| 1. |
- Aman, Robert, 1982-
(författare)
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Impossible Interculturality? : Education and the Colonial Difference in a Multicultural World
- 2014
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- An increasing number of educational policies, academic studies, and university courses today propagate ‘interculturality’ as a method for approaching ‘the Other’ and reconciling universal values and cultural specificities. Based on a thorough discussion of Europe’s colonial past and the hierarchies of knowledge that colonialism established, this dissertation interrogates the definitions of intercultural knowledge put forth by EU policy discourse, academic textbooks on interculturality, and students who have completed a university course on the subject. Taking a decolonial approach that makes its central concern the ways in which differences are formed and sustained through references to cultural identities, this study shows that interculturality, as defined in these texts, runs the risk of affirming a singular European outlook on the world, and of elevating this outlook into a universal law. Contrary to its selfproclaimed goal of learning from the Other, interculturality may in fact contribute to the repression of the Other by silencing those who are already muted. The dissertation suggests an alternative definition of interculturality, which is not framed in terms of cultural differences but in terms of colonial difference. This argument is substantiated by an analysis of the Latin American concept of interculturalidad, which derives from the struggles for public and political recognition among indigenous social movements in Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru. By bringing interculturalidad into the picture, with its roots in the particular and with strong reverberations of the historical experience of colonialism, this study explores the possibility of decentring the discourse of interculturality and its Eurocentric outlook. In this way, the dissertation argues that an emancipation from colonial legacies requires that we start seeing interculturality as inter-epistemic rather than simply inter-cultural.
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| 2. |
- Mbabazi, Penelope B.
(författare)
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Quality in Learning in Rwandan Higher Education : Different stakeholders’ perceptions of students’ learning and employability
- 2013
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The aim of the thesis is to investigate quality in learning in higher education in Rwanda by focusing on students’ learning and their employability. This focus allows for an understanding of key challenges for Rwandan higher education to emerge, at a time when more and more students are enrolling. Higher education is being rebuilt after the genocide of 1994 in Rwanda and the focus on quality in learning and preparing students for work life is thus timely and important. The empirical material comprises interviews with students, teachers and employers. Interpretation of this material is guided by perspectives on quality in learning: students’ approaches to learning, learning as transformation and employability. A meta-ethnographic analysis of the four articles on which the thesis is based generated five themes as central quality aspects of learning that could enhance the employability of graduates: becoming professional, skillful practices, becoming a learner, becoming responsible and international experience. The results illustrate that students have to some extent different views from employers and teachers regarding questions about quality in learning. Thus, it could be of value for policy makers and teachers to listen to what the students have to say when designing policy and curriculum in higher education in Rwanda.
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| 3. |
- Sandberg, Fredrik
(författare)
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Recognition of Prior Learning in Health Care : From a Caring Ideology and Power, to Communicative Action and Recognition
- 2012
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- During the last decades Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) has become a more frequently used method to recognise adult’s prior learning. This thesis analyses a process of RPL in health care, where health care assistants are assessed against subjects in the upper-secondary health care program. Prior research on RPL is to a high degree non-theoretical and focus is primarily on policy level research. This thesis adds to the field by progressing a critical social theory perspective on RPL. In the thesis the RPL process is analysed through Jürgen Habermas’ theory of communicative action and Axel Honneth’s Recognition theory. General questions posed are: What are the power issues in the RPL process? What implications does the tension between the lifeworld of work and the system of education have? What consequences does mutual understanding and communication have for the outcome of the RPL process? What part does recognition play for the participants? The results disclose the power relations that emerge in the relationship between participants and teachers. A caring ideology is developed and problematized. Further, the importance of mutual understanding between participant and teachers in the assessment of prior learning is discussed focusing on the consequences a lack of mutual understanding could have for the outcome in such assessments. On a macro level the analysis demonstrates the tension between the participants prior learning and the educational systems demand for formalising prior learning. In addition, analyses of a more developmental character that intends to show the potential for critical learning, change and recognition are progressed.The results suggest that communicative action can be used to develop RPL into processes focusing on critical learning and change. Recognition of traits and abilities could also enhance individual’s positive relations with the self. Such recognition could develop self-confidence and thus RPL could encourage learning and cultivate continuing self-realisation through work.
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| 4. |
- Hedlund, Elisabet, 1954-
(författare)
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Att styra i namn av framtid : Subjektskonstruktioner och tekniker för styrning
- 2011
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The purpose of the dissertation is to problemize the stories about a gradual change and development of education governance. The study objects are steering, constructions of the subject, and disciplinary techniques. The focus is future as a disciplinary technology. Based on the story of a gradual development and change in educational governance three strands were chosen: the late 1970s, the mid-1990s and the first decade of the 21st century. Teacher education was chosen because it is to be found in all educational system. The empirical material consists of policy bills and text designed to create knowledge about teacher education, and text created in the educational community that focus on education and future. The questions asked relate the study to Foucault´s thinking about governmentality, genealogy, and bio-politics. The essence in governmentality, genealogy and bio-politicis is that that knowledge and knowledge production is a productive activity that generate possibilities that allow us to construct ourselves as subjects. A general feature in the empirical material is the structure of an overall and collecting concept. The time characteristic become visible through the way that people live, work, and study. The stories create an image of a national and the individual's history, with a present, and a future with possibilities, and restrictions. Those constructions create the contexts that the subject is in and will be a part of. Regardless of story, the question and the task is to organize and provide for the individual as the creator of community, economy, health and future. In the documents it is mainly in the construction of "the other" that the community appears. A hierarchical surveillance was made visible in the tree strands. It can be described as frames in which time is divided into intervals with requirements and objectives possible to examine and document. Confession as a technique for discipline is reused under different names. Confession activities are organized in the pedagogical practices and are referred to as “dialogue pedagogy”, “didactics” and “performance assessment”. Practices were the individual are invited to speak, in a need to speak whit some “other” who “knows” and can act and tutor. The educational practice creates network, actors and audiences who act and communicate with each other simultaneously. The network spreads and demonstrates society's intentions and purposes whit the educational system. The networks and the talk of the future and education create the subjects ways to think and talk about herself and others. The educational and scientific discourse is part of a political rationality, where functions and practices create ways to coordinate and neutralize differences even though with different names. It is therefore not possible to say that one form of subject construction have been exchanged in benefit of another, it is rather a movement back and forth. The problem is about efficiency, control and to influence the individual's choice, and coordinate individuals in the creation of opportunities for the individual and the nation.
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| 5. |
- Lindberg, Ola, 1979-
(författare)
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'Let me through, I'm a Doctor!' : Professional Socialization in the Transition from Education to Work
- 2012
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Based on four articles, this compilation thesis analyses the demonstrated com-petence defining a medical doctor, to the extent to which he or she acquires a high status and high level of employability in professional practice. Overall, the thesis aimed to describe and analyse professional socialization during doctors' transition from education to work. Questions addressed included how higher education should be understood as preparation for professional practice, how ideals of the future professional were conceived and how these ideals differenti-ated 'good' from 'bad' doctors in professional development and recruitment. The research employed a version of practice theory as its theoretical framework, developed with the aid of work by Pierre Bourdieu, Judith Butler, John Dewey and Theodore Schatzki. Throughout the individual studies, ideals were con-structed and understood as moral imperatives, stating how doctors are expected to perform in professional practice. Article I explored the ideals of academia and higher education practices in a general sense. In this study, the ideals involve the perceived function of higher education in relation to work. Three different and conflicting perspectives were constructed with the aid of a literature study. Arti-cle II was a survey investigation of how two cohorts (n=169) of recent graduates from a Swedish medical programme viewed their competence and the prepara-tion they received for work through the medical programme. The results show that graduates might be overly prepared from a knowledge perspective, while lacking in practical skills and preparation for difficult situations in the work-place. Article III investigated the ideals of the medical programme using an interview study with eight medical students and eight medical teachers. The ideals constructed show how conflicting ideals, such as strength and humility, shape conceptions of the future professional. Finally, Article IV reports an inter-view study with recruiters of medical interns in Sweden's 21 most popular hospi-tals. Results showed that the most attractive candidates balanced two traits: orientation towards performance and orientation towards human relations. They also successfully demonstrated possession of these qualities in their appli-cation and subsequent interview. Overall, the results from the studies indicated that there are great differences between views of proper preparation for work and views of the highly-employable doctor. While medical knowledge and skills were seen as important in preparation for work, they were absent in the views of the highly-competent and employable doctor. Instead, generic attributes, such as drive, curiosity, cooperativeness, warmth, maturity and reflectiveness, char-acterised descriptions of the most accomplished medical professionals. These attributes also were seen primarily as developed before or 'beside' the formal medical education programme.
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| 6. |
- Nylund, Mattias
(författare)
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Yrkesutbildning, klass & kunskap : en studie om sociala och politiska implikationer av innehållets organisering i yrkesorienterad utbildning med fokus på 2011 års gymnasiereform
- 2013
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The overall purpose of this thesis is to critically contextualise the organization of content in Swedish upper-secondary vocational education by highlighting its social and political implications in relation to social class. Policy documents concerning the content of vocational education in Sweden from 1971 to 2011 serve as the main empirical source, with particular attention given to the reform of 2011 (Gy11). The thesis is comprised of four studies that each represents a different context that reveals social and political implications of the selection and organisation of content in Gy11. The content structure of Gy11 is thus analysed in relation to (a) the school’s role of fostering democratic citizens and the overarching societal function of education, (b) knowledge distribution among social classes, (c) a class context, including key historical and contemporary reforms, and (d) a modern historical context, focusing on how two previous structural reforms (1971 and 1994) organised power and control over educational content.The study results show that, in terms of its content structure and underlying principles, Gy11 represents a historical break with previous reforms in many respects. Fundamental organising principles of past reforms, such as students’ preparation for active citizenship, critical thinking and entry to higher education, have been given less importance while the content is more context-bound than in previous reforms. The Gy11 reform can thus be seen as a part of a broader policy trend that is detracting from earlier efforts to give all social classes equal access to an equivalent education and reduce social imbalances in education. This new way of shaping vocational education is, it is argued, likely to exacerbate class inequalities by both reducing social mobility and rendering knowledge distribution in society more asymmetric.
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| 7. |
- Wallin, Jessica
(författare)
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Entreprenörskap i skolan : Formulering och transformering av GY11 inom gymnasieskolans hantverksprogram
- 2014
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur entreprenörskap i skolan formuleras i läroplaner och tolkas av de som är verksamma inom gymnasieskolans hantverksprogram. Med utgångspunkt i ett läroplansteoretiskt perspektiv (Dahlgren, 1990; Lindensjö och Lundgren, 1986; Lindlensjö och Lundgren, 2000; Linde, 2000; Englund, 1997; Englund, 2005; Bernstein, 1971; Bernstein, 1990; Bernstein, 2000) studeras läroplanens formulerings- och transformeringsarenor, och relationen mellan dessa. Då den svenska läroplanen inte är fri från påverkan utifrån studeras även relationen mellan transnationella och nationella utbildningsdokument inom ramen för formuleringsarenan. Mer specifikt ställs följande forskningsfrågor i relation till båda arenorna:Vad beskrivs vara mål och innehåll i entreprenörskap i skolan?Varför ska entreprenörskap finnas med i undervisningen?Hur beskrivs genomförandet av entreprenörskap i skolan?
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