This essay takes its start in the problematic situation concerning source material in the study of the Norse religion before the Christianization of Scandinavia. There is a lack of written sources from the time when the religion was still practiced. There are plenty of archeological sources economic situation than their religious beliefs. The Icelandic stories written in the 13th and 14th centuries give us a broad pictureof the Norse mythology, but the writers were Christians which makes their reliability questionable.The focus of this essay is therefore on two texts written during the time when the Norse religion was still in practice. The first source is the travel notes written in 922 by the Muslim scholar Ahmad ibn Fadlan who met a group of the Rus? people.

This essay concerns the Celts during the Iron Age, and their ritual practice in human sacrifice. The method applied is an eclectic historic-critic reading of the few classical sources that exist together with archeological material and scholars conclusions of literal sources and archeological material. The hypothesis is that human sacrifice in the Celtic realm not is to be seen as a primitive act of violence, but that it filled a social function to preserve society and the Celtic way of life.The question this essay strives to answer is Which function/s do human sacrifice fill in a Celtic context during the Iron Age? The question is analysed with the aid of Radcliffe-Brown?s and Catherine Bell?s theories on ritual, as well as Malcolm Chapman?s postmodern ideas of the conception of the Celtic. The conclusion of the essay is that the prime functions of Celtic human sacrifice are to preserve society and the Celtic social way of life, combined with an aim to eliminate disturbing elements in that same society, such as crime and individuals who did not fit in to the social community..

Indications on poor understanding for the animal producers situation from the inspectors of animal welfare control have been seen in papers from farmers interest organizations. The aim of this study was to investigate what farmers view is on the animal welfare inspections done by regional Swedish authorities as well as the animal welfare inspectors work. The study investigated whether or not there were any differences between different counties in Sweden. There were also questions asked to see what animal producers thought could change in the animal welfare inspectors work so it would benefit them. The study was conducted using a telephone interview questionnaire.

Growing up as a child, we had a Dog. To us, it was like a means to an end. That is, hunting other animals for food and for protection, with no special care and treatment given to this animal. Butas days passed by I began to witness a wind of change against such actions. I was made to understand that we were committing two crimes-: using the Dog as a means to an end (for hunting and for eating animals).

Millions of animals are annually affected by human activities; in the food industry, zoos and animal shows, clothes and shoes production, furniture and pharmaceutical industry, research, as well as pet and sports animal industry. Companies working with Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, have become more common and within this area there are great possibilities for companies to work with animal welfare. In this study five companies were interviewed and 27 companies participated in a survey regarding CSR and animal welfare. The aim of this study was to investigate opinion and approach among companies towards implementing animal welfare as a part of their work with CSR. Furthermore the aim of the study was to investigate how companies may implement animal welfare. The result showed that the vast majority of the companies participating in the study works with CSR and the main part of the companies also answered that they have implemented animal welfare. The way of working with animal welfare varied among the participants; e.g.

The purpose with this thesis was to form an opinion of how the animal welfare in Sweden is experienced by both farmers and animal inspectors. A great part of this work consists of an inquiry concerning the south and the middle of Sweden. We sent the inquiries to milk and meat producers and to animal inspectors. The response was high, which indicates that this is a subject that affects many people. Our literature study is mostly made on the library bases LIBRIS and LUKAS. The facts we found there were directed towards animal experimentation and furred animal breeding. In order to compare with earlier results we used investigations that had been made by Riksrevisionen 2003. There is a difference in opinions about the new Swedish animal welfare agency that started first of January 2004.

This paper discusses animal welfare, and Sweden, as an EU member state, has a responsibility toensure that official animal welfare inspections are carried out in accordance with communityregulations. The first of January 2009, the welfare moved from the municipalities in to the 21county administrative boards. This restructuring was made due to the deficiencies that the auditconducted by the EU of the FVO (Food and Veterinary Office) 2003 found in the Swedishsystem. Sweden failed in coordination and inspection to ensure animal welfare.The aim of this examination paper is to shed light on animal welfare work operated in the countyof Halland and in Sweden in general. The paper focuses on a few questions.

Animal welfare can be measured in several different ways; for example by using animal-based measurements. It has been shown that register data from the Swedish Official Milk Recording Scheme can be helpful when identifying herds at risk of having poor animal welfare, which led to a development of the advisory service of ?Ask the Cow? and the web report ?Animal Welfare Signals?. The aim of this project was to find out if register data from ?Animal Welfare Signals? can be used as a screening tool for detecting herds at risk of having poor animal welfare and in need of an ?Ask the Cow?.

In the beginning of 2009 The County Administrative Boards assumed the responsibility of animal welfare, a task previously performed by the individual municipalities. This transfer was made with the aim of achieving more efficient and equivalent animal welfare controls across the country. Previous studies among animal owners have shown a somewhat negative image of animal welfare controls. This study focuses on investigating the experiences of the horse keepers in the County of Halland concerning animal welfare. The study is based on a questionnaire which was sent to 423 horse keepers in Halland, of which 130 were returned with information that laid the foundation of this study.

The main objective of this study was to evaluate animal welfare situation in Ethiopia during slaughter and to investigate chain activities between animal markets and Kera abattoir in Addis Abeba. In total, 442 animals were observed within 52 groups of cattle; both ox and calves with different breeds. The study was divided into four different sets of data collection; behavioural observations, recording of slaughter process, observation during transport and interview. During the behavioural observations, an ethogram was used with 46 behaviours observed, categorised into 5 different groups. The data was calculated using Excel and SAS. The results indicated that a significant correlation (p-value.

Reptiles and birds are animals that many people don?t have much experience of, so it can be difficult to do a proper animal protection assessment of these animals. It?s hard to determine if these animals is skinny, fat or in good shape, to do that it demands handling of the animal and not many inspectors that works with animal protection have experience of handling reptiles and birds. To see if a reptile or a bird is ill is difficult, when the bird or reptile looking sick it?s often too late to do something. www.blocket.se is a sell and buy page on the internet there many animals switch owner.

Behaviour problems are often behaviours that cat owners don´t like, but are normal to the cat. The reason to why cat owners experience certain feline behaviours as problematic is probably due to the current practice in cat housing. The ways that cats are kept today causes somewhat of a compromise between cat and owner and inhibits the expressions of the cat's natural and normal behaviour. The cat owners may misunderstand their cats behaviour, for example the cat owners believe that their cats perform certain behaviours because of feelings of guilt, hate, revenge or maybe to protest against something or someone. An animal hospital may help solve behaviour problems, but also help the cat owners to undstand their cat´s behaviour in an other perspective. The aim of this study is to investigate the need of a cat ethologist in animal hospitals.

On the first January 2009 the official animal welfare control were transferred from the municipalities to the County Administrative board. With this transition, some changes occurred for those who work as animal welfare inspectors. The aim for this study was to examine farmers' view on the transition between the municipalities and County Administrative board, in order to compare the two authorities. I have also studied the farmers view about animal welfare inspectors' knowledge, both theoretical and practical. The questionnaire also included questions about farmers' view on animal welfare legislation.

Animal-assisted therapy had its large breakthrough in the 1960-ties when a psychiatrist named Boris Levinson discovered the great advantages of involving animals in the treatment of patients. Therapy with animals involves that animals are used in a systematic way, in a person's process of treatment. The most distinguished companion animal used within this area is the dog, but horses, cats, rabbits, birds, dolphins and the most common farm animals are used in animal-assisted therapy. Most animals that are to be used for this specific purpose need to be trained in order to maintain their physical and mental health, but also to minimize the risks for the people that are involved. Most studies within this research area are focused on the positive effects on the patients and less on the effects on the animals.

Stunning of pigs at slaughter constitutes of primarily two methods; carbon dioxide and electricity. Both methods have advantages and disadvantages from an animal welfare point of view. The purpose of this study is to compare different methods of stunning pigs from a welfare point of view. Questions included in the study are 1) What differences are there, from an animal welfare point of view, between CO2 and electricity as methods for stunning pigs? 2) What alternatives are there to the methods currently in use? 3) Which method for stunning pigs is preferable from an animal welfare point of view?This report is a literature review.