The aim of this essay is to analyze the portrayal of the Romani people in 23 history textbooks marketed towards the Swedish lower secondary school between the years 1964–2014, but also which uses of history emerge from within these descriptions. During this period, the curriculum has passed through five different stages with varying approaches towards ethnic minorities. The method used to compare different textbooks, passages and time-periods was a qualitative and comparative content analysis based on a model by Professor Lennart Hellspong. This was supported by a theoretical framework focused around the typologies of uses of history by Professor Klas-Göran Karlsson. The findings show that Romani people are portrayed in similar themes or contexts over different curriculum-stages and many of the written passages focuses on the victimization and mistreatment of Romani by either Swedish or international actors. A comprehensive account of an objective and cultural history is only found in a few of the most current textbooks. The Romani and their history are often overlooked in favor of the majority society’s historical narrative if not a specific duty is charged towards their inclusion in the schools control documents. In the year 2000 the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities was ratified by the Swedish government and the subsequent revision of the curriculum made this inclusion a permanent fixture. However, some textbooks keep minority history brief and unsatisfying. The uses of history regarding Romani people vary over time and appear to be subject to the overarching sociopolitical landscape. An excluding and existential nationalistic narrative is identified to be common during the 1960’s but transforms towards a more including variety over time. Non-use and political-pedagogical use are both partial in varying degrees during all the curriculum-periods coupled with a perceived scientific presentation of historical facts, but not scientific use of history. The current curriculum introduces a widely moral and conciliatory use of history. This study confirms earlier research to an extent, but at the same time it extends to focus on the Romani people, a wider variety of books and a longer time-period compared with earlier studies on the subject. The findings open the possibility for future research on other Swedish or international minorities – or the Romani from other methodological or theoretical standpoints.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the medial portrayal of Romani people in the newspaper Dagens Nyheter from 2013 and 2014. In the theoretical chapter the concepts of new racism is used to speak of what is considered racist in the Swedish society today. Other concepts that are used are type and stereotype which are used to explain how our context is depending on distinctions to understand what surrounds us. Concepts such as myths and binary-oppositions are other theories that are used in this study.  Six debate articles have been selected to investigate how the Romani people are represented. Discourse analysis was used to answer the main questions in this study and was used to answer the purpose of this study. The main result was that the Romani people was discriminated and were not given the opportunity to speak their mind. It was always someone else outside this ethnic group who presented their view on something. They were considered passive as a group, in need of help from the remaining society. Said newspapers made generalizations about the group and connected them to begging. Finally, the perhaps most interesting result that this study finds is that the media makes distinctions between the Romani people and other social groups. The Romani people are made out as “the others” and a “we” and “them” in the Swedish society becomes prominent.

<p>The purpose with this study is to investigate the experiences some adult Romans have of co-operation between Romani parents and school. The study is based on interviews and has been inspired of critical ethnography and hermeneutic theories. What views have the Romani adults and parents on parental co-operation with school? Which strategy do they see as a practical way for improved parental co-operating with school? The study show that the Romani parents who participated in this study do want a very close co-operation and have used strategies of open communication and giving suggestion on how to co-operate with the schools. One of the informants has had the opportunity to give an in-dept interview and this gives an example of a more diversified picture of the Romani parental patterns in relation to school. The adult Ro-mani group that has been interviewed thinks that a close co-operation with school is very im-portant. One suggestion of improvement from the interviewers is teacher-assistans to improve the schools parental co-operation. There where also suggestions that educational efforts of the school is needed for all students and to include knowledge about who the Romani people are and about their history, culture and language. Some of the parents even showed examples of giving suggestions to teachers to increase the contact by writing in a dairy for each student. The parents in this study also reports of institutionalized antigypsyism and discrimination. In that view the in-dept interview gives an explanation to why the co-operation is believed to be so crucial. There is a fear that the public authorities in somewhat way would hurt the Romani children.</p>

The purpose with this study is to investigate the experiences some adult Romans have of co-operation between Romani parents and school. The study is based on interviews and has been inspired of critical ethnography and hermeneutic theories. What views have the Romani adults and parents on parental co-operation with school? Which strategy do they see as a practical way for improved parental co-operating with school? The study show that the Romani parents who participated in this study do want a very close co-operation and have used strategies of open communication and giving suggestion on how to co-operate with the schools. One of the informants has had the opportunity to give an in-dept interview and this gives an example of a more diversified picture of the Romani parental patterns in relation to school. The adult Ro-mani group that has been interviewed thinks that a close co-operation with school is very im-portant. One suggestion of improvement from the interviewers is teacher-assistans to improve the schools parental co-operation. There where also suggestions that educational efforts of the school is needed for all students and to include knowledge about who the Romani people are and about their history, culture and language. Some of the parents even showed examples of giving suggestions to teachers to increase the contact by writing in a dairy for each student. The parents in this study also reports of institutionalized antigypsyism and discrimination. In that view the in-dept interview gives an explanation to why the co-operation is believed to be so crucial. There is a fear that the public authorities in somewhat way would hurt the Romani children.

The aim of this study has been to examine how a few members of the Finnish and non- Scandinavian Romani subgroups experience their own, and their groups, situation on the Housing- and Labour Market. We´ve studied our respondents’ experiences of discrimination, which difficulties they think there are, what strategies can be used to deal with these difficulties and also their own ideas on how to improve the situation for the Romani people in the Swedish society. This has been done by six individual structured interviews which have been analyzed with concepts from Symbolic Interactionism, including Goffman’s Dramaturgical Role Theory, definition of Stigma and Kelly’s theory of Personal Constructions. Our results show that the respondents either have been victims of discrimination themselves, or have family/friends that have, which has led to adjustments to the expectations of how an employee or a houseguest should be. Our respondents believe that difficulties getting/keeping a job/house are a result of prejudice towards the Romani people and the main strategy that can be used is hiding their ethnic identity on these arenas.  Ideas for improvement include members of the majority population and Romanies working together long term to develop knowledge about the Romani people.

The thesis studies how and why ethnicity was used as a ground for separation in order to establish education that was segregated from the normal teaching in elementary schools. The thesis focuses on the educational policy targeted at Gypsies, vagrants and nomadic reindeer-herding Sámi. Due to their ways of living they did not fit into the general Swedish education, which was based on domicile. My aim is to problematise research of the teaching that was offered to Sámi and Gypsies. The safety zone has been used as a metaphor for analysing a physical, spatial way of thinking, where the location of the educational environment in relation to the surrounding society was focused on. The concept has also been used in order to analyse a dimension of educational content that was a matter of forming the pupils’ way of thinking and knowledge. What may at first glance be perceived as primitive and poor, e.g. teaching out of doors, may also, as I see it, be interpreted as a manifestation of a radical educational current. The education policy was moreover a concern not only for the state or for centrally placed actors but engaged the local authority community and other actors. The study shows how actors at different levels in a country committed to education handled issues concerning ambulatory ethnic groups. It was not the same issues that were relevant for the groups, but they involved a common pattern of thought. The education policy, teaching activities and sorting process that are described developed under the influence of international educational and socio-political currents and were shaped by politicians, civil servants, experts, teachers and all sorts of “amateurs”. It is the scope of their knowledge basis, opinions, proposals and actions that is focused on. The thesis also deals with a complicated justification process for identification, sorting and implementation of a separative education, where quite often a “Swedishness” that was difficult to capture was articulated as a norm in relation to the deviant groups.

The European Union has faced lots of criticisms over the last couple of years when it comes to how refugees are treated in Europe. The Lisbon Treaty states in Article 2 that the European Union is founded on respect for human freedom, dignity and equality. Values such as democracy, rule of law, respect for human rights and that the rights of persons belonging to minorities should be respected are also something that the Union should be based on. How is it then that the Roma people, which are Europe's largest minority, are being persecuted all over Europe, that they get deported and have their camps destroyed? Why are refugees from North Africa being sent back before they even have a chance to seek asylum?   In this essay I have examined how the EU are treating refugees and tried to distinguish if there are any differences in how they treat internal and external refugees. I have analyzed this by using liberal universalism theory to see if the EU lives up to the liberal values that they claim to be based on. I found out that the European Union has a lot to work on when it comes to managing refugees in a fair way. I also found that the economic crises we have today has stolen focus from the refugee issue and that it also have affected the attitude towards refugees in a negative way.

Different cultures have legends which affect the people and societies in which these legends are traded. Most legends are ecotypified, but some legends can survive even when those who tell them move. The aim of this study is to identify some characteristic features of the legend tradition within the Bosnian diaspora in Sweden, and to identify which type of legends that live on in the Swedish environment. The study is conducted as an interview study and the results analyzed with a hermeneutic approach. The study identifies five different types of legends that are categorized into three different categories: erotic, trauma and fear. The results show a fear among the respondents that if the legends disappear, a loss of part of their Bosnian identity will follow. The conclusion show that the category of fear lives on in the Bosnian diaspora, whilst legends building on trauma and eroticism are at risk of disappearing in a Swedish environment.

I juli 2019 försågs förskolan med en ny läroplan och med den ett utökat minoritetsuppdrag, vilket i korthet innebär att förskolan ska bidra till att skydda och främja de nationella minoriteternas språk och kulturer. Tidigare forskning pekar på att läroplansändringar om de nationella minoriteterna haft liten inverkan på ämnesinnehållet inom utbildningssystemet och att det finns svårigheter kopplade till att implementera kultur- och språkrelaterade policyer i förskolan. Syftet med föreliggande studie är därför att genom förskolepersonals förståelser lyfta fram dilemmatiska aspekter i förskolans minoritetsuppdrag. En tonvikt har placerats vid den nationella minoriteten romer, vilket delvis motiveras genom en webbenkät som distribuerats i studiens startskede. Av de fem nationella minoriteterna hade färst respondenter berört romer i förskolans utbildning. För en fördjupad förståelse och för att generera mer data hölls två fokusgruppsintervjuer med totalt sex informanter och en kompletterande individuell intervju med ytterligare en informant. Eftersom studien undersökt ett känsligt ämne genomsyras den av reflexivitet och etiska överväganden. Den data som genererats har analyserats och diskuterats med hjälp av Michael Billigs begreppsapparat ideologiska dilemman, med fokus på sunt förnuft och motstridigheter. Det sunda förnuftet säger att förskolans minoritetsuppdrag är viktigt för att bevara ett kulturarv, revitalisera minoritetsspråken och motverka fördomar. Motstridigheterna består i att arbetet med Sveriges nationella minoriteter och minoritetsspråk villkoras på grund av prioriteringar och rangordningar, resonemanget ”inget minoritetsbarn – inget minoritetsuppdrag”, en rädsla för att göra fel och en strävan att undvika konflikter. Genom en analytisk diskussion påträffas fyra dilemmatiska aspekter i skärningspunkterna mellan 1) ideologier som förskolan förväntas förmedla och ideologier om förskolan som institution, 2) en strävan att revitalisera minoritetsspråken och att det aktualiseras först när ett minoritetsspråkigt barn finns i barngruppen, 3) en strävan att motverka fördomar och en rädsla för att i stället befästa dem och 4) att ge barn förutsättningar att utveckla en kulturell identitet och minoritetsspråket och att upprätthålla tillitsfulla relationer och samarbeten med vårdnadshavare genom att låta bli när de så önskar.Studien bidrar till kunskap om dilemmatiska aspekter i förskolans minoritetsuppdrag och gör dem på så sätt möjliga att adressera. / In July 2019, the preschool was provided a new curriculum and with it an extended minority assignment. In short, this assignment means that the preschool shall protect and promote the languages and cultures of the Swedish national minorities. Previous research indicates that curriculum changes regarding the national minorities generally have little impact on the subject content within the education system and that there are difficulties linked to implementing policies about language and culture in preschool. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to highlight dilemmatic aspects in the preschool's minority assignment through preschool personnel's understandings. An emphasis is placed on the national minority Roma, which is partly motivated by a web survey that was distributed in the initial stages of the study. Out of the five national minorities, the fewest respondents had referenced Roma people in the preschool’s education. For a deeper understanding, and to generate more data, two focus group interviews with a total of six informants and a supplementary individual interview with yet another informant were held. Since a sensitive subject is being examined, the study is permeated by reflexivity and ethical considerations. The data generated has been analyzed and discussed using Michael Billig's theoretical approach to ideological dilemmas, with a focus on common sense and contrary themes. What passes as common sense is that the preschool's minority assignment is important to preserve a cultural heritage, revitalize the minority languages and counter prejudice. The contrary themes regard conditions for working with the Swedish national minorities and minority languages, such as priorities and rankings, the reasoning "no minority child – no minority assignment", a fear of making mistakes, and avoiding conflicts. Through an analytical discussion, four dilemmatic aspects are found in the intersections between 1) ideologies that the preschool is expected to convey and ideologies about the preschool as an institution, 2) an effort to revitalize the minority languages and that this is only actualized when a minority language speaking child is present in the child group, 3) an effort to counter prejudices and a fear of instead reinforcing them and 4) supporting children’s need to develop a cultural identity and their minority language and to maintain trusting relationships and collaborations with children’s guardians by not doing so, if that is their wish. This study contributes to highlighting dilemmatic aspects in the preschool's minority assignments and is thereby making them possible to address.

This thesis investigates Zigenarundersökningen [the Gypsy study] – a socio-medical study of Swedish Roma conducted in 1962-1965. The Study was financed by the National Labour Market Board, which sought scientific information on every adult Roma citizen in order to plan for targeted authority interventions. The socio-medical team used a number of different medical and social techniques, drawing together different kinds of data – from the molecular to the social level – and adding “objective” records from public institutions, which resulted in the creation of detailed and voluminous individual case files. On the basis of these files, the public health specialist John Takman in charge of the socio-medical examinations formulated a professional opinion on each individual and family. During the execution of the study, new scientific and social questions were articulated, resulting in that the originally limited investigation concerning only a smaller group of Roma citizens evolved into a comprehensive research project covering all people identified as Swedish Roma. In this thesis, this expansion is analysed using methodological tools from Science and Technology Studies that focus on the reflexivity between the goals of scientific actors, and the social conditions and problematisations that surround them. In this way, science and policy mutually influence each other in situated practices, which also involves the drawing of scientific boundaries that serve to establish epistemic authority.   Departing from Engin F. Isin’s theory on social citizenship, and its alterities, as constituted in contingent and contextualised social practices, and from Franca Iacovetta’s study of Canadian gatekeepers’ work in cold-war Canada, the thesis investigates how the, with time, increasing and more comprehensive activities of experts and professionals created new dimensions of citizenship. Against this background, the thesis draws the conclusion that the scientific-political examinations of problematised citizenship and citizens in Sweden in the 1960’s, while defining deviance, also defined normality. This implies, furthermore, that scientific measurements and classifications of alterity contributed to constituting those measuring and classifying – the experts and professionals – as virtuous citizens, in accordance with contemporary norms of professionalism and expertise, while the Roma were continually constructed as problematic citizens. Hence, scientific-political activities concerning Swedish Roma in the 1960’s created new spaces of social citizenship, where the contents of both normality and deviance were nuanced and (re)defined.