The present thesis explores the potential role and implications of technology in elderly care from the users’ perspective. This exploration is undertaken in terms of five empirical studies of a telehealth project and a meta-analysis of their contributions. An important insight emerging from this work is the need to rethink the human subject as a body, rather than as a mere mind using technology. The thesis draws on phenomenology to reconceptualize the user of technology, and on this basis, to theorize about the potential role and implications of technology in care. It concludes that, in combination with humans that integrate technology with their other sensory and emotional capacities, technology can produce affect. The findings indicate that technology can contribute to senior citizens feeling safe, cared for and thereby less isolated. The findings further demonstrate that, because of the perceptual capacity gained from technology, the care workers become aware of new health problems that urgently call for their sensory and emotional responsiveness. On this ground, the thesis challenges the determinist view that technology threatens the essentially ‘human’ aspect; rather, it concludes that feeling and other bodily resources are fundamental in the use of technology. Indeed, technology activates such ‘human’ capabilities. Hence, technology plays a role as a complement for rather than as a replacement of care workers. It increases their work burden by informing them about new needs. This may improve care quality but at an increased cost, which is relevant from a practical perspective. At a more general level, the thesis challenges the dualist legacies in mainstream management research that have sought to divorce mind form body, nature from culture and reason from emotion. It can therefore contribute to broader theoretical developments and fuel existing debates beyond the care setting.

Industrial society has changed thoroughly during the last half a century. In many Western cities and towns, new patterns of production and consumption entailed that centrally located industrial areas became redundant. The once lively workplace and urban core became silent and abandoned, gradually falling into decay. In recent decades, the former industrial built environment was reinterpreted and reused as apartments, offices, heritage sites, stages for artistic installations and destinations for cultural tourism. Companies and former workers, heritage and planning professionals, as well as artists and urban explorers, were some of the actors involved in the process. The overall aim of the study is to contribute to an understanding of this transformation, and hence it addresses questions about what happened to the industrial places that lost their original function and significance. How were they understood and used? Who engaged in their future? What were the visions and what was achieved? Three former industrial areas are examined from a historic perspective and with a critical hermeneutic approach: Koppardalen in Avesta, Sweden, the Ironbridge Gorge Museum in Britain, and Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord in the Ruhr district of Germany. Included in the results that challenge previous research, the study claims that the key figures were often newcomers to the place, and white-collar professionals, rather than former workers asserting a historic perspective from below on the basis of a crisis experience. In general, the study shows how the redundant industrial place became an arena for visions of the future in a local community, and, furthermore, how it was being turned into a commodity in a complex gentrification process. The place was given new value by being regarded as an expression of the overall phenomenon of reused industrial buildings, and, simultaneously, as a unique and authentic entity. In the conversion of the physical environment, the industrial past became relatively harmless to many people, because the dark and difficult aspects were defused in different ways. Instead, the industrial place was understood in terms of adventure, beauty and spectacle, which included rust from the past as well as hope for the future. / QC 20100910

A materiality approach is developed in this thesis in order to understand social-material relationships during the south-east Scottish Iron Age. The focus is on everyday objects, traditionally lesser studied in terms of cosmological value, made of bone and antler, stone, clay/pottery and metal (copper alloy and iron) from the Broxmouth Hillfort assemblage and other excavated Iron Age sites in East Lothian. This study sets out to move away from typology to examine the connections between these materials through their sourcing, affordances (signative and pragmatic), design, manufacture, use and deposition. In addition to the archaeological evidence, a range of analytical methods are employed; including laser scanning confocal microscopy, raman spectroscopy, and residue and isotopic analysis. It becomes evident that the materials studied, despite their predominantly local availability, were invested with meaning in appropriation, making, and were deliberately curated and maintained in use, assembling rich personal biographies. Identities were tied up with making, using and depositing of materials in turn embodying beliefs of fertility, renewal and productivity which were central to Iron Age cosmology, continuing into the Roman Iron Age. These results contribute to our understanding of the construction and practice of society in the Iron Age of Britain, with implications for how we may design our own 21st Century material worlds. It is proposed that social relations in the Iron Age of south-east Scotland were heterarchical.

This text aims to place nonhuman animals at the core of urban space and history to provide an insight into the life and materiality of dogs in Stockholm 1824-1920. The theoretical possibilities of more-than-human enquiries into history are discussed along with non-human animals as historical beings together with humans creating a common history (Ingold 2000, Whatmore 2002). Moreover nonhuman animals are discussed and incorporated in an exploration into using what is here discussed as a multispecies narrative and used as an analytical tool to try to avoid the pitfalls of representationalism. It is also introduced as a possible new methodology to approaching the urban landscape within the field of environmental history. The main empirical material of dogs in nineteenth century Stockholm are records from the city dog pound along with records of dog tax and rabies. Other than archive material a wide range of material contemporary to the research period such as art, photography and literature is used as part of a broad exploration of nonhuman animals as integral in materiality of Stockholm and as historical beings. Findings of the study confirm that dogs and other nonhuman animals hugely impacted both the spatial structure and social space of Stockholm and that this impact transformed over the research period defined by societal changes. More specifically the study shows that dogs played an important role as free roaming scavengers and were for this reason accepted as an integral part of the city in the nineteenth century in Stockholm. Later in the research period when the city became more regulated this role started to change and dogs were not accepted loose on the streets to the same degree and transformed into pets and symbols of social mobility and class. Regarding the use of a multispecies narrative the conclusion that can be drawn form this thesis is that is opens up for discussions on the materiality of urban space and history.

This study focuses on the material aspects of the wood and metal workshop, which is one out of two learning settings in the Sloyd subject. Sloyd is a compulsory school subject in Sweden, which includes textile, wood and metal work. Historically, wood and metal Sloyd has been dominated by male pupils and teachers. The purpose of the thesis is to describe and analyse how the materialized masculinity of the wood and metal workshop is embodied by the pupils during class. The study concerns 41 observed lessons in three different workshops, during the period of 2011-2013. Six groups have been ob- served and the observations have been complemented with individual interviews, group interviews and one video recording. The study is conducted from a gender perspective, which considers sociomaterial structures to be a part of a gender structure. Following Raewyn Connell, Yvonne Hirdman and others, the gender structure of the sociomaterial wood and metal workshop is brought to light. But the main focus lies on the embodied phenomena of the sociomaterial structure. This is applied through a hermeneutical phenomenological methodology, where the main analytical tools have been ”the corporeal turn” as presented by Maxine Sheets-Johnstone, ”the lived body” as Merleau-Ponty describes it, and Young’s interpretation of”situatedness” in feminist phenomenology. As regards the results, an overarching structuralistic analysis of pupils’ expectancies and be- haviours in the setting, along with historical documents, show that the wood and metal workshop holds a strong material classification in school. It is geographically peripheral and resembles the workshops of the industry outside school, rather than classrooms inside school. The workshop also has a strong inner classification, where the metal room is classified as the most masculine place in the workshop, and the painting room and the workbench are classified as being weak in masculinity. Analysis shows that the materiality close to the skin (caps, dirt, protection gear and garments) is embodied both as an ex- pression or a visual sign for others, but also as a tactile immanence or non- visual objectification of the body. Analysis also shows that the materiality in contact with the hand of- ten has an elongated form. The common use of elongated objects (wagging, fencing, poking, crafting) in the Sloyd groups are described as a consequence of historical views on masculine movements and transcendence by the founders of male (wood and metal) Sloyd. Furthermore, the processing of the common three-dimensional materials are analysed as "inside", as a non-visual kinetic-kinaesthetic experience that lessens the visual objectification of the body. Beyond the reach of the hand, the three- dimensional, silent and personal artefacts render specific intersubjective situations. The space of the workshop is considered performative, using the silent and three-dimensional objects as proposals of intersubjective situations and tactile-kinaesthetic turn-takings. Conclusively, the results are discussed in relation to concepts of individuality and corporeal meaning in the workshop, the concrete rather than abstract masculinity, and in relation to the well-used concept of mediated experience in creative subjects such as Sloyd. / Genusforskarskolan

Digital art installation is the result of informatic materials entering gallery spaces and challenging the establishment of media forms. This thesis contends that the open, recursive and recombinatory process of looking at digital installation is in fact the result of noisy relations between information and the spatial temporal contexts of the art gallery. In order to focus on the processes of informatic materials within gallery spaces, this thesis identifies four key modulations of noise and materiality ? emergence, feedback, entropy and delay. I demonstrate how these impact on a range of recent digital installations by Australian and New Zealand artists. The lens of digital materiality shifts from an informational context into that of art history where it is found to highlight the systemic relationality of the installation. The thesis opens with a consideration of histories of media-specificity, and argues for a necessary separation of our concepts of media and materiality. This context provides a set of tools by which the remainder of the thesis investigates a range of digital material flows that are not tied to fixed media definitions. I draw on a range of theorists including Umberto Eco, Gilles Deleuze, Claude Shannon and Jack Burnham to further locate these material flows within two strands: experimental sound and information theory. This discussion forms the basis of the thesis? re-appraisal of media distinctions and highlights the complex relationship of informational materials to both sonic and visual histories. The second half of the thesis undertakes an appraisal of emergence, feedback, entropy and delay in specific works and suggests dimensionality, movement and duration as key determinants of the digital installation. These chapters demonstrate that what is at stake in digital installation is the viewer?s implicit role in the shifting relationships of digital materiality. Overall, this thesis presents a framework for emergent materiality in digital installation. I develop a theory of emergent materiality as a process specific to digital installation, and argue that digital installation is in fact a subject-forming assemblage of information-noise in which relations of dimensionality, movement and duration coalesce without cohering. And, within which gallery spaces begin to get noisy.

Digital art installation is the result of informatic materials entering gallery spaces and challenging the establishment of media forms. This thesis contends that the open, recursive and recombinatory process of looking at digital installation is in fact the result of noisy relations between information and the spatial temporal contexts of the art gallery. In order to focus on the processes of informatic materials within gallery spaces, this thesis identifies four key modulations of noise and materiality ? emergence, feedback, entropy and delay. I demonstrate how these impact on a range of recent digital installations by Australian and New Zealand artists. The lens of digital materiality shifts from an informational context into that of art history where it is found to highlight the systemic relationality of the installation. The thesis opens with a consideration of histories of media-specificity, and argues for a necessary separation of our concepts of media and materiality. This context provides a set of tools by which the remainder of the thesis investigates a range of digital material flows that are not tied to fixed media definitions. I draw on a range of theorists including Umberto Eco, Gilles Deleuze, Claude Shannon and Jack Burnham to further locate these material flows within two strands: experimental sound and information theory. This discussion forms the basis of the thesis? re-appraisal of media distinctions and highlights the complex relationship of informational materials to both sonic and visual histories. The second half of the thesis undertakes an appraisal of emergence, feedback, entropy and delay in specific works and suggests dimensionality, movement and duration as key determinants of the digital installation. These chapters demonstrate that what is at stake in digital installation is the viewer?s implicit role in the shifting relationships of digital materiality. Overall, this thesis presents a framework for emergent materiality in digital installation. I develop a theory of emergent materiality as a process specific to digital installation, and argue that digital installation is in fact a subject-forming assemblage of information-noise in which relations of dimensionality, movement and duration coalesce without cohering. And, within which gallery spaces begin to get noisy.

Digital art installation is the result of informatic materials entering gallery spaces and challenging the establishment of media forms. This thesis contends that the open, recursive and recombinatory process of looking at digital installation is in fact the result of noisy relations between information and the spatial temporal contexts of the art gallery. In order to focus on the processes of informatic materials within gallery spaces, this thesis identifies four key modulations of noise and materiality ? emergence, feedback, entropy and delay. I demonstrate how these impact on a range of recent digital installations by Australian and New Zealand artists. The lens of digital materiality shifts from an informational context into that of art history where it is found to highlight the systemic relationality of the installation. The thesis opens with a consideration of histories of media-specificity, and argues for a necessary separation of our concepts of media and materiality. This context provides a set of tools by which the remainder of the thesis investigates a range of digital material flows that are not tied to fixed media definitions. I draw on a range of theorists including Umberto Eco, Gilles Deleuze, Claude Shannon and Jack Burnham to further locate these material flows within two strands: experimental sound and information theory. This discussion forms the basis of the thesis? re-appraisal of media distinctions and highlights the complex relationship of informational materials to both sonic and visual histories. The second half of the thesis undertakes an appraisal of emergence, feedback, entropy and delay in specific works and suggests dimensionality, movement and duration as key determinants of the digital installation. These chapters demonstrate that what is at stake in digital installation is the viewer?s implicit role in the shifting relationships of digital materiality. Overall, this thesis presents a framework for emergent materiality in digital installation. I develop a theory of emergent materiality as a process specific to digital installation, and argue that digital installation is in fact a subject-forming assemblage of information-noise in which relations of dimensionality, movement and duration coalesce without cohering. And, within which gallery spaces begin to get noisy.

Cette thèse a pour objet le palo monte, culte initiatique d’origine bantoue que l’on pratique aujourd’hui sur tout le territoire cubain. Ses adeptes, les paleros, se lient rituellement à certains esprits des morts, les nfumbis, afin de bénéficier de leurs pouvoirs extraordinaires. Religion peu prescriptive, le palo monte laisse à ses adeptes une grande latitude en matière d’innovation rituelle et d’improvisation. En l’absence de corpus mythologique, de textes sacrés, de liturgie fixe et de toute autorité institutionnalisée, chaque groupe initiatique définit sa méthodologie religieuse de façon autonome. L’objectif de cette thèse est d’expliciter comment des pratiques religieuses se créent, se légitiment et se transmettent dans un contexte de variabilité extrême. Je porte d’abord une attention particulière à la matérialité du culte et tout particulièrement aux interactions quotidiennes entre les paleros et leur nganga, chaudron qui condense la présence du mort : objet-sujet omniscient, la nganga médiatise un réseau relationnel complexe qui permet l’émergence en continu des pratiques du palo monte. Je m’intéresse ensuite aux rites paleros en tant que performances au cours desquelles les prêtres forgent leur réputation en créant une sorte de cosmologie personnalisée. Tout en proposant une analyse interactionnelle de ces rituels, je montre comment certains aspects de la personnalité des adeptes interviennent dans la définition de la forme rituelle de chaque groupe. Enfin, je montre comment les actes réflexifs des paleros, omniprésents sous la forme de critiques, de justifications, de confrontations, etc. sont constitutifs de la transmission et du renouvellement des pratiques. / This thesis is on palo monte, a Cuban initiatory religion of Bantu origin, widespread over all Cuban territory. Its worshippers, the paleros, establish ritual bonds with determined spirits of the dead, called nfumbis, in order to receive their supernatural powers. Imposing a small number of prescriptions, palo monte enables its devotees to operate a wide range of ritual innovations and improvisations. Indeed, the inexistence of a mythological corpus, a sacred text or a strict liturgy, and more generally of any kind of institutionalized authority, allows every initiatory group to define its religious methodology in an autonomous way. The aim of this research is to explain how these religious practises are created, legitimized and transmitted in a context which allows for extreme variability. In this perspective, the analysis focuses primarily on palo monte’s materiality and more specifically to the daily interactions between the paleros and their nganga, a cauldron condensing the presence of a dead man. I argue that the nganga, as an omniscient object-subject, mediates a complex relational network and enables a constant reinvention of palo monte’s ritual practises. I focus thus on palero rituals as performances through which priests make a name for themselves by creating a kind of customized cosmology. By putting forward an interactional analysis of these/their rituals, I show how determined aspects of the adepts’ personalities intercede in the definition of each groups’ ritual patterns. Finally, I point out how paleros’ reflexive acts – in the form of pervasive critique, vindication, debates, etc. – are constitutive of their practices’ transmission and renewal.

Abstract Sustainability has been one of the most discussed topics among the business world and society for the last decade. The globally growing concern about sustainability related issues has led to businesses and non-businesses meet the demand of their stakeholders by producing a sustainability report to demonstrate their work and development in sustainability and how they have measured it. There has been a fast-growing trend of sustainability reporting in few years and there are a number of different initiatives and requirements that define what kind of sustainability reports are produced. From the different sustainability initiatives, the largest principle-based initiative is the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) with almost 13 000 signatories and the largest reporting-based initiative is the Global reporting initiative (GRI). These two initiatives entered in to a partnership in 2010 with the aim of the GRI providing guidance for the signatories on how to disclose information from different areas in sustainability in their sustainability reports. There has been previous research that criticized the UNGC to be too broad and the principles difficult to translate in to sustainability reporting despite the existing partnership with the GRI. These previous studies expressed the lack of qualitative studies about the subject especially from the signatories’ perspective and the importance of approaching the topic from a practical point of view. The purpose of our research study was to create an understanding of the practicalities in UNGC signatories’ sustainability reporting, the challenges they face in the progress and how are they approaching those challenges. The thesis focuses on the Nordic region and the two research questions are:   How are the UNGC signatories practically translating the 10 principles into their sustainability reporting? What challenges do UNGC signatories find in sustainability reporting in general and how have they approached these challenges?   To answer these research questions the authors conducted a qualitative study by semi-structured interviews with company representatives from different Nordic UNGC signatories. The research study identified how do they practically identify what to report about the principles which is determined by materiality assessment provided by the GRI framework. This determines what is material for the company and its industry and focus on those areas in their sustainability report. Legal requirements, internal regulations and other commitments were also identified guiding sustainability reporting. The main challenges related to the sustainability reporting were mainly about data related issues, satisfying the stakeholders and the high number of different frameworks and regulations that are not necessarily interrelated. Majority of the participants approached these challenges by carrying out the materiality assessment as accurate and clear as possible in order to avoid data related difficulties. Some participants offer their different stakeholders with sustainability related information by different forms in order to make the sustainability reporting easier to read and understand. For the high number of frameworks and regulations, the participants have expectations for alignment among them in the future in order to make the reporting easier for everyone involved with sustainability reporting. The results of our findings were supported by theories and concepts such as the stakeholder’s theory, signalling theory and the CSR concept. Previous studies about sustainability reporting and UNGC were also compared to our findings in the analysis.