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- Berggren, Kalle, 1980-
(author)
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Reading Rap : Feminist Interventions in Men and Masculinity Research
- 2014
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The present thesis explores how masculinity is constructed and negotiated in relation to race, class and sexuality in hip hop in Sweden. Theoretically, the study contributes to the increasing use of contemporary feminist theory in men and masculinity research. In so doing, it brings into dialogue poststructuralist feminism, feminist phenomenology, intersectionality and queer theory. These theoretical perspectives are put to use in a discourse analysis of rap lyrics by 38 rap artists in Sweden from the period 1991-2011. The thesis is based on the following four articles:Sticky masculinity: Post-structuralism, phenomenology and subjectivity in critical studies on men explores how poststructuralist feminism and feminist phenomenology can advance the understanding of subjectivity within men and masculinity research. Drawing on Sara Ahmed, and offering re-readings of John Stoltenberg and Victor Seidler, the article develops the notion of “sticky masculinity”.Degrees of intersectionality: Male rap artists in Sweden negotiating class, race and gender analyzes how class, race, gender, and to some extent sexuality, intersect in rap lyrics by male artists. It shows how critiques of class and race inequalities in these lyrics intersect with normative notions of gender and sexuality. Drawing on this empirical analysis, the article suggests that the notion of “degrees of intersectionality” can be helpful in thinking about masculinity from an intersectional perspective.‘No homo’: Straight inoculations and the queering of masculinity in Swedish hip hop explores the boundary work performed by male artists regarding sexuality categories. In particular, it analyzes how heterosexuality is sustained, given the affection expressed among male peers. To this end, the article develops the notion of “straight inoculations” to account for the rhetorical means by which heterosexual identities are sustained in a contested terrain.Hip hop feminism in Sweden: Intersectionality, feminist critique and female masculinity investigates lyrics by female artists in the male-dominated hip hop genre. The analysis shows how critique of gender inequality is a central theme in these lyrics, ranging from the hip hop scene to politics and men’s violence against women. The article also analyzes how female rappers both critique and perform masculinity.
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| 2. |
- Sohl, Lena, 1975-
(author)
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Att veta sin klass : Kvinnors uppåtgående klassresor i Sverige
- 2014
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This thesis examines women’s upward class mobility in a Swedish context, with particular focus on notions of class, gender, race, Swedishness and sexuality. The thesis analyses qualitative interviews with 16 upwardly mobile women. In the analysis the women’s lived experiences, contextualized through structural processes, are in focus.The women’s educational success seems to be crucial in their understanding of how they were able to move out of the working class. The analysis suggests that being duktig (good, capable and efficient) is central in the women’s understanding of their upward class mobility. Further, the analysis shows that racialization and notions of Swedishness clearly structure the women’s experiences of upward class mobility in different ways.I argue that the women’s need to “escape” from working-class positions must be understood by highlighting the complex processes of inequalities based on notions of class, gender, race, Swedishness and sexuality. Moreover, contrasting dynamics within common stories of “class escape” suggest the possibility of using such narratives as entry points: not only into the complexities of social location in present-day Sweden; but also the complexities of what is required in order to move through social space.
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| 3. |
- Wernesjö, Ulrika, 1980-
(author)
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Conditional Belonging : Listening to Unaccompanied Young Refugees’ Voices
- 2014
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This thesis explores negotiations of belonging among unaccompanied young refugees in Sweden. The thesis further aims to shed light on methodological aspects of bringing out their voices. The analysis draws on postcolonial and poststructuralist approaches to belonging and relates belonging to the concepts of home, place, racialization and notions of “Swedishness”.The thesis analyses qualitative interviews with 17 young people, who arrived in Sweden as unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors and have been granted permanent residency. The interviews are complemented with walk-alongs and photography-based interviews.Paper 1 gives an overview and discussion of research on unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors. I argue that there is a lack of their voices in the research, and that their own agency and perspectives are not addressed due to a focus on vulnerability and emotional health (or lack thereof). Paper II, which is delimited to participants in a rural village, shows that they negotiate belonging and a sense of home related to places but that othering is constraining. In paper II and III I suggest that the participants’ belongings and position in Sweden can be understood as conditional due to othering and racialization. In paper III, I argue that expressing gratitude can be understood as a form of impression management and, thus be a strategy to negotiate their position in the interview setting as in the host country.I finally argue that in order to understand the participants’ negotiations of belonging attention has to be paid to their agency as well as the conditioning of belonging in discourses and in interactions on the local level.
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| 4. |
- Nyström, Anne-Sofie, 1974-
(author)
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Att synas och lära utan att synas lära : en studie om underprestation och privilegierade unga mäns identitetsförhandlingar i gymnasieskolan
- 2012
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- In the last decade stratification within educational results has, in Sweden as in other countries, been framed as a matter of boys’ and young men’s under-achievement. The question of whether this is a problem, and if so, for whom and how to change the structure, has been discussed in research and educational policy. The aim of the thesis is to contribute to these fields and to enhance knowledge of young people’s gendered and classed identity processes, by analyzing how achievement and engagement were negotiated and given meaning in relation to young men. Previous research has primarily explored identity processes among “risk categories” or subordinated students. The objective here was to analyze how masculinity was accomplished via peer-group interactions within a rarely problematized category, through examining how upper middle-class young men identify themselves and are ascribed identities by others.The study’s design was inspired by ethnographic methodology and combined participant observation, semi-structured individual and group interviews and a background questionnaire. Identities, social categorizations (especially gender and class) and dominance-relations were thus analyzed from an actor-oriented perspective. The research participants were young men and women, age 15-16, in two school classes. The field work was conducted at, respectively, a Natural Science and a Vehicle Programme; educational settings with connotations to masculinity but significantly different in terms of class. The study enrolled a total of fifty-six students, but focus is upon the fifteen young men among the natural science students. High achievement and under-achievement, high social and cognitive ability, and group loyalty are main themes in the study. Identity claims were analyzed in relation to the practices through which they were negotiated, e.g. self-hindrance. Similar to other research, the results emphasize the relationship between masculinity and “effortless achievement”. The concept “under-achievement” is developed as an analytical tool, by distinguishing between five dimensions.
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| 5. |
- Egeberg Holmgren, Linn, 1979-
(author)
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IngenMansLand : om män som feminister, intervjuframträdanden och passerandets politik
- 2011
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This thesis explores constructions of gendered and gender political positions and practices of men identifying as ‘feminist’. The analysis is based on qualitative interviews with 28 men aged 20-34. At issue is how seemingly contradictory positions for men as feminists are made comprehensible in theory and practice. An introduction showcase theoretical discussions on gendered experiences and the possibilities of men being feminist, mainly from standpoint, radical feminist and poststructuralist radical constructionist perspectives. Men doing feminism emerge as an unresolved complex matter. This is followed by a critical discussion of state feminism, double emancipation and research on men and masculinities in the welfare state. The support for men’s participation, predominantly as white heterosexual fathers, in the Swedish gender equality project has consequences for the construction of men as potentially ‘new’, ‘good’ gender equal feminist subjects. In the construction of profeminist positions in interview performances, interviewees are located in-between the radical feminist, poststructuralist and gender equality perspectives on men, masculinity and feminism. Two themes involve an implementation of the concept of passing and introduce the analytical concept of co-fielding. Passing consists of the microsociological process of making radical and deconstructive profeminist positions authentic and yet being able to manage masculinity in homosocial contexts. Co-fielding refers to the conjoint interlacing of experiences, knowledge and meaning-making in interview interaction where relations of researcher-researched are characterized by discursive closeness and overlapping positions. Co-fielding practices affect the outcomes of co-construction of interview performances, the negotiation of gender and power relations and the reflexive use of (in this case feminist) knowledge in qualitative interviews. In analyzing the presentations of self, ambiguous meanings of profeminist positions emerge and the doing, undoing and redoing of feminism and masculinity appear multi-faceted. Radical feminism and radical constructionism seem intersected in making men’s feminist positions comprehensible. Such rebellious positions emerge as oxymoronic and, when critically brought into the gender equality context, located in a no man’s land out of place. In all, the thesis seeks to bring together theoretical, national and empirical locations of profeminist men, and in a concluding chapter also explore issues of ethics in feminist research and cross-gender interviewing.
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