Our nation has made great strides since 1954's Brown v. Board of Education, 1963's I Have a Dream speech, and the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. However, Jeannie and other minorities continue to endure in a struggle for true equality. A debate exists as to whether race issues are improved by discussion, or if they improve by ceasing these types of discussions and not even mentioning race. The purpose of this qualitative biographical narrative is to vicariously relive Jeannie's Journey and ascertain what relevance her life story has to our historical timeline. The sole participant in this study was Jeannie Hodges. Data for this study were collected through 3 in-depth interviews using an interview protocol based upon a conversational interview process. Who we are is a direct manifestation of where we have been and the journeys we have taken. Jeannie's journey shows us that we can look at the past and discuss history without hate, pointing fingers, or laying blame. We benefit from gaining a deeper understanding of where we as a people have been as opposed to as individual races of blacks and whites. Understanding our combined histories provides an appreciation for where we are today as well as guidance for the future. The point is to gain a deep understanding of the interconnectedness of our individual histories, like threads in a tapestry. It is crucial to our continued progress that we not cease discussions about race or about this part of our historical timeline. Can we as a nation, acknowledge our past, embrace our future, and continue the journey together?

The purpose of this study is to contribute to a deeper understanding about how placement discontinuities of children in foster care affect their learning. The aim is to find out more about their learning and what role school plays in their life. A life-world perspective is used and theories mainly developed by Alfred Schütz (2002) build the theoretical framework. The empirical research is mainly based on narratives of a pair of twins at 19 years of age, who agreed to share their life stories and experiences of their time in school. Meetings were arranged separately with Alex, the boy, and Helena, the girl, both eager to participate. They felt that their stories could contribute to knowledge. The stories show that placement discontinuities in their early childhood made memories and their perspective of time blurry. They both suffered severe neglect in two of their foster care placements. School offered them a safe place throughout their adolescent years. However, despite this, they are critical to the teachers who saw that they suffered neglect at home but never acted upon that knowledge. Hence their first-hand experiences suggest that teachers, considered important in earlier research studies, are not as important as friend made or the daily routines that provide certain security in an otherwise uncertain life. The social services didn’t listen or support them. Alex and Helena felt that they had to take care of themselves. Their stories show that both of them are goal-oriented and that they highly value a good education. This is evident since they have always taken responsibility to complete set homework and to make school a functional place where they have also learned to know themselves. Furthermore, it is obvious that the twins have played a tremendous role for each other when their life-world time after time has changed. Alex and Helena’s stories and experiences can give the social services a deeper understanding of what lies behind the statistics. A teacher, who listens, shows support and has ambitious expectations regarding the children’s academic performance, has been confirmed in previous research to be of significant importance. In addition, the study shows that teachers should learn more about children in foster care. A life-world perspective and life-world theories can contribute to an alternative point of view regarding learning in life-world discontinuities. Learning can be reflected on by using Schütz theory about “strangers” as a way of understanding learning in a wider range, especially when there are discontinues in the life-world. The reflections made in this study point out the possibility that schools, as organizations, seem to have independent cultures that can be transferred between one another. In fact there seems to be certain variables that are the same for schools in general and hence it is of significant value to recognize school as a regional life-world. The expectations of how you act as a student and among friends are important for the sense of belonging. It is possible that Alex and Helena succeeded in school partly because some of the things they learned about the first school could be transferred to their new school. The study contributes with two new concepts; “livsvärldsbrott”- life-world-disruption and “livsvärldsbevarande”- life-world-preservation.

The title of this essay is “The capital of stories” and refers to Jerusalem, which in this essay I treat as a story in itself. To understand that story I analyze four novels that take place in Jerusalem; two from Palestinian authors and two from Israeli authors. The novels are Jerusalem och jag by Anita Goldman, En berättelse om kärlek och mörker by Amos Oz, Golda sov här by Suad Amiry and Men Jerusalem står kvar by Mahmoud Shukair. My study explores how these stories, despite being centered on the same place, present different perspectives and contain different conceptions of that place. Through a close reading and comparative analysis of the four novels, this study finds that the stories about the place Jerusalem are essential to shaping the worldviews, perspectives and personal stories of the characters inhabiting it. For example, the tension between the heavenly Jerusalem and the earthly Jerusalem is a theme in all of the novels. How the characters see and relate to this tension shapes a significant part of their world-views, in effect changing who they are. While analyzing stories about and within Jerusalem, my study explores how these stories broaden our understanding of the world that surrounds us and how we can coexist as humans while being inhabited by different stories.   Key to this study are two theories, how stories act in people’s lives by Frank, and narrative shortcuts by Olofsson. This study uses these theories as a launching point, engaging with and exploring these theories.  The study is of greater relevance because it demonstrates that our life-stories are connected to our physical surroundings, such as our homes, our neighborhoods and religious monuments. The stories we tell, are told, and take part of, about these physical places impact who we view ourselves to be and our place in the world. The stories we take part of can also affect who we feel compassionate for and relate to, since stories are what makes our humanness visible. Taking part in these stories, and understanding the narrative shortcuts intrinsic to them, increases our understanding of the world we live in and each other, improving our ability to understand and coexist with one another. By understanding and further exploring the relationship between who we are and the stories that inhabit us, we can improve both research into and education of religion and world-views.

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Yes / In the context of offenders who have learning difficulties, autism and/or social, emotional and mental health problems, their families, and professionals who work with them, I explore caring and ethical research processes via fieldnotes I wrote while carrying out lifestory interviews. Life-story interviews and recording fieldnotes within qualitative criminological, education and sociological research have long since been used to document and analyse communities, institutions and everyday life in the private and public spheres. They richly tell us about specific contexts, research relationships and emotional responses to data collection that interview transcripts alone overlook. It is in the process of recording and reflecting upon research relationships that we can see and understand ‘care-full’ research. But caring and ethical research works in an interdependent and relational way. Therefore, the participant and the researcher are at times vulnerable, and recognition of such is critical in considering meaningful and healthy research practices. However, the acknowledgment that particular types of data collection can be messy, chaotic and emotional is necessary in understanding caring research. / The Leverhulme Trust (RF-2016-613\8).

Yes / Visual representations of prisons and their inmates are common in the news and social media, with stories about riots, squalor, drugs, selfharm and suicide hitting the headlines. Prisoners’ families are left to worry about the implications of such events on their kin, while those incarcerated and less able to understand social cues, norms and rules, are vulnerable to deteriorating mental health at best, to death at worst. As part of the life-story method in my research with offenders who are on the autism spectrum, have mental health problems and/or have learning difficulties, and prisoner’s mothers, I asked participants to take photographs, reflecting upon their experiences. Photographs in this case, were primarily used to help respondents consider and articulate their feelings in follow-up interviews. Notably, seeing (and imagining) is often how we make a connection to something (object or feeling), or someone (relationships), such that images in fiction, news/social media, drama, art, film and photographs can shape the way people think and behave – indeed feel about things and people. Images and representations ought to be taken seriously in researching social life, as how we interpret photographs, paintings, stories and television shows is based on our own imaginings, biography, culture and history. Therefore, we look at and process an image before words escape, by ‘seeing’ and imagining. How my participants and I ‘collaborate’ in doing visual methods and then how we make meaning of the photographs in storying their feelings, is insightful. As it is, I wanted to enable my participants to make and create their own stories via their photographs and narratives, whilst connecting to them, along with my own interpretation and subjectivities. / The Leverhulme Trust RF-2016-613\8

Qu'est-ce qui prédispose le Portugal, le Brésil, le Québec, et l'Indiana aux USA, à mettre en place des sites institutionnels des récits de vie comme les musées de la personne, contrairement en France, où des initiatives de ce genre relèvent de la vie privée ? Nous nous interrogeons sur la force que peuvent revêtir ces récits de vie vidéos et sur le choix de ces pays de les podcaster : s’agit-il de redonner la parole à toutes les générations, les rendre plus visibles ou audibles, dans le but de transmettre, de laisser des traces pour la postérité ? Quelle est la teneur des ces traces, et qu’est-ce qui s’opère dans l’interaction entre générations ? Nous recherchons à podcaster et étudier les traces sémiotiques, sémantiques, sémiologiques des récits de vie issus de ce réseau de sites « Musée de la personne » de ces 4 pays. Nous considérons que les traces de la mémoire vivante des récits présents sur des supports numériques ou audiovisuels, constituent un édifice aussi matériel qu’un musée dans un espace donné. Le récit de vie traduirait une immémorialité, « un mouvement permanent entre temps présent et temps passé, des informations ou des événements passés et présents marquent le dialogue présent ». Nous sommes en présence de normes nouvelles, mais surtout en présence de paradigmes successifs ou de mouvements paradoxaux de recontextualisation et de reconfiguration symbolique, au fur et à mesure que ces récits de vie se transmettent d’un citoyen à un autre. Ces récits et « ces pratiques mémorielles sont très vivants chez les Anglais et les Australiens ». Il nous semble que les récits de vie peuvent participer à la formation du lien social entre générations, entre citoyens nationaux et non nationaux. Ce lien social doit s’inscrire dans l'attention et la responsabilité portée et partagée entre ascendants et descendants. Ce programme d'attention aux générations s'appelle la « neguentropie ». Il s'agirait d'un programme éthique et responsable de l'attention portée à autrui, basé sur la générosité.Tous ces dispositifs d'attention, ces récits de vie doivent s’inscrire dans une « noopolitique » de la santé publique aussi bien physique que mentale. Il s'agit de prendre garde « aux déficits attentionnels et aux troubles intergénérationnels ». Un « psychopouvoir » devrait être mis en place par nos gouvernements au service « d'une politique industrielle des technologies de l'esprit ». / What predisposes Portugal, Brazil, Quebec, and Indiana in the USA, to set up institutional sites of “life stories” on supports (media) videos (like virtual museums), unlike in France, where such initiative remains private life? We will try to focus on the strength of life stories, and we will try to understand why countries chose to podcast them. Actually, do they use life stories in order to hand over to the rising generation, and to make them more visible and audible, so that life stories are passing on and leave prints forever (to let posterity)? Besides, what is the content of these prints, and what do they occur to the generations? Also, what about the interaction between them? In fact, we will try to podcast and study semiotic, semantic and semiological prints of life stories that we can find on the following websites, called “Museum of the person" which is suitable for the four countries that we have previously mentioned. It seems that life stories prints found in digital and audiovisual media, are like a material building, as real as a museum in a given and real place. Moreover, we have to say that a life story is like a "permanent movement between the past and the present” that influences the present dialogue. We are facing with such new standards, especially with successive paradigms or paradoxical movements of recontextualization and symbolic reconfiguration, every time that a life story is told from a citizen to another. Life stories and memory passing down generation to generation, are very common to English and Australian people. It truly seems that life stories prints are part of a social link between all the generations, and also between national and non-national citizens. This important social link takes part of aspecific care/ attention to memories and their responsibility that are shared between ascendants and descendants. This care program is called "neguentropy". It is an ethical and responsible program based of the attention to others, and generosity. All this plan of actions, relying on the attention of life stories, should be part of a”physical and mental public noopolitic health program”. The aim is to face attention deficit disorder and intergenerational discord. Finally, a "psychopower" should be set up by our governments in order to serve an “industrial policy of spirit mind technology”.

Depuis 1976 le concours de beauté « Miss Brésil Gay » a lieu chaque année à Juiz de Fora (Brésil) et ses 36 éditions ont attiré régulièrement des milliers de touristes. La compétition se déroule entre les 27 États brésiliens représentés par des concurrentes qui ne sont pas des travestis, mais des garçons qui s’habillent en femme. Tenu comme l’un des premiers de ce genre au Brésil, il est devenu l’une des manifestations culturelles les plus représentatives de la ville et l’un des événements gays les plus connus du pays. Cette thèse discutera de l’homosexualité et des « tribus gays » pour valider l’hypothèse que le concours se rapproche d’une « effervescence postmoderne ». La première partie est basée sur la sociologie classique, la sociologie compréhensive, l’imaginaire et la sociologie du quotidien. Il y a ensuite une révision théorique des points les plus pertinents de l’ouvrage de Michel Maffesoli en relation à ce travail : tribalisme, identités, altérité, effervescences et Dionysos. Les rites et rituels de passage reçoivent une attention spéciale, en fonction de leur importance dans cette étude. La deuxième partie est une approche transdisciplinaire sur l’homosexualité à travers la reconstruction sociohistorique, les identités, les effervescences touristiques, les utilisations du corps et l’homophobie. La troisième partie est consacrée au travail sur le terrain, composé par les « histoires de vie » de cinq misses gays brésiliennes. Il s’agit d’une recherche qualitative qui utilise les méthodes de l’Observation Participante et de la Participation Observante pour arriver aux analyses de données, à la validation des hypothèses et à la vérification des résultats, répertoriées dans la cinquième partie. À travers le microcosme du Miss Brésil Gay, l’objectif est de contribuer à l’élaboration de nouvelles catégories de la pensée sociologique sur l’homosexualité et sur les fêtes « tribales », à partir d’un regard postmoderne. / Since 1976 the beauty pageant contest Miss Gay Brazil is held annually in Juiz de Fora (Brazil) and its 36 editions regularly attract thousands of tourists. The competition takes place between the 27 Brazilian states represented by competitors who are not transvestites, but men who dress as women. Held as one of the first of its kind in Brazil, it has become one of the most representative cultural events in the city and one of the country’s best known gay events. This thesis will discuss homosexuality and « gay tribes » to validate the hypothesis that the contest is approaching a « postmodern effervescence ». The first part is based on traditional sociology, « comprehensive sociology », the imaginary and « everyday life sociology ». There is also a theoretical review of the most relevant points of works by Michel Maffesoli in relation to this study: tribalism, identity, alterity, effervescence and Dionysus. The rituals and rites of passage are given special attention, according to their importance in this research. The second part is a transdisciplinary approach to homosexuality, through a socio-historical reconstruction, identities, « gay tourism », utilisations of the body and homophobia. The third part is devoted to the « field », composed by the « life stories method » of five Brazilian Gay Misses. This is a qualitative research that uses « observing participation » and « participating observation » to arrive at data analysis, validation and verification of results, exposed in the fifth part. Through the microcosm of Miss Gay Brazil, the aim is to contribute to the development of new categories of sociological thought on homosexuality and fêtes « tribales » from a postmodern point of view.

Syftet med studien är att belysa och få ökad förståelse för hur ensamstående äldre kvinnorupplever sin flytt till äldreboende och vad god ålderdom är. Tre kvinnor har intervjuats i enkvalitativ studie med djupintervjuer som grund för den hermeneutiska tolkningen. Analysenär gjord utifrån teoretiskt livsloppsperspektiv, aktivitetsperspektiv samt genusperspektiv.Resultatet visade att upplevelsen av flytt berodde på varierande faktorer och individuellaerfarenheter. När flytten var efterlängtad upplevdes den som positiv, när flytten var mer ellermindre oundviklig var den svårare att acceptera. Vad god ålderdom innebar kan relateras tilltrygghet och tillgång till personal, ett gott utbud av aktiviteter samt goda sociala relationer.Att flytten var en vändpunkt var alla överens om. / The purpose of the study is to illustrate and gain an increased understanding of how singleelderly women experience their move to retirement homes and the resulting effects of theirquality of life. Three women have been interviewed in a qualitative study with in-depthinterviews as the basis for the hermeneutic interpretation. The analysis is made from thetheoretical perspectives of life span, activities and gender. The result showed that theexperience of moving was due to varying factors and individual experiences. When the movewas long awaited, it was perceived as positive, when the move was more or less inevitable, itwas more difficult to accept. The result also showed that quality of life was safety related toadequate staffing, a large range of attractive activities and the opportunity to be sociallyactive. That the move was a turning point was agreed upon by all.