The idea of sects has been something observed from a distance, which creates a mystery regarding what occurs in these selective religious groups. In today's media cults is often depicted as mystic groups, but is that a correct portrayal of cults, or is in fact misleading? The purpose of this thesis is to create an overview regarding the mental health by former sect members by the usage of Heider Fritz interpretation of attribution theory. The issue that will be leading this thesis is “How can attribution theory be used to understand sect defectors regarding their mental health?”. This work will be analysed with thematic analysis, due to it being more fitting, regarding to the material based on peoples own stories about their experiences, as well as the usage of theory functioning like framework while reading and later analysing the material. The theory that will function as a base for the work is as mentioned, Attribution theory describe people under the impression that events outside of logical explanation is caused by God. In a religious perspective the roles between God and humans are mentioned several times throughout the Bible. The result of this thesis shows that people in Swedish sects develop mental illness due to the strict image of God and the pressure put on members by parish leaders, that functions as a form om degradation. Although it is important to underline that one cannot generalize the members of a sect, due to the complex individuality prerequisites that each person obtain. The prerequisites vary from person to person and therefore establish the psyche of every individual and the risk of developing a mental illness. / <p>På grund av Covid-19 har opponeringen av uppsatsen skett utanför universitetes lokaler, via Zoom</p>

In pharaonic times, religion, magic and medicine had little distinction between each other due to the commonly held belief that all parts of life were influenced and even controlled by divinity and the supernatural. To navigate life easier, and in true Egyptian fashion, a large corpus of text was composed of magic, medicine and religion. The latter includes the arguably most well-known work, the Egyptian Book of the dead, the religious scripture that would help the deceased navigate the netherworld in the hopes for eternal life. The papyri depict numerous plants and remedies as well as spell and healing methods accompanied by magical incorporation such as incantation or invocation of a god or goddess. These can be considered a basis for the fundamental ideas of religion and daily life of ancient Egypt, always consisting of divine involvement. This essay will deal with a symbol that the ancient Egyptians saw as synonymous with life, and immortality: The narcotic blue water lily, Nymphaea Caerulea. The study will be a work on the human religious experience with a plant that I will theorize as having been used for an entheogenic effect in order to connect with the divine by asking some key questions: How and why was the lily used? How is the flowers depiction on art, in texts, and different iconography indicative to a usage in religious experience and through the mythology produced in the civilisation?

We are used to regarding aesthetic experience from the point of view of a spectator, rather than something we actively provide and give. It is not common in the aesthetic debate to analyse what it is like to offer an aesthetic experience, but it is rather the opposite. Philosophers and aestheticians tend to study and focus on how the experience is perceived by someone, not on how it unfolds for the one who provides it. I believe that the experience of giving - especially when we give ourselves to others - is an aesthetic experience in itself. By "giving ouselves to others" I mean opening ourselves to others through acts of generous and disinterested service. In fact, it seems that we are truly and fully happy when we are willing to give ourselves to others in this way. Accordingly, the questions I am going to answer in this research are: why can we be happy by giving ourselves to another person? Can we be "gifts" for others without expecting something back? Is this experience aesthetic? I argue that love and disinterestedness are two key-concepts which help us understand how it is possible to selflessly give ourselves. In addition to that, I claim that such an act is aesthetic because we judge it as "beautiful" and not only as "good". The experience of self-giving is aeshetic because we invoke aesthetic concepts when we describe it.

My research is focused on the relation between the foreign policy vector and national identity as projected by Armenia’s Prime Minister (PM) Nikol Pashinyan in the public sphere. This study is a search for expressions of ‘sameness’ and allegiance in the geopolitical balancing and reconstruction of Armenia’s foreign policy narrative, ideology and identity.  The work entails an exploration of how Armenia’s relations to the EU, France, Iran, Russia, and the US are being projected through the Prime Minister’s Twitter account from 2018 through 2022. A quantitative and qualitative (discourse) analysis of PM Pashinyan’s tweets through these five years indicated that references to Russia predominantly have contents and direct contextual links to the sphere of security and defence. There is an absence of positive tonality toward Russia following Armenia’s war with Azerbaijan in 2020 and the Russia-brokered ceasefire agreement. In contrast, during the whole five-year period France stands out as receiving unanimously positive remarks with content on various subjects. France stands out as being referred to the most in values and ideology. The EU, US and Iran all feature less than Russia and France. Posts with the US mentioned are in the sphere of external relations and in connection with the Armenian diaspora. The Armenian communities in Iran are also subject of a number of tweets. Many Twitter posts referring to Armenian-Iranian state relations include references to shared history and heritage. In summary, my analysis illustrates a foreign policy engagement towards the West from PM Pashinyan. However, his tweets also acknowledge the strong ties to Russia in security and defence and the deep heritage shared with Iran.

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Today Sweden is one of the most secularized countries in the world and almost nowhere do so few believe that traditional religion plays a role in their lives. The purpose of this study is to investigate and analyze how secularization is portrayed in nine selected textbooks intended for middle school education and also to analyze how this result can be understood from two perspectives: secularization and modernization.  To clarify this purpose through a specific inquiry, two research questions have been formulated: How is secularization presented in the different textbooks? and How can the production of educational materials be understood in terms of secularization and modernization?. The aim is also to achieve this by using pre-selected analytical questions that will help answer the research question along with the selected excerpts in the material. The theory used in this study consists of the definitions of secularization and modernization presented and discussed in Bruce (2002, 2011) and Davie (2013). Bruce (2002, 2011) discusses the role of modernization in the decline of religion in society and the emergence of the secular society, where rationality, science, and technology became increasingly important. The discussion also assumes that the rise of secularization is a development of modernization. Davie (2013) initially discusses how modernization and the separation of church and state created a society that no longer relied on religious thinking but instead on empirical and ethical approaches.  Since the essay aims to study how textbooks present a concept, a content analysis of qualitative significance has been conducted to select and analyze what the author intends to convey through their portrayal of secularization. To structure the presented material, a coding process has been conducted to identify the context in which secularization is portrayed and presented in the different textbooks. The coding categories are as follows: "Secularization as the main part of the context," "Secularization as a part alternatively labeled in the context," and "Secularization not presented." Based on these codes, a thematization of the material has been carried out to use the analytical questions that have been employed to answer the research question. The themes are as follows: 'secularization,' 'modernization,' 'micro-level,' and 'macro-level.' The conclusions that this study has been able to identify and establish are that secularization can be portrayed and presented in several different ways. It is up to the author to focus on which perspective, starting point, or societal level secularization should be used.

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The aim of this essay is to show that the protagonist of the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment is more open to change in his life than is often assumed by commentators. In the end of the novel the student Raskolnikov confesses the murder of two women, and he is sentenced to eight years in a prison colony. In a short scene Raskolnikov seems to experience a spiritual awakening, a "resurrection", with the words of the original text. The genuineness of that conversion, foretold in the epilogue, has been contested by critics. That negative assessment is a starting point for this essay. Is a new beginning, a spiritual restoration or even a resurrection, like in the biblical tradition, at all imaginable for Raskolnikov? I propose it is, based on my reading of the novel. I will especially look back on an episode before the main action of the novel starts. It concerns Raskolnikov's engagement to a young girl who died before the couple could get married. The story about the fiancée suggests that a more purposeful future for the main character - in contrast to who he seems to be in the novel - cannot be dismissed. One main argument for the spiritual transformation of Raskolnikov is an experience he has in the minutes before the resurrection scene. He envisions the biblical patriarche Abraham on his fields with grazing herds. I interpret this as a myth about possibilities. Abraham lives in the beginning of time and God gave him a mission. Abraham lives a long and full life. Life does not have to end in misery but can be meaningful and long also for Raskolnikov.

Insult and the personal experience of being insulted constitute an ongoing societal issue. Despite the existence of a legally defined definition of insult, a new and controversial culture known as “the culture of offense” has emerged. The starting point of this study is to examine the phenomenon more closely to gain a better understanding of its nature and significance. The purpose of the study is to investigate social media as a possible cause, from the perspective of teachers, focusing on middle school students. Through a quantitative questionnaire, middle school teachers in schools located in Gävle and Uppsala were asked questions regarding students’ behavior in school in relation to their social media usage. Although only 11 respondents answered, it is evident that several individuals perceive change in student behavior associated with their media usage and a growing culture of offense. Several arguments pertaining to the culture of offense is further discussed in the text. One argument may be that the new culture has promoted a more open society where individuals are more inclined to express themselves in unjust situations. On the other hand, the importance of legal protection and freedom of speech is emphasized. The paper raises questions about how to ensure legal protection for those accused of insult and how to uphold the principle of free expression when people are afraid to voice their opinions. The text concludes by emphasizing the importance of being aware of and paying attention to new phenomena in society, even though experience of insult is subjective and vary among individuals.

The aim of this study is to examine Swedish teachers’ experiences and perspectives on honour-related oppression and violence amongst students as well as how to recognise and manage honour-related issues amongst the students. Furthermore, the study aimed to identify possible associations between religious groups or religion in general and honour-culture. This was done through a qualitative phenomenological method with semi-structured interviews of six teachers working in different schools in Stockholm. The six participating teachers had different backgrounds yet three of them had backgrounds in the Middle East. The empirics of this study has been analysed through three theoretical frameworks: social constructivism, ethnocentric and cultural relativism and finally individualism and collectivism. The results of this study show that Swedish teachers find managing honour-related issues amongst students complicated as they find themselves unaware of official procedures. All six teachers express the importance of this issue, although the three teachers with backgrounds in the Middle East find managing honour-related issues easier due to their language skills. The Arabic language was found closely associated with students who experience honour-related oppression and violence. The parents of these students were found as the main factor of the issue as they often come from societies with values that differ from the Swedish democratic values. Working with the parents was found as the main solution for the issue. The mapping of these students is made through listening to their opinions and values and if they are influenced by honour-culture. Also, the teachers find that certain students do not attend some compulsory school-activities, like swimming, due to their parents which was found to be a common thing amongst students who live in honour-culture. A point was made to look at the participating teachers’ background and what was found was that all teachers had religious backgrounds. This can imply that religious teachers feel a need to participate to prevent common prejudice regarding honour-culture being related to religion. This also suggests that teachers with religious backgrounds feel a certain liability for students who live in honour-related conditions. However, all informants expressed clear distance from the statement of religion and honour-culture being related. Moreover, connections between Islam and honour-culture are commonly made, however, previous research argue that honour-culture is related to religiousness in general rather than a specific religious group which my study verifies.