The aim of this study was to investigate how selected municipalities’ use social media, with a focus on how they are working to increase the dialogue between municipalities’ and residents. To answer the purpose of the study three questions has been formulated: how do the communicators use social media in their daily work? What opportunities and challenges are the municipalities’ experiencing with Facebook? How do they work with Facebook to increase dialogue with citizens? The theories that has been used in this study is Cutlip’s and Grunig’s public relations theories, Shannon and weavers communication model, Cutlip’s and Heath’s theory of issue management and Jenkins theory of convergence culture. The method that has been used in this study is qualitative semi-structured interviews and the analysis is done with a thematic text analysis. The material of this study contained interviews of four communicator officers that are responsible for social media in the municipalities’.    The results of the semi-structured interviews showed that the communicator officers used social media to quickly, easily and cheaply connect many citizens in comparison with the traditional media. The biggest opportunity with Facebook for municipalities’ was to improve issue management by spreading the information faster and have an improved dialog with the citizens. The biggest challenge was to think more strategically how to enhance the use of Facebook. The communicator officers try to invite citizens to dialogue by presenting information that citizens want comment and debate about. Municipalities’ also will have meetings with PR agencies to improve the dialog with the citizens in Facebook.

Employable humanists. A qualitative study on humanist students' views on employability. The crisis of the humanities is a controversial debate in the media and within academic settings. Because of lack of request for humanists in the labor market, the question of humanistic skills and employability is becoming increasingly important. The concept of employability importance not only echoes within the economic discussions, but also on everyday agenda in the academic world and takes a large part in the communication between the university and the students. It is therefore important to get answers to the question whether there is conformity in the interpretation of this concept between the university and the students. The aim of this desk study is to examine how the concept of employability has its significance in the academic communication and how the responsibility for employability is portrayed. This is done by studying how the concept of employability is formed and how the responsibilities outlined in texts from Career Center at the University of Umeå, and by comparing study results with the students' perceptions of the concept of employability and responsibility. The study has a qualitative disposition and consists of two main methods: qualitative interviews with focus groups to explore students' views, and critical linguistic analysis of texts with a focus on metaphor analysis and syntax analysis which are also supplemented by the multimodal text analysis. Results of this study indicate that the concept of employability takes a central part of the university’s communication. There are many common starting points in the interpretation of the concept and the responsibility between the university and students. Both the Career Center at Umeå University and students believe that actual knowledge, skills, experience as well as network forms the meaning of the concept of employability, and has a big importance in the student’s position on the job market. However, because the students look at the use of the concept of employability in the texts as acceptance to the social ideological perception of the individual as objects, there is some criticism of the use of the term employability in the university’s communications.

Es wird heute weltweit versucht, Konzepte für vielfältige taktile kartographische Medien zu entwickeln, die vorrangig der allgemeinen Orientierung und Mobilität, aber auch verstärkt dem Wissenserwerb, z.B. im Geographieunterricht an Schulen für Blinde und Sehbehinderte, dienen sollen. Diese Konzepte müssen von denen der "visuellen Kartographie"1 zwangsläufig mehr oder weniger abweichen und auf weitgehend anderen Methoden, Regeln und Techniken beruhen. Wesentliche und durch die Praxis verifizierte Erkenntnisse der visuellen Kartographie sind der taktilen Kartographie zugänglich zu machen bzw. in/an diese zu adaptieren. Trotzdem dürfen grundlegende Theorien und Erfahrungen der Kartengestaltung und Kartennutzung für Sehende nicht völlig negiert werden.

Title: Recycling, society and social media: a qualitative case study of a municipally-owned company’s Facebook communication. The aim of the study has been to, through a case study of a company’s Facebook communication create understanding for how the medium may be used as communication channel in order to achieve effective, engaging communication with the company’s Facebook followers. The company Stormossen is a municipally-owned waste disposal company located in Kvevlax, Finland. The study uses a mix of the theoretical perspectives intentionalism and hermeneutics, in that its aim is to look at both sides of the communication process - the sender and the receiver - thus gaining a comprehensive picture of the research problem. The theoretical frame is made up of theories on new media logic and social media, participation, communication strategies and social communication. Two methods are applied in the case study, an informant interview with a key person at the company and a qualitative content analysis of the company’s official Facebook page. A total of 133 status updates were selected for analysis, mainly focusing on examining the content, mode of communication and the followers’ interaction and communication on the page. The main results of the study have shown that the company has not fully adapted to the new media logic in their Facebook communication. The communication strategy used is mainly an inside-strategy with emphasis being placed on organizational targets and the one-way distribution of information about the company and its services, with limited attempts to involve and initiate dialogue with the followers. These findings are in line with earlier research on how companies use social media. The company also has an unclear picture of who their followers are and why they would be interested in interacting with the company on Facebook. The followers on the other hand are mainly passive, and their motive for communication can be explained with the need for self-presentation. In order to create content and communication that the followers find relevant and want to interact with and share, the company has to actively work to adapt more to the new media logic. Facebook should be used both as a way of making information available but also for networking with and inviting followers to participation and dialogue, thus making themselves useful to the followers in order to build a good reputation and effective communication. Key words: Social media, Facebook, web 2.0, social communication/social marketing, civic information, communication strategy, social media-strategy, new media logic, participation, communication model, case study, qualitative study, Stormossen, municipally-owned company