This thesis aims to understand how the second-generation Afro-Swedes experience everyday racism in public spaces as racialized and gendered bodies. The three key dimensions of study are to recognize (1) blackness in public space, (2) experiences of everyday racism in public space, and (3) coping strategies to everyday racism. These three dimensions are gathered from six participants’ narratives done through semi-structured interviews. The thesis reveals that public spaces are based on lived experiences. The second-generation Afro-Swedes are likely to suffer from emotional damage while exposed to racism and discrimination acts in public spaces. The collective notion amongst the select group is that feeling unsafe and unwelcomed in predominantly white spaces hinders their mobility patterns. The internal individualization of the concept of blackness is additional; however, there are similarities in how the Swedish society misses the individual aspect of their identity and groups black people as a collective. The thesis further concludes that everyday racism is a product of structural racism and is thus the aspect society should focus on the most. More research needs to be done regarding second-generation Afro-Swedes and black people in Sweden about spatial processes of race and the interconnection with gender, focusing on the embodiment of space rather than segregation.

A market survey conducted on students currently studying at different universities in Sweden showed that a majority of students either were in need or previously had been in need of a platform where solely students can buy and sell everyday services to each other. Furthermore, the survey showed that a majority of the students in question found it very important that a web application is easily navigated and that they can find what they are looking for with as few clicks as possible. The purpose of this study was to examine how different aspects of a web application intended for students in Sweden affects navigability in terms of the number of clicks needed to perform various tasks on said web application. This was done by iteratively developing and assessing a website based on research within the area, navigability measures as well as qualitative and quantitative feedback from user testing. The results suggest that a higher degree of navigability was obtained when the structure of the web application was made broader through more direct links to and from different nodes. It also seems to be of importance that users were certain of where a click of a button would take them in the overall structure, through effective labeling and placement.

Entrepreneurship is a common choice of occupation amongst migrants in Malmö. African migrant entrepreneur experiences however, are identified as homogenous to other immigrant groups. This study is based on the unique everyday experiences of African migrant entrepreneurs in Malmö recognising their networks, depths of embeddedness and their urban place-making. To this effect, this study focuses on the processes of establishing networks during the pre-migration stage as a means to migrating and settling in Malmö and their embeddedness in their ethnic communities to establish entrepreneurship. Further insight is provided into African migrant entrepreneurs’ socio-spatial navigations and realities. Social network theory and social capital probes into the social relations of African migrant entrepreneurs, examining the multidimensionality of relationships established. Transnational theory explores migrant entrepreneur relationships that are not bound by physical space but encourage entrepreneurship and maintain a connection to home. Embeddedness theory is implemented to analyse the extent ethnic affiliation can facilitate or limit the ambitions of African migrant entrepreneurs.  This study is qualitative in nature and used an ethnographic approach. In-depth interviews were conducted with 7 African migrant entrepreneurs; 5 men and 2 women. Of the 5 men, 2 are Nigerian, 1 Ghanaian, 1 Kenyan and 1 Somali. The women are East African; 1 Ethiopian and 1 Kenyan. Accounts from the participant’s experiences revealed how African migrant entrepreneurs in Malmö network to aid their entrepreneurship. The study finds that most African migrant entrepreneurs operate within dense social networks where they receive social and economic support from their communities. However, there are African migrant entrepreneurs who are linked to broader social network outside their own communities that provide access to move beyond kin-based networks. Findings show African migrant entrepreneurs are constantly looking for opportunities to expand their entrepreneurship, diligently strategizing and utilising their embeddedness to circumnavigate opportunity barriers. This study concluded that African migrant entrepreneurs are key cultural players and contributors to the liveability of urban space. It illustrates the role of African migrant entrepreneurs in urban placemaking through the construction of places in their everyday lives. African migrant entrepreneur’s everyday lives and their experiences are a contributing voice to global discourse on migration and urban spatial practices.

The starting point for this paper is Jerrold Levinson's taxonomy of perceptual beauty. Despite the ambiguity of the concept, we think we can recognize beauty in different shapes and contexts, which suggests that the different manifestations of beauty have a common feature or a common underlying nature. My claims are 1) that there are good reasons to believe that there are different species of beauty, 2) that everyday scenes can accommodate real cases of beauty that Levinson does not capture in his framework, and 3) that the essay's examples of an everyday scene - Laura and the clothesline - do not fit into Levinson's seven main categories. The conclusion is that we need a new category to accommodate this instance of prosaic beauty. The multiplicity of beauty is greater than we usually assume and that says something about the importance of beauty in human life.

Females continue to have negative dispositions towards mathematics even though the performance gap between females and males has all but disappeared. While there are many hypotheses for why these negative dispositions exist among females towards mathematics, this paper explores the possibility that the field of mathematics could favor more masculine ways of reasoning at the exclusion of valid, non-masculine mathematical thought. To research this idea, the day-to-day, non-formal, non-school mathematical activities of two women were identified and analyzed. The analysis uncovered complex mathematical processes among both women that were fundamentally different from the mathematical processes common in the mathematics field. Such results seem to affirm the idea that females' ways of doing mathematics are not acknowledged or validated by the mathematics community and therefore suggest the development of more inclusive mathematics research and instruction.

Privatization of the public realm is rampant in modern cities. Public space accessibility and usage is often determined by inhabitants’ socio-economic background in the mega cities of the developing world as well. The case of Chennai, a city of 9 million people drawn from different regions in India, is used in this project to understand this phenomenon and evolve an alternate approach to urban public space design and use, in which citizen-led initiatives are encouraged, instead of being ignored, by mainstream urban planning and design processes. Chennai is one of the fastest growing cities in the world today. Conventional planning has failed to direct this growth towards creating sustainable urban environments for all, and has instead encouraged lopsided development that caters only to the affluent sections. This trend has affected public spaces as well, which are now centered on consumption and dependant on heavy investment in real estate and technology. This has a considerable impact on the spectrum of socio-economic groups that are able to access and use them. The project questions the prevalent situation, and focuses on three aspects that have been ignored in recent times. The first (Everyday Urbanism) is explored as a method to revitalize the second (Public Spaces), in order to achieve the third (Sustainable Lifestyles) as a long term goal. This is done using analysis and design in parallel, and results in a proposal for a new design process and through it, scale specific design solutions for Chennai’s public spaces that will create a high quality of life for inhabitants of the heavily populated, demographically diverse and socio-economically fragmented city.

The paradox of contemporary migration in the EU is that new actors, rules, and institutions have emerged and created internal spaces where there is a gradual reorientation of the character of EU border regime. These spaces have become arenas where EU member states are re-categorizing, re-scaling, expanding, and diversifying their modes of internal migration control and enforcement. To overcome this paradox, this research seeks to explore migration policies in Sweden, Germany, and France to demonstrate that the narratives about EU common border policy is complex, uncertain, polarising, and conflicting. This paper argues that the emergence of the EU common border regime with a multiplicity of actors have created everyday bordering as a rebordering mechanism of control that threatens the idea of a common EU border, especially at the level of nation states. My theoretical approach is based on ‘everyday bordering and the politics of beloninging’. And I applied an interpretative approach in the analysis of official policy documents, academic articles, media reports, advocacy papers, NGO documents, and political speeches.

Matematiken är en stor del av vårt vardagsliv. Matematikundervisningen är idag till stor del läroboksbaserad och abstrakt vilket inte bidrar till långsiktiga användbara kunskaper. Då lärare vittnar om att elevernas matematiska förståelse är låg, är syftet med denna kunskapsöversikt att undersöka hur matematikläroboken kan kompletteras för att eleverna ska utveckla matematisk förståelse. Matematisk förståelse i skolan är nära förknippat med meningsskapande. Meningsskapande handlar om att se matematikens användbarhet, som är ett värdefullt redskap för individen och samhällsmedborgaren för att lösa vardagliga problem.      Detta är en kunskapsöversikt som består av åtta vetenskapliga artiklar. Artiklarna är inhämtade från en forskningsdatabas. Artiklarna är tematiserade och analyserade för att kunna svara på vår frågeställning. Vårt huvudsakliga fokus är lågstadiet.   Slutsatsen av denna kunskapsöversikt är att läroböcker ska ses som en resurs som behöver kompletteras för att uppnå matematisk förståelse. Undervisning behöver bli vardagsanknuten, erfarenhetsbaserad och ämnesöverskridande, där läraren intar en ansvarsfull ledarroll istället för att agera förmedlare av ett matematiskt innehåll. Arbetsmetoden konkret-illustrerande-abstrakt, som är en översättning från engelskans concrete – pictorial – abstract (CPA), utgår ifrån det konkreta och arbetar mot det abstrakta. Genom att undervisningen utgår ifrån CPA   och laborativt material gynnas elevernas matematiska förståelse. Det väsentliga blir att synliggöra sambandet mellan den konkreta vardagen och den abstrakta läroboksmatematiken. / Mathematics is a large part of our everyday life. Mathematics teaching today, is largely influenced by mathematics textbooks and are abstract, and does not contribute to long-term useful knowledge. Teachers testify that students mathematical understanding is low. Because of this, the aim of this research is to examine how the mathematic teaching has to change to make the students achieve this. Mathematical understanding is closely associated with meaning making. Meaning making is about seeing the usefulness of mathematics, as a useful tool for the individual and the citizen of society that can be used to solve everyday problems.      This is a knowledge overview. The result data consist of eight scientific articles that were collected from a research database. The articles were themed and reviewed to be able to answer our question. Our main focus for the conclusion is primary school.   The result shows that mathematic textbooks have to be seen as a resource that needs to be supplemented to achieve mathematical understanding. The teaching has to become everyday connected, experience-based and interdisciplinary, where the teacher is taking a responsible leading role, instead of being an intermediary of the mathematical content. The working method concrete - pictorial - abstract (CPA), starts with the concrete and work towards the abstract. Through teaching with CPA and manipulatives, befriends the student´s mathematical understanding. The key point is to make the connection between the concrete everyday life, and the abstract textbook.

Sander Roberto Maurano Filho Producing and Consuming the Nation: Ethnography of a Czech National Memorial Abstract Following a research agenda stimulated by Billig (1995), Palmer (1998) and Fox (2008) towards the study of aspects of everyday life through which nations are reproduced, this work approaches the National Memorial on Vítkov Hill, part of the Czech National Museum in Prague. In order to investigate to what extend national cultural productions constrain people's practices and understandings, this research offers an ethnographic study of the production and consumption of the monument, considering practices of consumption and occupation that reproduce, subvert or negotiate its national content and colossal planning. The National Memorial on Vítkov Hill combines memorial, museum, statue and park, which had their meanings re-negotiated by different political regimes during the 20th century. Re-opened in 2009 aiming to 'make sense' of national history, identity and memory in the context of a new, democratic and European Czech Republic, the monument combines official ceremonies, such as military parades and presidential rituals, with permanent and temporary exhibitions with national functions. Although planned to celebrate the nation, exhibitions are consumed by visitors that distort the national...

This dissertation describes the life story of Věra Skálová Selnerová, a Czech actress who was born in 1921 in Prague. She grew up in Ústí nad Labem but in 1993, she and her family had to flee back to Prague. There she commenced her career as an actress - she worked with Andula Sedláčková and later on with Vlasta Burian. She also starred in several movies (Advokát chudých, Muži nestárnou, etc.). After the war she suspended her acting career and married General Jaroslav Selner, who fought on the Western and the Eastern Front. After February 1948, she and her husband were persecuted and together they left Prague. She worked as a clerk and a teacher. In the sixties, they returned to Prague and she began to work for Pragokoncert, but she had to leave this job in 1968 because of her political beliefs. Her husband died in 1973. After 1989, they were both rehabilitated. This thesis uses oral-history interviews, archival materials, scholarly literature and memoirs. Keywords: Věra Skálová Selnerová, theater, film, Protectorate, communism, persecution, everyday life. Abstract This dissertation describes the life story of Věra Skálová Selnerová, a Czech actress who was born in 1921 in Prague. She grew up in Ústí nad Labem but in 1993, she and her family had to flee back to Prague. There she commenced her...