The essay's aim is to create an understanding for the act; ritual, and the functions or possible functions in an organisation. Many of the functions attribute to rituals lie in the ritual's double function. A ritual can function both as a practical/functional and a symbolic act. The functionality in a ritual doing is not depending of the "symbolic meaning". The functional value exists there always.

During an excavation at Old Uppsala 571 raw garnets was found. In comparison with similar fragments from other sites in Sweden my aim was to prove a completely domestic production of garnets for cloisonné work. I have chosen to look at the archaeological sites of Old Uppsala, Valsta, Slöinge and Paviken and more closely at the material from Old Uppsala and Valsta. My theoretical framework has been to look at the garnets own agency in the contemporary society.Garnet cloisonné was a popular jewellery form during the Merovingian period on the continent although it came to an end in the early 7th century. It was during this time in Scandinavia a new sort of garnet, technique and paste was introduced and the garnet cloisonné was profoundly used for the gear of the elite and ritual objects.

The goals of this essay are to identify rituals and ritual behavior at the department of archaeology and ancient history at Lund University. To do this a series of empirical examinations was conducted. Observations, interviews and polls revealed that some ritual behavior is in fact present. Two types of rituals were identified; the interaction ritual, as presented by Erving Goffman in the book Interaction Ritual, Essays on Face-to-Face Behavior, in 1967. The second type of ritual is a ?problem solving? ritual, such as meetings.

This essay consider ritual death during the ironage, and through a presentation of historical and archaeological sources. Considered ritual death I think we should study both historical and archaeological sources, to get a vider view and a new perspective. To make the essay easier to understand I have split up the early and the late Iron Age in the discussion. In order to study the ritual death I have shown archaeological examples like bogsacrifices in the early ironage, and decapitated victims in the Viking society. The victims have been considered as slaves by some archaeologist.

This qualitative research study aims to investigate how eight members of the Society of Friends (also known as Quakers) experience a divine presence in their Meeting for Worship. The purpose is also to find out how their identity as Quakers has been created, and to see how they look at their Meeting of Worship when it comes to ritual as a concept.The method used in this study is individual, semi-structured interviews and observations of Meeting of Worship. The results show a relatively homogeneous group of individuals from a secular upbringing who as adults sought out a community where silence is appreciated and used to achieve an experience of a divine presence. Berger and Luckmann's theories of socialization have been applied to the results and the discussion reveals how the secondary socialization has been essential in the process of forming the individual into being a Quaker. There is however one exception, in the form of one participant who grew up in the Society of Friends.

The purpose of this study has been to investigate the virtual world that people are part of on online dating sites. To do this we have investigated two different research questions, which are the following: What functions do the online dating sites provide? Why and how are the online dating sites being used by their members? In order to gather information about these matters, we have used a qualitative method consisting of participating observation, scrutinizing and single person interviews. Our results indicate that people have different goals with their usage of online dating sites; some are looking for love, a long-term relationship while others are looking for sexual contact. There are many different online dating sites to choose from depending on the users? objective.

AbstractThe aim of this essay is to understand the view of man as a creature in the Norse culture by studying rituals and ritual actions in conjunction with homicide. The material on which the study is based is called the Icelandic sagas, which are important source of information to the Norse culture. To achieve the purpose, I used a qualitative content analysis and qualitative narrative analysis along with ritual theories based on Roy A Rappaport among others. The questions are for instance:- What ritual actions occur in connection with the homicide, according to the Icelandic sagas? - What are the differences in how individuals are treated in passages where the ritual actions in relation to homicide and homicide cases investigated and why?The results show four different types of ritual acts in relation to homicide.

AbstractThe aim of this essay is to understand the view of man as a creature in the Norse culture by studying rituals and ritual actions in conjunction with homicide. The material on which the study is based is called the Icelandic sagas, which are important source of information to the Norse culture. To achieve the purpose, I used a qualitative content analysis and qualitative narrative analysis along with ritual theories based on Roy A Rappaport among others. The questions are for instance:- What ritual actions occur in connection with the homicide, according to the Icelandic sagas? - What are the differences in how individuals are treated in passages where the ritual actions in relation to homicide and homicide cases investigated and why?The results show four different types of ritual acts in relation to homicide.

This essay studies the funnel-beaker ceramic in connection with the megalith graves in South Scandinavia. In my work I have described the nature of ceramics and looked on the crockery types and ornamentation and then discussed the use of the material in a ritual perspective. In the first part I have focused on the critical aspects you have to think about when you do a study like this one. In the second part of this essay I have done a case study, with the ceramic material, in three passages graves in the area of Falbygden, Western Sweden and studied the ceramic material and the nature of it in South Scandinavia as well. Then in the third I discussed the potential use, there is two, of the ceramic material in general of South Scandinavia and looked at it in a ritual perspective..

AbstractThe aim of this essay is to understand the view of man as a creature in the Norse culture by studying rituals and ritual actions in conjunction with homicide. The material on which the study is based is called the Icelandic sagas, which are important source of information to the Norse culture. To achieve the purpose, I used a qualitative content analysis and qualitative narrative analysis along with ritual theories based on Roy A Rappaport among others. The questions are for instance:- What ritual actions occur in connection with the homicide, according to the Icelandic sagas? - What are the differences in how individuals are treated in passages where the ritual actions in relation to homicide and homicide cases investigated and why?The results show four different types of ritual acts in relation to homicide.

This is a study of Prehistoric musical instruments from Scandinavia and the different meanings they could have had in the Prehistoric society. I have described the different types of possible music instruments and the different categories that they belong to. I have also written about their different functions that could have been for example ritual artefacts, shamanic tools or useful instruments in hunting. Two case studies are also presented in the essay, the Falköpingsflute and the Balkåkradrum..

AbstractThe aim of this essay is to understand the view of man as a creature in the Norse culture by studying rituals and ritual actions in conjunction with homicide. The material on which the study is based is called the Icelandic sagas, which are important source of information to the Norse culture. To achieve the purpose, I used a qualitative content analysis and qualitative narrative analysis along with ritual theories based on Roy A Rappaport among others. The questions are for instance:- What ritual actions occur in connection with the homicide, according to the Icelandic sagas? - What are the differences in how individuals are treated in passages where the ritual actions in relation to homicide and homicide cases investigated and why?The results show four different types of ritual acts in relation to homicide.

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.

Mainly focusing on the big picture regarding the research concerning the religious sphere in Bronze Age Scandinavia, the research field has been missing out on the smaller picture. The results have a tendency to produce a picture where the big landscape monuments, social structures and cosmology appear in the foreground. This essay is a comment to this phenomena and a methodological and terminological discussion regarding the way in which we as archaeologist?s works with questions about religion and rites. The main task though is to make an attempt in trying to identify the ritual performers and to answer the question whether it's possible or not to do that.

This paper deals with the question of whether the symbolic language of the late Neolithic and middle Bronze Age was transferred from ceremonial monuments and barrows into the domestic sphere in the late Bronze Age. I will consider such elements as doorway orientation, the significance of boundaries and depositional practices to see if Early-Middle Iron Age settlements were indeed a major scene for ritual behaviour..