The representation of new religious movements in documentaries and mainstream media affects our understanding of and attitude toward new religious movements. Scholars argue that media shapes our knowledge of new religious movements and that we most often trust this information as truthful. This study aims to investigate and analyze the representation of Heaven’s Gate in HBO’s documentary series Heaven’s Gate: The Cult of Cults and whether this representation can be useful in a classroom context. The data was retrieved by closely watching the four episodes of the documentary series while taking notes and rewatching the documentary series until relevant information and quotes were retrieved. The research method employed was a movie analysis, more specifically a qualitative content analysis. The theoretical framework used is drawn from Joseph Laycock and his three identified narratives in which media tend to portray new religious movements: medicalization, deviance amplification, and convergence. The results reveal that the documentary series uses these narrative features in various ways, but it also challenges and contrasts them. Furthermore, the conclusion of the representation is complex and nuanced. The documentary series presents a respectful, informative, and somewhat equitable representation, but also reinforces stereotypical and negative societal discourses. Additionally, this study suggests further study in the field of documentaries and new religious movements to explore the representation of other new religious movements.

The purpose of this study is to investigate how Swedish newspapers chose to portray the mass-suicide of the new religious movement Heaven’s Gate in 1997. The study aims to gain insight into how the Swedish mass-media portrayed the religious leader Marshall Applewhites' actions, and the rest of the members and discuss what patterns of the reporting can be related to other depictions of “sects” investigated in previous research.    Laycock's theory of how the media portrays new religious movements is used to categorize the use of Heaven's Gate in the articles.   By searching the Swedish Royal library’s (KB) newspaper database, 496 articles are found that mention “Heaven’s Gate* and 99 articles that mention Applewhite*. Of these, 89 are considered relevant articles that are included in the source material. The material will be analyzed using a qualitative text analytical method. With the help of previous research about how new religious movements are portrayed in the media, a context is established which is also linked back to strengthen the result and is discussed in the final discussion of the study.  The results indicate that all concepts in Laycock's theory appear in the media portrayal of Heaven's Gate. Moreover, most of the responsibility for the suicides is attributed to Applewhite in the source material. Finally, a couple of concluding reflections on the content are presented.

Detta konstnärliga examensarbete är ett försök att som pianist nå en fördjupad förståelse för Franz Schuberts Drei Klavierstücke (D.946). Verket komponerades under Schuberts dödsår 1828 men var det i mars eller maj? Syftet är att framföra Drei Klavierstücke på bästa möjliga sätt. Det utförs genom kontextualisering av Schubert liv och en fördjupad analys av hans musik samt jämförelser av olika partiturutgåvor, finnandet och problematiseringen utav Schuberts huruvida verket skrivs i mars eller maj, samt att erhålla djuplodade kunskaper som underlag för att skapa minnesvärda associativa titlar. Därigenom kan jag bättre visualisera inom mig det som ska spelas. Med andra ord, den konstnärliga gestaltningen byggs därmed upp genom min visualisering av verket i min instudering. De första två styckena i Drei Klavierstücke hänger utan tvekan ihop med varandra (Leisinger, et al., 2015) och därför har jag valt att framföra dessa två på min examenskonsert. I studien vill jag ändå skapa associativa titlar till alla tre styckena. Med en konstnärlig metod samt litterära kunskaper på tyska, engelska och svenska skapade jag de associativa namnen. Dessa redovisas i studiens resultatkapitel, med originalspråk på tyska: Reise in Jenseits in Drei Teilen, 1. Lebensende, 2. Jenseits, 3. Himmelstür. Emellertid skapades även översättning på svenska: 1. Livetsslut, 2. Efterlivet, 3. Pärleporten. Gällande mars eller maj lämnar förlagens svar på detta öppet. Enligt dem stavades maj som M-A-Y. Schubert talade sannolikt engelska då han tidigare arbetat som hjälplärare. Det verkar ändå konstigt att ange månaden på engelska i ett dokument som i övrigt författades på tyska? / This artistic thesis is an attempt to reach a deeper understanding of the piano pieces Drei Klavierstücke (D.946) composed by Franz Schubert in 1828, but was it in March or May? The aim is for me as a pianist to perform Franz Schubert's Drei Klavierstücke in the best possible way. It is carried out through contextualization of Schubert's life and an in-depth analysis of his music as well as comparisons of different score editions, the finding and problematization of Schubert's writing of May or March, as well as obtaining deep knowledge as a basis for creating memorable associative titles. This way I can better visualize a representation of the work in my rehearsal. The first two pieces of Drei Klavierstücke are undoubtedly related to each other (Leisinger, et al., 2015) and therefore I have chosen to perform these two at my graduation concert. In the study, I still want to create associative titles for all three pieces. With a poetic method and literary knowledge in German, English and Swedish, I created the associative names. These are reported in the result chapter of the study, with original language in German: Reise in Jenseits in Drei Teilen, 1. Lebensende, 2. Jenseits, 3. Himmelstür. However, an English and a Swedish translation was also created: 1. End of Life, 2. Afterlife, 3. Heaven’s Gate. Regarding March or May, the publisher's answer to this is left open. According to them, May was spelled M-A-Y. Schubert, who was previously an assistant teacher, certainly spoke English. However, why would he do that in a document that was otherwise written in German? / <p>Repertoar:</p><p>Leoš Janáček (1854 – 1928)”På en övervuxen stig”, Serie I1. Våra kvällar (Naše večery)2. Ett bortblåst löv (Lístek odvanutý)4. Madonnan av Frydek (Frýdecká panna Maria)</p><p>Franz Schubert (1797 – 1828)Drei Klavierstücke, D.946 posth.I. Allegro assai, ”Lebensende, The End of Life, Livetsslut.”II. Allegretto, “Jenseits, Afterlife, Efterlivet.”</p><p>Wilhelm Stenhammar (1871 – 1927)Tre fantasier för piano, Op. 11.Nr. 1 Molto appassionato</p><p>Paus</p><p>Frédéric Chopin (1810 – 1849)Ballad Nr. 3, Ass dur, Op. 47  </p><p>Robert Schumann (1810 – 1856) arr. Franz Liszt (1811 – 1886)Liebeslied (Widmung), S. 566.Ur: Myrthen op. 25   </p><p>Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 – 1827)ur: Sonat Nr. 21 C-Dur Op.53II. Introduzione: Adagio moltoIII. Rondo. Allegretto moderato — Prestissimo</p><p>- - -</p><p>Medverkande: Daniel Chun, piano.</p><p>Georg Asplund, KMH lärarstudent inriktining musik och mediaproduktion,  uppgift: videofilm.</p><p>Axel Wokander, KMH klassisk musik pianostudent, uppgift: bild projektor keynote.</p><p>- - -</p><p>Keynote presentation som visades på storskärm, innehöll namn på repertoar för publikens skull.</p><p>- - - </p><p>Videofilm på konserten, togs från inifrån scenen och fångar även publiken förutom vänster sida av pianisten Daniel Chun och pianot.</p>