Selected South African high school students’ perceptions of stereotypes in William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” are the center of attention in an attempt to establish or refute the existence of a uniform interpretation in the interpretive community. The textual reader responses were collected by using a questionnaire. The results show that the respondents use stereotypes to understand encounters with literary texts and as tools to connect the content of the text with their own experiences. The stereotypes also provide a framework for the readers to position themselves with or against the text and the depicted characters. Consequently, the female respondents are more inclined to distance themselves from sexist values than the male readers. Next to all the readers condemn racist values and racist language detectable in the text. Overall, the readers distance themselves from negative values and identify themselves with positive values. The results show that readers use a variety of stereotypes as aids to interpret the characters, events, values and structure of society in “A Rose for Emily”.

It is a common intuition that we can learn something of moral importance from literature, and one of the ways in which we teach our children about morality is through stories. In selecting books for children to read a primary concern is often the effect that the moral content of the story will have on the morality of the child reader. In this thesis I argue in order to take advantage of the contribution that literature can make to moral development, we need to teach children to read in a particular way. As a basis for this argument I use an account of moral agency that places emphasis on the development of moral skills - the ability to critically assess moral rules and systems, and the capacity to perceive and respond to the particulars of individual situations and to choose the right course of action in each - rather than on any particular kind of moral content. In order to make the most of the contribution that literature can make to the development of these skills, we need to teach children to immerse themselves in the story, rather than focusing on literary criticism. I argue that, contrary to the standard view of literary criticism as the only form of protection against possible negative effects, an immersed reading will help to prevent the child reader from taking any moral claims made in the story out of context, and so provide some measure of protection against possible negative moral effects of the story. Finally I argue that there are certain kinds of stories - recognisable by features that contribute to a high literary quality - that will enrich the experience of an immersed reading, and will therefore make a greater contribution to moral development than others.

Um dos últimos textos a ser publicado em vida pelo autor, Le Voyage d\'hiver, de Georges Perec, teve um destino diverso no âmbito da crítica literária perecquiana e do OuLiPo. Essa disparidade de tratamento parece estar vinculada ao tipo de análise que o papel do leitor suscitou na crítica até então. O objetivo dessa dissertação é realizar uma análise alternativa deste papel de modo a explicar a diferença apontada. Tentando evitar as aporias que a crítica perecquiana enfrenta na compreensão da obra do autor, esta dissertação traz também a análise de alguns aspectos do manuscrito preparatório de Le Voyage d\'hiver. / Le voyage d\'hiver - one of the last texts to be written and published by Georges Perec- has drawn different levels of attention to itself. Not having been frequently analysed by the critics, it has been used by the literary group known as the OuLiPo as a springboard for the production of a series of texts that repeated and expanded the themes dealt in Perec\'s text. This difference of approach seems to be related to the way the role of the reader is viewed by the critics. Therefore, the aim of this dissertation is to propose an alternative approach to the study of the role of the reader in Le Voyage d\'hiver. Moreover, in order to deal with some of the problems that the critics face when studying the work of Georges Perec, this dissertation analyses certain aspects of the Le Voyage d\'hiver manuscript.

Developing critical thinking and mastering its skills has been a vital priority for the curriculum in Swedish upper-secondary school. The National Curriculum for upper-secondary school and the syllabus for the English subject emphasize the importance of implementing and enhancing the development of the students’ critical thinking which leads to having active learners who are able to think creatively and keeps them away from becoming narrow-minded. The purpose of this study is to explore the prospect of teaching critical thinking through reading literature. Guided by the critical thinking skills that are defined in The Delphi Report including (1) interpretation, (2) analysis, (3) evaluation, (4) inference, (5) explanation and (6) self-regulation, this study explores the possibility of promoting critical thinking skills through reading literature. The study also examines the efficacy of the reader-response approach in helping the students to be critical thinkers and active readers. Using qualitative data from conducting interviews, this study analyses teachers’ perspectives and considered the implications for teaching literature in terms of fostering the students’ critical thinking. The study showed that the teachers’ awareness of the significance of integrating literature in teaching English was found to play a great role in fostering the students as critical thinkers. The study also showed that teachers emphasized the importance of in-class discussions about literary works in order to expand the students’ thinking horizons and enhance their sense of self-confidence as contributors to the learning process. It also showed that the reader-response theory has a significant role in fostering the students’ critical thinking even though it is not clearly stated in the teachers’ perspectives on teaching literature.

Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka berättarna och narraterna i Rick Riordans The Lightning Thief (2005) och The Lost Hero (2010), samt att se vilka implikationer de har på berättandet i sig självt. Uppsatsen fokuserar på en komparativ undersökning av romanerna i fråga, och gör allt detta från en narratologisk utgångspunkt. Det narratologiska perspektivet kommer framför allt ifrån Gérard Genettes Narrative discourse och hans termer extra-, intra-, hetero- och homodiegetiskt berättande. Studien av narraten gör detsamma men med Gerald Prince artikel ”Introduction to the Study of the Narratee” i Reader-response criticism: from formalism to post-structuralism. För ett bredare perspektiv på flera, både nyare och äldre, narratologiska studier använder uppsatsen också Manfred Jahns ”Narratology 2.1: A Guide to the Theory of Narrative”. Genom analysen kan man utläsa att The Lightning Thief antar ett homo- och extradiegetiskt berättande med en specifik grupp av narrater. Detta kontrasteras med The Lost Heros hetero- och extradiegetiska berättande med en grundnarrat utan uppenbara kännetecken. I förlängningen kan man också upptäcka att det finns en skillnad mellan berättarens och narratens förhållande till en verklig läsare och hur, speciellt i The Lightning Thief, läsaren är tvingad att fundera på hur den relaterar till både narraten och berättaren. / This paper aims to study the narrators and the narratees in Rick Riordan's The Lightning Thief (2005) and The Lost Hero (2010), and to see what implications they have on the narrative itself. The paper focuses on a comparative examination of the novels in question and does all this from a narratological standpoint. The narratological perspective first and foremost comes from Gérard Genette's Narrative discourse and his terms extra-, intra-, hetero-, and homodiegetic narrative. The study of the narratee does the same but with Gerald Prince's article "Introduction to the Study of the Narratee" in Reader-response criticism: from formalism to post-structuralism. For a wider perspective of several, both new and old, narratological studies the paper also uses Manfred Jahn's "Narratology 2.1: A Guide to the Theory of Narrative". Through the analysis, one can gather that The Lightning Thief takes on a homo- and extradiegetic narrative with a specific group of narratees. This is contrasted with The Lost Hero's hetero- and extradiegetic narrative with a "zero-degree narratee" that has no apparent characteristics. By extension, one can also notice that a difference lies with the narrator's and narratee's relationship to an actual reader and how, especially in The Lightning Thief, the reader is forced to figure out how it relates to both the narratee and the narrator.

The object of this study is the reading log that has been issued by the Swedish National Agency for Education’s teachers’ in-service training, The Literacy Boost or Läslyftet. The in-service training programme has been broken down into different modules, and the focus of this study is the reading log that has been addressed by a section of one of the modules. Essentially, this study aims to investigate six different teachers’ perceptions and experiences of the reading log. The method used for this investigation is semi-structured interviews. Consequently, the following research questions were outlined: 1.How do the teachers view the reading log and how have their views been altered by the in-service training?2.Which types of text are the teachers prone to use the reading log for?The results of the semi-structured interviews have shown that the different teachers’ perceptions of the purpose of the reading log were unanimous and aligned with theories addressed in the material. However, the necessity of writing for reflection was questioned by one. Further, all the teachers were acquainted with the reading log prior to the in-service training, and even though only a few new theories were acquired, many teachers benefited from new insights and various ways of using the reading log. Many had also experienced the repetition as positive. Lastly, the interviews also uncovered that the language teachers were more prone to using the reading log for literature studies, whereas teachers who also taught civics were prone to using the reading log for different types of texts.Key words: reading log, reflection, social development theory, reader-response criticism, discussion, the extended concept of text, formative assessment, efferent and aesthetic reading In Swedish with an abstract in English

Detta är ett examensarbete baserat på en etnografiskt inspirerad studie som har syfte att undersöka hur lärare motiverar och utformar undervisningen av äldre texter på gymnasiet samt hur elever på olika gymnasieprogram upplever denna undervisning. För att utföra studien har använt mig av källor som bidragit till att samla in, bearbeta och analysera den empiri som intervjuerna och observationerna resulterat i. Frågeställningarna är baserade på syftet med studien och lyder: 1. Hur använder sig svensklärare av äldre texter i klassrummet idag? 2. Hur motiverar svensklärare undervisningen av äldre texter i klassrummet idag? 3. Skiljer sig litteraturundervisningen av äldre texter åt mellan de olika programmen och i så fall hur? 4. Hur upplever eleverna undervisningen av äldre texter? För att besvara mina frågeställningar utfördes tre lärarintervjuer, tre fokusgruppsintervjuer med elever ur respektive klass samt observerade två av tre klasser under ett lektionstillfälle. Som metod för analys valdes en innehållsanalys där teman vaskades fram. Detta innebar att intressanta träffpunkter valdes ut efter transkriberingen av intervjuerna som därefter formade tre teman. Resultatet delades sedan upp i tre delar baserat på dessa teman. Dessa tre teman är: Läsning för att öppna dörrar, läsning för igenkänning och läsning för läslust. I varje tema presenteras vad som utläses vara hinder och möjligheter med den olika tillvägagångssätten för undervisning av äldre texter.

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The concept of art experience among beholders is well-known but lacks empirical studies on everyday art experiences among laypersons. In this bachelor thesis, the appearance of layperson beholders’ art experience is explored by a qualitative interview study method. Eleven chosen responders are individually interviewed at Härnösand Art Gallery beholding the same assorted visual artwork. Descriptions and narratives are compared to artists’ intentions as shown in a separate interview. The theoretical approach leans on psychology and perception in art, focusing on the aesthetics of reception. Although a small-scale investigation in a rather narrow context, the investigation shows interesting findings: It highlights the frequency and intensity of everyday art experience in laypersons and the easiness of defining pictorial art from other informative or commercial pictures. Further, it highlights that the process of art experience perception has a strong hold of autonomy and is perceived as very personal and part of own personality. It also shows the rapid perception and endurance of mood as response and interpretation in contrast to the continuous processing of details and meaning. Lastly, the comparison of the artist’s intention and the beholders’ experience shows concordance.These properties of everyday common art experience can be a causal factor for the general prevalence of art in society.

This thesis aims at analysing the novel History Is All You Left Me by Adam Silvera using a queer phenomenological lens in order to reveal to what extent it depicts aspects of sexuality, consent and relationships in a non-heteronormative way. Furthermore, the thesis discusses different ways of making visible the effects of normativity on student’s learning and development through the proposed queer phenomenological pedagogy.  The literary analysis is conducted by implementing queer theory, queer phenomenology and reader-response to reveal and convey the above-mentioned aspects in a way that enables critical thinking from a non-heteronormative perspective. The pedagogical implications show how the different aspects of sex/sexuality, consent and relationships can be put in juxtaposition and evaluated to broaden the pupils’ understanding and perception. The thesis concludes that the novel History Is All You Left Me contain several examples of sexuality, consent and relationships, amongst others, in a non-heteronormative way, which can be put in juxtaposition in the classroom to further enable critical thinking regarding the topics. Furthermore, the thesis concludes that a queer phenomenological pedagogy can work against normalisation and for pupils finding or expressing their identity and uniqueness.