1.
Liedgren Dobronravoff, Pernilla
(författare)
Att bli, att vara och att ha varit : Om ingångar i och utgångar ur Jehovas vittnen
2007
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This dissertation seeks to describe and investigate the entering and leaving of a highly structured and hierarchical religious community, exemplified in this case by the Jehovah's Witnesses. The respondents in this study were chosen from both active members of the Jehovah's Witnesses in Sweden and those who have left the organisation for personal reasons. Repeated interviews with ten active members of the organisation have been conducted in the course of the study and compared to equal numbers of former members. The interviews have been semi-structured to deal with questions of how a person has come into contact with the organisation; how they retrospectively experienced the process of entry; the reasons for becoming a member. Questions have also been asked about life in the organisation. The group of "exiters" have also been asked about the experience of leaving, why they wanted to leave, and how this process was started and carried out. In addition to this I have analysed a four-year diary describing the time inside and the process of leaving the organisation. This has given me an extra psychological insight into the inner experience of someone who has gone through the whole process. The analysis has been done by categorising the content of the transcribed interviews. The analysis of the diary has involved thorough reading, resulting in a division of it into four different parts, where each part has been given a certain key-word, signifying the author's emotional state when writing it. A person converting as an adult has to pass six phases before being considered a Jehovah's Witness by the organisation. These are: Contact with the Jehovah's Witnesses, studying the bible with members of the organisation, questioning, accepting, being active as publisher (spreading the belief), being baptised. For a person brought up in the organisation, the process to full membership is much shorter: Upbringing in the organisation, taking a stand on the belief, being baptised. The exit process contains of seven phases: Different levels of doubts, testing of doubts, turning points, different kinds of decisions, different steps in executing the decisions, floating, a period of emotional and cognitive consideration of membership and its experiences, relative neutrality.
2.
Lassinantti, Kitty, 1968-
(författare)
Diagnosens dilemman : Identitet, anpassning och motstånd hos kvinnor med ADHD
2014
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This thesis explores the increasing medicalization of society, the process whereby social phenomenon are transformed into medical problems. Alike the general tendency of neu- ropsychiatric diagnoses, the number of people with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactiv- ity Disorder) has increased and expanded from a boys’ diagnosis to include both adult men and women. Studies on the latter category is however scarce. The objective of the thesis is to contribute with a micro sociological and critical perspective on the effects of the biomedicalization process, by focusing women's experience of getting and living with ADHD. The empirical material consists of narrative interviews with sixteen women, diagnosed with ADHD in adulthood. The participants, age 20 to 50, were enrolled via Swedish NGO:s in 2010 and 2013.The thesis resides on four analytical themes: biomedicalization, pharmaceuticalizaton, functionality and gender. It shows how diagnostics evokes processes that involve learning and using a biomedical terminology to describe and understand oneself. ADHD is, in general, depicted as diffuse, expansionary, masculine and deviant sociability and cognitiv- ity. Unlike depression and anxiety, described as temporary and unwanted illnesses, the ADHD-diagnosis embraces the whole personality. Hence, the women find it difficult to identifying and separating ADHD from the self. Furthermore, categorizations of oneself as a ‘woman with ADHD’ imply constructions of individual and collective identity that has ideological implications, i.e. the individual narratives are related to grand narratives. These contradictory grand narratives bring about ideological dilemmas that are handled rhetorically in the women's everyday life. The masculine connotation of ADHD, for ex- ample, render the women experiencing themselves as transgressing not only femininity but also ADHD-personhood. Additionally, as social actions are attributed to the ‘ADHD brain’, the brain is portrayed as a pathological deviant and dysfunctional object for phar- maceutical intervention. Nevertheless, this discourse is also contested by the women by pointing to 1) positive aspects of the ‘ADHD-brain’ in everyday life, or 2) gender inequal- ities and demands of the late-modern society. Concluding, the women in this study are not only victims of their bodies or societal norms, but also agents negotiating– adapting and opposing to – expectations of how to be an ideal citizen or woman.
3.
Aytar, Osman, 1960-
(författare)
Mångfaldens organisering : Om integration, organisationer och interetniska relationer i Sverige
2007
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
The aim of this dissertation is to examine inter-ethnic relations between organizationally active people with different ethnic backgrounds. I focus on relations that are based on a mutual interdependence between parties, mutual respect, common procedural rules, real opportunities that expressly approve or reject a proposal in a decision or deliberation situation free from compulsion, where people, who have different ethnic backgrounds, strive after insight and understanding in their relations.In this dissertation I present three empirical cases about cooperation, consultation and participation as forms of inter-ethnic relations from the organizational fields in the society. These cases are examples of what I characterize as “organizing inter-ethnicity”, or organizing people with different ethnic backgrounds around common concerns. Organizing inter-ethnicity is in turn a part of organizing and integrating diversity in society. Drawing on the results of three case studies, I distinguish between opportunities and barriers.My case studies clearly illustrate that the tensions that influence the patterns of and variation in opportunities and barriers have sources that reach well beyond ethnicity. Tensions between old and new organizations, between working immigrant organizations and refugee organizations, between organizations from same group or between organizations that have conflicts from their members’ countries of origin provide some examples of the difficulties that generate barriers to broad interest constellations between organizations.
4.
Blomberg, Helena
(författare)
Mobbning, intriger, offerskap : att tala om sig själv som mobbad i arbetslivet
2010
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This thesis is a study of bullying narratives, mainly co-produced in a process of ongoing interaction. The focus is on how narrators rhetorically organize their storytelling and identity work by using discursive resources. The empirical material consists of 12 interviews with, and 12 written stories by people who have been exposed to workplace bullying plus information from three websites about bullying, and previous research. The overarching aim of the study is to identify how a bullying discourse is produced, reproduced, challenged and negotiated in bullied persons’ narratives. Specific aims are to determine how bullying is portrayed publicly, how narrators with experience of being bullied build their stories, how the narratives stand in relation to victimization, what makes it possible to talk about vulnerability and what are its limits, and finally to develop a narrative approach.Theoretically and methodologically, the study has its basis in narrative analysis, discursive psychology, conversation analysis, and metaphor analysis. The study shows how the narrators categorize themselves as active, competent, and consensus seeking. They resist being victimized, but by their use of the interpretative repertoire and a standard story of bullying, they nevertheless become indirectly victimized. What’s at stake, in the narratives, is the question of guilt, which they rhetorically evade by the use of different metaphors. These metaphors depict bullying as a mystery, a lifelong source of suffering, a transformation, a learning experience, a battle, a contagious virus, and a trap. The narrators are constrained by the narrative conditions, the interpretative repertoire, standard story, and narrative form and content – a story of good and evil when creating their own story. The narrative conditions at the same time set the limit for expressing oneself in the identity work. This also means we are part of the production and reproduction of the bullying discourse when I, as a researcher, and the narrators use the repertoire and the standard story in mutual understanding.
5.
Dahlkild-Öhman, Gunilla, 1945-
(författare)
Att börja tala med barn om pappas våld mot mamma : Radikalt lärande i arbetet med vårdnad, boende och umgänge
2011
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This thesis explores the scope for children’s voices offered to children in court mandated investigations regarding custody, residence or contact. The focus is on children who have been exposed to their father’s violence against their mother The aim is to study how the legislators’ intentions concerning children’s participation in this area are implemented in work groups. The assumption is that implementation can be seen as collective learning. Implementation may in this case challenge established relations of power like age and gender orders. Professional discourses on violence have to shift from gender neutral to gendered discourses and discourses on children have to include a participation discourse. Learning which includes a shift in discourses and challenges established power relations is defined as radical learning.The approach is social constructionist and draws on group interviews with social workers specialized in family law.The thesis analyses which discourses of violence and of children are accessible and used at group level. This can be seen as a discursive opportunity structure. The discourses in question are: gender violence, child protection, treatment and family law discourses as well as care and participation discourses. The conclusion is that all these discourses are accessible to the professionals and the effects of the different discourses are discussed regarding the possibilities for creating a safe situation for mother and child during the investigation.The thesis furthermore analyses the organisation of the work groups. These characteristics can be seen as an organisational opportunity structure. The analysis shows different patterns in the groups when it comes to structure and stage of learning process. One group seems to be at the stage where the members are prepared to start talking to the child about the father’s violence.The final chapter presents a discussion of radical learning and the possibilities for radical social change when established power relations are challenged.
6.
7.
Eriksson, Maria, 1969-
(författare)
I skuggan av Pappa : familjerätten och hanteringen av fäders våld
2003
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
The aims of this thesis are to shed light on the handling of fathers’ violence in the context of separation and divorce in Sweden today; and to analytically and empirically relate age, gender and kinship to each other. The aims are fulfilled by three interlinked studies of what constructions and the constructing of age, gender and kinship mean for the handling of fathers’ violence against mothers/co-parents and children: in social policy; by separated mothers; and finally by family law secretaries. Each study builds upon a separate set of qualitative material: public documents from three policy areas; thematically structured interviews with abused, separated mothers and family law secretaries. The empirical results make visible some unintended consequences of current attempts in Sweden to create gender equality, shared parenting, a “new father” and to promote children’s interests. Study one demonstrates that when the politics and policy regarding parenthood, separation and divorce are taken as the point of departure, the contemporary age-, gender-, and kinship-order stands out as patriarchal: as marked by father-power based upon ties of blood to not yet adult children. Furthermore, violent fathers neither exist as a concept nor as a policy problem. The interviewed mothers narrate how they have tried to deal with the co-parent’s/ex-partners’ behaviour as violence but have encountered hindrances; the interviewed family law secretaries’ handling fathers’ violence stands out as more of a non-handling, especially in the case of violence against children. When the everyday constructions and constructing of age, gender and kinship discussed in study two and three are taken together, the contours of the patriarchal order seen through the lens of policy are also made visible: fathers’ space for action is vast; children’ and mothers’ more limited. The analysis shows how political and professional handling of fathers’ violence through a non-handling is made possible by well-established notions of heterosexual relationships, fatherhood, motherhood, age- and kinship-relations, as well as family law secretary-professionalism. However, the two studies based upon interviews demonstrate not just how the everyday constructions and constructing mentioned above can be used to reproduce father-power, but also how this power can be challenged.
8.
Lindblom, Jonas
(författare)
När vetenskapen tystnar : Ett socialpsykologiskt studium av massmedias behandling av morden i Falun, Bjuv och på Stureplan
1999
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This dissertation is a social psychological study of the influence of science on everyday thinking. The specific focus is the way in which mass media, as an intermediate arena of knowledge in society, accepts or rejects scientific concepts and findings. Particularly, it concerns the phenomenon that the Swedish mass media calls "the inexplicable violence". The thesis points to a journalistic independence from science. On the one hand this refers to the condition, that the journalist can reject the legitimacy of scientific explanations to violence. On the other hand it illuminates the establishment of independent links of knowledge, between the journalist and everyday man. This work consists of three main arguments for a journalistic independence from science. The first argument demonstrates how the scientific expert and the journalist differ in their interpretations of violence. While the scientific expert refers to social, biological, psychological or medical causes, the journalistic thinking is based upon a moralistic perception in terms of motives. The second argument deepens the understanding of the moral rationality in mass media. It shows in detail how the moral pathos gives rise to a distinct set of assumptions, differing from the presuppositions of the scientific experts. The third and final argument, establishes a connection between the journalist and "the everyday thinker". The purpose of this concept is not only to show that everyday man could reject science and formulate his own knowledge. It also suggests that even when accepted, science could not give self-evident and unquestionable answers to social problems.
9.
Medina, Eduardo, 1957-
(författare)
Från ”tyst vår” till ”hållbar utveckling” : En kritisk diskursanalys av miljöfrågans utveckling 1962–1987
2013
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This dissertation studies the development of the environmental issue from a discursive perspective. Through an analysis of views on nature and the environment in several NGOs and main political organs, the dissertation tries to explain how a certain view became hegemonic. The analysis pertains to the period between the publication of Silent Spring in 1962 and the introduction of the concept sustainable development by the UN in 1987. From a realistic starting point and with critical discourse analysis (CDA) as its method, the dissertation aims to identify causal powers and mechanisms that have generated and institutionalized the environmental discourse. An analytical model is developed and applied on three levels; a sociolinguistic, institutional, and macrosocial level; which also reflect the methodological progression of the study from description to explanation.The result shows that the discursive practice was hegemonized by a Western view promoting economic growth. This discourse gradually gained ground at the expense of an anti-systemic discourse which posited structural societal changes as the answer to environmental problems. Mechanisms such as the exclusion of some views and actors from common discursive practices were crucial for the process of homogenizing the discourse and developing consensus. Through incorporating that part of the environmental movement which did not fight the dominant economic and political system, the UN turned it into support for its own project, which is part of the process of hegemony. At the same time the environmental objectives of the hegemonic discourse were established in the institutional spheres.The institutionalization of the environmental issue changed the focus from social critique to a question of development and technology, something which helped displace the original critical and partially anti-systemic character of environmental discourse. Through turning the critical and negative account of the situation into a more harmonious and hopeful vision, for instance in terms of sustainable development, a foundation was laid for the later development of ecological modernization. When the hegemonic discourse invested the concept of sustainable development with emphases on progress and economic growth, it encapsulated the environmental issue within the framework of the prevailing social system.
10.
Dag, Munir, 1968-
(författare)
Unga människor med rörelsehinder : förankring, marginalisering och social exkludering
2006
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
The aim of the thesis was to describe the specific barriers young people with disabilities experience in their ambition to get a job. The aim was also to investigate how these young people’s social and economic situation has been affected by their disability. The results are based on two reports: one qualitative, consisting of interviews with 12 individuals with physical disabilities, and one quantitative in the form of a questionnaire answered by 706 persons. In the case of the questionnaire, the response rate was 48 per cent. Both reports are based on the same criteria, namely, that the respondents should have a physical disability, be 20–35 years of age and be participating in some form of employment policy program. The results from both studies show that individuals with physical disabilities encounter different types of barriers on the labour market, which can be categorised as being either at the individual level or at the social level. The barriers at the individual level are low education, long-term unemployment, grave physical disability and lack of work experience. The barriers identified at the social level are primarily poorly adapted workplaces, a too high working pace, employers’ negative attitudes, insufficient knowledge of the competence of disabled persons and an overly generous social welfare system. All these factors constitute a direct obstacle to employing persons with a physical disability. The results from the interview study show that the respondents have few social relations. The majority of the respondents have social intercourse solely with family members or parents. Most of the respondents in the questionnaire study state that they have frequent social relations with friends and acquaintances. Both the interview study and the questionnaire study reveal that the respondents’ financial position has worsened as a result if their physical disability. Conclusions that can be drawn from this thesis are that young people with physical disabilities encounter different barriers in their attempts to get a job and to maintain social relations. Based on the results, some of the respondents can be regarded as being socio-economically marginalised.
