Making sense of anguish is an important process leading to personal growth, development, and overall meaning making. Today's quarterlife students (students between the ages of 20-25) may face a variety of traumatic life events that influence how they grow as individuals and are able to move forward from these experiences. I examine several topics that many quarterlife students experience during these challenging years. As a gay identified individual, I examine aspects of `coming out' and the reluctance of blooming into the individual that I wanted to be. I examine the impact of resenting those individuals who may have hurt you and the ultimate growth that results from the pursuit of forgiveness. I then examine the importance of not sacrificing who you are within romantic relationships, and how being in abusive relationships can inhibit one's ability to be happy. Lastly, I close with how despite all of the traumatic experiences one must overcome, we all have the ability to be happy and construct positive meaning from such times of anguish. Written within a scholarly personal narrative methodology, my thesis examines several generational life events that have the potential to cause anguish, and how one can harness personal growth and meaning making from traumatic past experiences.

This compilation thesis concerns how an educator task in Swedish police education context can be understood as individual and collective meaning making and professional development. The main actors in this thesis are police teachers, police supervisors and field training officers (FTOs), and they have a mutual task in educating new police officers and hence preparing for a complex occupation. However, due to varied educating preparations these three groups of police educators seem to perform their task with different prerequisites in a constantly revised and developed Swedish police education. During the last twenty years research and literature regarding occupational and professional education concern, among other issues, professional development and professionalization, frequently from a learner orientated and lifelong learning perspective. Hence, as ideas of transferring occupational knowledge from person to person increasingly appears to be regarded as obsolete, internship education through supervising pedagogies seems to have evolved during the last decades. The rarely investigated intra-professional educators (e.g., police officers educating new police officers) have an important role in this kind of learning process, especially due to socialisation phenomena frequently described in worldwide research regarding the police occupation. The conceptions of Swedish intra-professional police educators are investigated through an exploratory and qualitative design using mainly focus-group interviews and with a reflexive approach and hermeneutic analyse models. Viewed through a theoretical framework based on meaning making, reflexivity and thought styles/thought collectives, the findings disclose that the Swedish police educators clearly share similar views on pedagogies although they have disparate preparations before the task. Their conceptions reveal how the police educating task works as an incentive for increased insights in the police task, as well as in the educating task. These findings are also conceptualized as a collective process in interacting with police students and police probationers, with reflexivity as a main tool for meaning making, especially in the educating task. In conclusion this thesis argues how the conceptions of the Swedish police educators can vitalize the discussion about how police educators better can be prepared, especially through courses with reflexive pedagogies. The conclusion also emphasizes on how the positive, reflexive and creative intentions within the intra-professional police educators can be used as a role model and as an incentive in developing the Swedish police force, and that these ideas can be applied on other occupations and professions. / I en stor fyrkantig soffgrupp i ett fikarum på Polishögskolan i Solna runt år 2002, fördes stafettsamtal om problembaserad undervisning. Lärare, chefer och ibland städpersonal eller administrativ personal deltog genom att gå in och ut ur dessa samtal beroende på vilka andra sysslor som pockade på. I denna fyrkant skapades på något sätt både pedagogik och pedagoger, av både erfarna och oerfarna utbildare. Detta skedde främst genom utbyte av erfarenheter av lyckade och mindre lyckade undervisningsaktiviteter i syfte att skapa mening i ett för många av deltagarna okänt utbildningskoncept, ofta genom användandet av begreppet reflektion. Stafettsamtalen kan beskrivas som del av en process eller ett förlopp där något framåtskrider och utvecklas, i detta fall polisutbildarnas kunskapande och meningsskapande om polisutbildning. Den meningsskapande processen placerades inom ramen för den nya reviderade polisutbildningen, som satts i spel 1998. Polisutbildningen skulle nu bygga på en problembaserad pedagogik (Colliver, 2000; Hmelo-Silver, 2004) och initialt utföras av i huvudsak yrkespraktiker med begränsad pedagogisk erfarenhet eller utbildning, vilket genererade oväntade problem som krävde snabba lösningar. De första åren från 1998 innebar många problem med både frustrerade lärare och polisstudenter, vilket en utvärdering visade (Rikspolisstyrelsen, 2000). Denna situation skapade ändå en pragmatisk men reflekterande utbildningskultur där studenternas lärande till poliser till stor del var i fokus (Polishögskolan, 2014b). De lärare som hade polisiär bakgrund, i denna avhandling benämnda ”polislärare”, fick en framträdande roll för att fungera som en brygga mellan yrkeserfarenhet och teoretisk/praktisk kunskap, trots att få av de utbildande poliserna hade pedagogisk utbildning eller någon längre erfarenhet av att undervisa. Vissa polislärare visade också en brant utvecklingskurva gällande förmågan att undervisa, medan andra misslyckades helt och försvann lika snabbt som de kom. Denna beskrivning bygger på min egen upplevelse av händelseförloppet, för jag satt också där i fyrkanten, som nyanställd lärare i muntlig och skriftlig framställning, erfaren gällande undervisning men helt okunnig om polisverksamhet. Lärarna på Polishögskolans gemensamma uppdrag var att på bästa sätt förbereda polisstudenter för en introduktion in i en polisiär yrkesverksamhet och yrkeskultur (Crank, 2004; Lauritz, 2009). Ett polisyrke som många i samhället har en uppfattning om, och som visat sig vara ett i många avseenden komplext uppdrag. Manning (2010) har under årtionden ägnat sig åt att belysa polisarbetets komplexitet och förändring. Han menar bland annat att polisarbetet kan ses utifrån ett dramaturgiskt perspektiv där poliser förväntas 2 fatta svåra beslut baserat på subjektiva omdömen i en offentlig miljö, och i hög grad beroende av samarbetet med kollegor och allmänheten: Policing is both an individual and collective performance, based on faceto-face interactions, public deference, and societal validation of the collective representation. The process of interaction is the product of policing, and the consequences of these interactions are the most consequential outcomes of policing. (2010, s. 183) Polisuppdraget har också förändrats under de senaste trettio åren, från reaktivt till proaktivt allteftersom samhället ökat kraven på polisen via problembaserat långsiktigt polisarbete (Fielding, 1988; Macvean & Cox, 2012; Paoline & Terrill, 2007). Uppdraget kan dessutom sägas vara motsägelsefullt, med å ena sidan den repressiva aspekten att upprätthålla lag och ordning och å andra sidan vara en service och trygghet för medborgarna (Petersson, 2015). Litteraturen beskriver också att många av de kunskaper som krävs för att lösa snabbt uppkomna situationer är svåra att utveckla på ett utbildningscampus utan kräver kontakt med yrkespraktiken (Chan et al., 2003). Ur detta perspektiv blir det därför synnerligen intressant hur sådan kunskap utvecklas och frodas i utrymmet mellan utbildning och yrkespraktik. Vidare, även om forskningen visar att det finns poliser som är olämpliga och har stora svårigheter att hålla sig professionella i detta uppdrag, finns det berättelser om poliser som klarar av att upprätthålla den professionella etiken i svåra situationer. Det finns alltså uppenbarligen poliser som kan vara empatiska, men ändå tydliga och handlingskraftiga, repressiva men ändå professionella, goda kollegor som ändå kan säga ifrån och anmäla om något fel begåtts. Litteratur om polisyrket berör även fenomen som sammanhållning, kamratskap, konformitet, kåranda, alienation, övervåld, rasism, stress, posttraumatisk stress, korruption och lämplighet (Crank, 2004; Lauritz & Karp, 2013; Van Maanen, 1975). Litteraturen ger också exempel på antiintellektualism inom polisen, där handlingskraft är normen och reflektionsförmåga ses som en svaghet (Crank, 2004; Granér, 2004, s. 214). Det finns också beskrivet hur konkret yrkeskunskap byggd på sunt förnuft (common sense knowledge) uppmuntras under polisutbildningen, vilket grundar sig i polisarbetets oförutsägbarhet och därmed riskfylldhet; man måste kunna lita på att kollegan finns där och agerar när fara uppstår. Där skildras också hur sunt-förnuft-kunskap konstitueras i rutinartat småprat mellan uppdragen i det dagliga polisarbetet, till exempel genom utbyte av dråpliga anekdoter från polisarbetet (”war stories”) (McNulty, 1994). Blivande poliser beskriver också sitt första möte med poliskollektivet som välkomnande och omslutande, speciellt avseende det vardagliga småpratet kollegor emellan (Ekman, 1999: Lauritz, 2009). Här har studier också visat på ett polisyrke med ökad etisk medvetenhet, där nya poliser faktiskt kan fungera 3 som förändringsagenter mot en positiv utveckling av poliskulturen utifrån dessa höjda samhälleliga krav (Chan et al., 2003; Granér, 2004; Reid, 2015). Efter att ha tagit del av ovanstående litteratur, väcktes mitt intresse för olika perspektiv på polisutbildarnas betydelse för hur lärandet till ett polisyrke går till, och vilken betydelse detta får för en förmodat lärande organisation (Andersson Arntén, 2014; Bergman & Jansson, 2010). Runt 2006 gjorde jag en första genomgång av forskning om polisutbildning. Då upptäcktes en lucka i forskning om yrkesutbildare som aktiva subjekt i sitt yrkeslärande (Se Webster-Wright, 2009), i synnerhet studier av poliser som är polisutbildare. Speciellt noterade jag en avsaknad av svensk forskning på hur polisutbildare hanterar frågorna ovan och hur de ser sig på sig själva som utbildare i detta sammanhang. Ett kunskapsintresse började på så sätt mejslas fram och blev inledningen till ett explorativt forskningsprojekt inom yrkesutbildningsfältet, ett projekt som skulle pågå i över tio år. Slutresultatet blev denna doktorsavhandling om polisers individuella och kollektiva upplevelser av uppdraget som polisutbildare och presenteras i form av sammanläggning av en redan publicerad licentiatuppsats om polislärare (delstudie ett) samt två artiklar rörande aspiranthandledare (delstudie två), och aspirantinstruktörer (delstudie tre). Jag menar att denna avhandling kan vara intressant även för andra yrkesutbildningar, både vad gäller frågor om grundutbildning såväl som vidareutbildning, men även rörande förändring, utveckling och lärande i en yrkespraktik. Kunskapsbidraget är främst empiriskt eftersom polisutbildare, internationellt och i Sverige, i begränsad omfattning har undersökts. Avhandlingen bidrar också i metodologiskt avseende då främst intervjuer i fokusgrupper använts, vilket är ovanligt i polisforskning. Dessutom tillämpas ett teoretiskt ramverk baserat på idéer från bland annat John Dewey, Jennifer A. Moon och Ludwik Fleck, i en kombination som kan vara en inspiration för andra liknande studier med fokus på utvecklingsprocesser i yrkesutbildning och yrkesverksamhet.

Thesis advisor: Michael G. Pratt / Through two inductive qualitative studies, this dissertation explores the surprising emergence, and members’ subsequent responses, to value-laden claims regarding “why we exist” – what members themselves and scholarship refers to as organizational purpose. Study One finds that, although unintended, the implementation of specific practices within this organization generated powerful emotional energy amongst members. Leaders subsequently grafted this energy into organizational symbols and engaged in meaning-making to articulate what this energy meant for why the organization existed. This study advances theories of organizational identity formation and Selznick’s institutionalism by highlighting an alternative unit of analysis focused on features of shared experiences rather than discourse, documenting an alternative generative mechanism focused on emotional energy, and recasting leaders not as ideological visionaries engaged in sensegiving, but by setting in place conditions to build, harvest, and articulate emotional energy. Study Two examines members subsequent responses to these value-laden claims, finding that members either broadly rejected claims finding them akin to a desired projected image or broadly accepted claims finding them to be real and implicating of the organization itself. These responses varied depending on various ways members construed the credibility of the organization, as well as the plausibility of the organization’s claims. This study advances theories of how members accept or reject organizational meanings by highlighting the ways in which members anthropomorphize organizations – treating them as if they were human beings – and evaluating claims in light of what they see as organizational traits, motives, and intentions. I addition, this study advances theory by identifying the critical importance of perceiving how products and services – “what we do” – is linked to claims regarding “why we exist.” / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2015. / Submitted to: Boston College. Carroll School of Management. / Discipline: Management and Organization.

This thesis examines the narrative reconstructions taken from extended conversations with 25 bereaved individuals, who volunteered their experiences of losing a loved one. By considering the interaction between self and other to be the source of knowledge, these interview conversations provided a vehicle through which the human encounter with death and loss not only found expression but came into being. Bereavement is approached as a ‘cultural object’, so as to capture prevailing ideas, norms and beliefs about how this should be handled and provide further insight into the place of death in contemporary British Society. Such ‘norms’ are taken to be co-constructed through discursive practice, and continually evolving through negotiation between the individual and social processes. Attention is therefore drawn to the way people use available cultural forms to construct and express meanings that are particular and personal to them. This study demonstrates the value of an interactive approach for gaining a fuller understanding of the complexity of social life, thereby contributing to methodological and ethical debates on the implications of using qualitative, interactive methods, particularly with sensitive topics. It highlights the co-constructed nature of the data and the crucial role of self-reflexivity in managing the emotional impact of the research on the researcher as well as the participants. An analysis of interview narratives has revealed how deceased loved ones retained a significant social presence in the life of survivors regardless of other social factors. It has highlighted the diversity of meanings people gave to their experiences, which convey how bereavement interacted with other agendas and priorities to shape their day to day social life and sense of identity. Such findings revise and extend current understandings of the ‘continuing bonds’ people forge with their dead and the nature of ‘personhood’ in contemporary British society.

This thesis examined framing practices used by leaders who participated in the Capacity Day 2007 event, which is organized by the World Bank Institute, as part of its Leadership Development Program. The study examined strategic uses of framing as a meaning-making tool. The framing strategies identified in this study were accomplished through the strategic use of language. Furthermore, the study recognized the implied negotiations of frames made by the skilled 'framers' and found that situations are continuously 'reframable'. Unsuccessful framing attempts were correlated with the contradictions between what was said and what was eventually understood. The positive outcomes that followed from successful strategic framing were easily observable. The study also recognized instances of what I describe as manipulative framing and uses different examples to draw a distinction between ethical and unethical manipulation in framing.

<p>ABSTRACT</p><p>Liljestrand, Johan (2002): Klassrummet som diskussionsarena. (The classroom as an arena for discussions)</p><p>The aim of the dissertation is to study whole class discussions in the Swedish upper secondary school, concerning issues subjected to controversy in the public debate. The empirical study is related to a wider question: the possibilities for the school to educate democratic citizens. </p><p>By using discourse analysis,14 videotaped lessons from social- and religious studies where analysed, with the ambition to investigate recurrent patterns of participation and meaning making. Five teachers and six classes participated in the study.</p><p>The analysis shows that the teachers have two concurrent goals: to focus on the students’ contributions on issues in the public debate, and introduce the students to different questions in the public debate. A consequence of these goals is that the role of the teacher often becomes complex. By acting on the basis of having responsibility for the students’ development of knowledge, and sometimes also calling attention to certain values, the teacher attempts to guide the students as not yet ready for the public debate. Features from other kinds of teacher-centred education are thereby present in the discussions. However, students can also act as more autonomous participants in relation to the teacher. When they are not answering the teacher’s questions in an expected way, and in particular, in situations in which they are interacting with each other, the students may discuss the public issues without being teacher-guided to the same extent as in other situations. </p><p>The last chapter concludes that the authority of the teacher is partly given by the official steering-documents. It is still possible to ask if the guiding role of the teacher itself could be subjected to discussion. This suggestion is made from the point that teacher authority is considered as more or less limited for developing a critical attitude among the students. One may also ask if the students’ could be offered possibilities to choose the topic for discussion themselves. This latter point is made against the background that classroom-discussion presupposes student’s viewpoints in order to be accomplished. </p><p>Key words: discussion, democracy, public issues, education, participation, meaning making.</p>

The study explores the experience of individuals who have lost a number of close people in their life, through death, over the course of their adult lifetime. Twelve individual interviews (11 women, 1 man) are presented in narrative form and explored for their content and meaning. The experience of multiple loss was revealed to be unique and varied for each participant and each loss was experienced independently from the others, concomitant on the relationship to the deceased, the nature and timing of the death and the relevance to the participant’s identity. Similar themes occurred across and within cases that are attributable to having lost a number of close others. Common effects were seen in participants’ experiential knowledge of grief and its vicissitudes, death and its processes, and life and its meaningfulness. Participants believed that their losses have had a profound effect on them, changing their lives immutably. Changes were perceived in terms of impact on the way they view the world, themselves and their relationships. Individuals perceived both positive and negative effects. Analogous with current research and theories in the field many of the participants reported experiencing personal growth as a result of their losses. The present study extends past research findings by attributing these effects to the accumulation of losses. A model for understanding the process of meaning-making in multiple loss was devised. Respondents were apt to process one death at a time, incorporate its meanings and effects on them, compare the effects to each other by contrasting the distinct experiences, and create a framework for meaning that was mutable. There were typical features of these meanings that were characteristic to the tone of the narrative. Stories of multiple loss tended to have an unresolved, a transformational or a growth related tone. An enhanced model of meaning- making in loss is described that augments current models of meaning-making in coping with loss. The implications of these findings for theory and practice are discussed.

The study explores the experience of individuals who have lost a number of close people in their life, through death, over the course of their adult lifetime. Twelve individual interviews (11 women, 1 man) are presented in narrative form and explored for their content and meaning. The experience of multiple loss was revealed to be unique and varied for each participant and each loss was experienced independently from the others, concomitant on the relationship to the deceased, the nature and timing of the death and the relevance to the participant’s identity. Similar themes occurred across and within cases that are attributable to having lost a number of close others. Common effects were seen in participants’ experiential knowledge of grief and its vicissitudes, death and its processes, and life and its meaningfulness. Participants believed that their losses have had a profound effect on them, changing their lives immutably. Changes were perceived in terms of impact on the way they view the world, themselves and their relationships. Individuals perceived both positive and negative effects. Analogous with current research and theories in the field many of the participants reported experiencing personal growth as a result of their losses. The present study extends past research findings by attributing these effects to the accumulation of losses. A model for understanding the process of meaning-making in multiple loss was devised. Respondents were apt to process one death at a time, incorporate its meanings and effects on them, compare the effects to each other by contrasting the distinct experiences, and create a framework for meaning that was mutable. There were typical features of these meanings that were characteristic to the tone of the narrative. Stories of multiple loss tended to have an unresolved, a transformational or a growth related tone. An enhanced model of meaning- making in loss is described that augments current models of meaning-making in coping with loss. The implications of these findings for theory and practice are discussed.

This thesis explores how activities that young children are engaged in within the preschool environment, can be understood in terms of early language and literacy processes. The overall aim is to construct knowledge about young children’s spontaneous sign processes as well as meaning making and early literacy processes in preschool. A wider aim is to contribute to the theoretical understanding of young children’s multimodal use of language. More specifically, there is an interest to show how preschool educators describe and analyse young children’s literacy and how young children construct language in interaction with other children and technology. The overall theoretical view of is a social constructionist perspective of language and knowledge. Young childrens’ early literacy is seen from Early Childhood Literacy and multimodal views. The results are presented in four studies that together construct knowledge about the overall aim. The first two studies, based on focus groups, give insight into preschool educators’ views, and professional language about young children’s literacy. Young children’s interactions with each other and an interactive board (IWB), were then explored by video recordings in the third and fourth studies. The interactions are discussed in relation to sign- and meaning making, imagination and creativity. The professional language of Swedish preschool educators is eventually discussed as a dialogism of earlier theoretical and leading voices. The use of concepts such as bodily alliterations and pictographic writing are proposed as ways to expand the theoretical approach to young children’s literacy processes in preschool. By observing childrens interactions and view their bodily activities and their use of resources as doing literacy- and language their literacy could be challenged in preschools in its own right, and seen as literacy education.

The topic of this essay is core value issues, how they are mediated in school and how they are practiced. I am investigating a problem concerning the existential worth of the core values-content for children, or in other words, the difficulty of reconciling the theory of the core values and their practice. This problem is portrayed by two stories. The aim of this work is to investigate how to combine the core values theory with its practice, in other words, make it meaningful. In my essay, I turn to recent research in the field to provide a background to my issue, and hereby further point to my problem. To further deepen the understanding of the problem, I use the professor and educator Eugene Matusov´s theory of dialogic pedagogy. Matusov, much inspired by Bahktin, asserts that all human communication is inherently dialogic. Based on this thesis I have tried to understand my problem and examine what possible solutions Matusov can contribute with. What I have found is that core values practice, here illustrated by my stories and current research, is problematic because it very much is program-based. This tends to lead to correcting children's behavior through actions and prevention against bullying and abusive actions. This becomes the core values practice. Instead I argue based Matusov´s theory, that the core values practice ​​should rather have a broad democracy and community focus where norms, societal discourses and structures are examined in a joint effort. I also argue that meaning making and learning can, and aught to, be promoted through dialogic pedagogy.