youth position in the labor market. Because youth unemployment is not an isolated phenomena the analysis covers several policy areas, such as education policy, labor market regulation and housing policy. I use discourse theories drawn from Laclau and Mouffe to expose how language is used as an instrument of political power. I conclude that the current situation is a result of policy choices where the young have fallen behind due to lack of political organization. Their situation is not problematized to the required degree and is often explained on an individual level rather than on a structural level. .

In the paper three women with vulvar vestibulitis (long-term pain condition during sexual intercourse) were interviewed to find which conceptions the women experience exist about vestibulitis and how the women they self feel about the condition. Furthermore it was examined if and how the construction of vulvar vestibulitis affects the identity of the women. The method used was half-structured interviews with interview guide. Foucault's discourse analysis was used to analyse the interviews. Several constructions of vestibulitis were revealed from the interviews.

The purpose of this Masters thesis is to examine how young womens sexuality is described in Swedish youth novels. The analysis is based upon eight books of which four were published during the period from 1970 to 1975 and four books were published during 2000 to 2005. The theoretical framework is based on a gender theoretical perspective where Yvonne Hirdmans theories about a gender system and Ylva Elwin-Nowaks and Heléne Thomssons ideas about gender construction are crucial. Also Anthony Giddens theories about sexuality in the late modern society are used, where the plastic sexuality and the pure relationship are central ideas. The method is based upon textual analysis, and a model of analysis is constructed with its basis in the theoretical attempt.

The Swedish education system reflects the multicultural society in Sweden, therefore there is a need of school textbooks that pupils can identify themselves with to create meaning and value in their learning. According to the Swedish Education Administrations (Skolverkets) report (2006) and Selander (2003, s. 198) the school textbooks are the main source of education in class. There has been an implicit message in the older textbooks that is associated with the belief that non-Europeans are "seen" as victims, and that Europeans are privileged with a "good life".Many school texbooks has been analyzed from different points of perspectives, however, analysis from a postcolonial perspective on home economics books has practically been nonexistent.Analysis in this study are focused on how non-western people are been portrayed in six different textbooks in the subject to conclude if the colonial discourse is still maintained and reproduced in the school. To answer the question of formulation an image analysis is made of the six, previiously mentioned, textbooks.

The following is an examination of work and gender and how they interlocked in a Swedishbrewery between 1923 and 1939. Leaning on labor process theory and Marxist feminist theory,this paper examines what constituted women?s work in the brewery industry in this era, how women?s work changed with rationalization and economic recess, and how the all-femaleunion locale reacted to these changes. The events portrayed are related to earlier research ongender on the labor process, to the history of the Swedish labor movement in large, and to theevolution of the so-called ?Swedish model? with its relatively low level of conflicts on thelabor market.

ABSTRACTThe aim of this study has been to analyse and understand the effects of heteronormative structures in the Swedish asylum process. Homosexual refugees, seeking asylum in Sweden, is in focus when proceeding an analysis about these social structures and normative phenomena. The main discourse, being handled in this study, is between homosexuality and heterosexuality. However, central findings in this study consists of how different approaches, such as gender based identities as well as sexual preferences and ethnic background, combined is influencing the asylum process and the treatment of the asylum seekers.The analysis is based upon legal material, as well as the guidelines and work ethics of the Migrationsverket, which is being compared with theoretical approaches on heteronormativity and structural hierarchy. To achieve a wider understanding of the area and to gain more information, we have also performed interviews with relevant sources.Key-words: Heteronormativity, asylum seekers, homosexuality, power structuresSara Haugbak & Jenny Thomsen, Sociology C, University of Växjö, Sweden.

Literary debates about canon occur regularly. In the summer of 2006 such a debate took place in Sweden. The aim of this Master thesis is to examine the debate to identify the different discourses and what they reveal about ideas concerning the role of literature in society. The empirical material used for the analysis consists of 46 debate articles from three important newspapers. The combined theory and method applied is the discourse analysis described in Ernesto Laclau?s & Chantal Mouffe?s discourse theory.

The aim of this master?s thesis is to examine the discourses about Malmö public library that can be identified in several documents published by the library, articles, and various WebPages. Furthermore, our intention is to study the relation between the library?s identity, image and profile. The questions posed in the study are: Which identity discourses are Malmö public library giving expression for? What kind of conflicts between these discourses can we find? How is the identity, image and profile of the library in relation to one another? How does Malmö public library profile and market itself as a non-profit organization? Our theoretical and methodological building ground is in the discourse analytical field, with Enesto Laclau?s and Chantal Mouffe?s theories about discourse and society, as a starting-point.

The main purpose of this study is to show how narrative can be understood as cultural practice, how it can be said to function both internally and externally, and to ask questions about how the narrating subject, through the organizing of narrative, positions it self and mediates between the different discoursive contexts of which it is a part. This is done by an analisys of how six swedish soldiers tells the tale of how they came to choose a military carrer and why they have served or want to serve in peace-keeping missions abroad. The source material is primarily collected through unstructured interviews with theese soldiers, but also through textual analysis of a soldier blog. Theoretically the study draws on a combination of the discourse theory of Michel Foucault, narrative theory, Richard Jenkins theory of the internal-external dialectic of identifikation and intersectionality to construct a framework that allows the narratives to be deconstructed and understood as discoursive products of both the military contexts as such and the larger cultrual context that surrounds it. The conclusions of this study suggests that the organizing of soldier narratives are a complex and multifaceted process, in which the soliders must balance between the ideals, values and norms of the military context while also taking into account how society at large views and interprets the practices and forms of military life.

This study is mainly critical-theoretic and explores the theoretic jungle of the concept of intersectionality with the use of Post-colonial and Feminist theories. The purpose of the thesis is also to investigate the concept of intersectionality further by looking upon its practical use as theoretic tool. This is performed in a discourse analysis of two programs developed by Swedish Liberal Party autumn of 2005. Another purpose is to discuss the multiculturalist dilemma as well as the phenomenon of a hegemonic western Feminism. One conclusion of this thesis is that the use of intersectionality is not unproblematic.