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Introduction: The increasing digitalization of society means that digital competence has acquired a key role for today’s citizens and for their participation in social life and democracy. Public libraries are considered as an important institution that can give access to this competence as well as help citizens improve their media and information literacy, since one of the libraries’ tasks is to promote and protect democracy and access to information. To do this, librarians must possess fundamental digital skills and knowledges. In Sweden a national project called Digitalt först med användaren i fokus was launched between 2018 and 2020 and it gave birth, among other things, to a digital learning platform for public librarians called Digiteket. This online resource offers both scientific arti-cles and courses aimed at improving the librarians’ digital competence. With our thesis we want to try and expand the still underdeveloped research around this pedagogical resource. By focusing on a selection of courses, we aim to achieve a better understanding of how their learning process is designed and what type of learning is made possible. At the same time, we want to analyse how the authors chose to organize the course texts, address the target group and make meaning through the texts. Method: Our approach has been to develop a series of questions linked to seven fundamental concepts than belong to two theoretical frameworks focused on learning and communication: didactical design theory and multimodal social semiotics. Three courses from Digiteket were chosen and treated as a didactic and communicative resource constructed as a semi-formal learning design sequence. The courses’ didactic design and metafunctions have been analysed with the help of the questions mentioned above. The instructions contained in Digiteket’s course guide and a short email-interview made with one of the authors responsible for Digiteket’s content helped us add nuance to the analysis. Analysis and results: The didactical design analysis revealed that the courses have a very clear and defined structure with explicit goals and expectations. However, the participants’ possibilities regarding the production of ma-terial as a part of learning is almost non-existent as is also the possibility to discuss one’s learning process. Interaction with the didactic tool and communication between course participants, along with reflection on the learnt subjects and references to further readings are present to a certain extent although mainly situated outside the learning platform. The semiotic analysis of the course texts has shown a pattern in how the course subjects and their relevant aspects are presented, where the subjects are initially seen as influential in the reader’s life. The roles then get inverted, and the reader is shown how to take control of the subject. The texts use several strategies where language and text disposition are involved, and it positions the readers either centrally or as a part of a bigger context of individuals (society as a whole or public librarians). These and other strategies, like the at times playful language, coherence between different courses and internal logical cohesion in each course manage to construct solid pedagogical texts connected to the target group in a varying extent.Conclusions: Digiteket shows a consistent application of fixed pedagogical principles developed with the target group (public librarians) in mind, even if there seems to be room for the integration of more social activities and of different types of didactic tools and media. The platform is in a developing phase and has the potential to become a national hub for boosting librarians’ digital competence and subsequently enable them to transmit knowledges to the public, in accordance with libraries’ societal task. This is a two-year master’s thesis in Library and Information Science.

The purpose of this study is to examine how three volunteer organizations present volunteer projects on their websites to identify who is constructed as central in the description of the project and which role is created for the reader. This study uses Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA), Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) and Post-colonial theory as a theoretical framework to analyze visual and textual elements from three project descriptions. The findings indicate that the project descriptions of two of the organizations highlight the volunteer worker, while at the same time using a tourism discourse in creating the reader’s role. The findings also show that the third organization highlights the beneficiaries of the volunteer work, while creating the reader role of a friend. Additionally, the findings indicate the existence of underlying collective beliefs that can be connected to post-colonial structures in two of the project descriptions but not in the third. The conclusion is that who is highlighted, and the role created for the reader, differ between the three organizations. Two of the organizations focus more on the volunteer worker, and this coincides with the occurrence of Othering. The third organization focus more on the beneficiaries, with no occurrence of Othering.

This study highlights the complex ways in which children engage with semiotic resources during designed dance activities. The study explores how preschool children aged four to five use semiotic resources during dance activities. The aim is to investigate the children's use of symbolic expressions and the communicative dynamics involved. Grounded in social semiotic theory, with a focus on meaning making and transduction, this study uses observation as a method to collect qualitative data from a selected group of child participants. The analysis, grounded in social semiotic analysis, reveals that children create meaning through different semiotic resources, which include different signs and symbols. These can take the form of physical expressions where children's creativity, imagination, emotional expression and social interaction are the basis. The results show that through the three designed dance activities, children mainly used semiotic resources such as gestures, gazes, sounds, facial expressions and verbal expressions to create meaning. By exploring the semiotic resources used and their application in these interactions, it can contribute to the research and one can gain a deeper understanding of children's communicative and symbolic expression during dance activities. The study has potential implications for educational strategies that can promote children's social and cognitive abilities. / Denna studie belyser de komplexa sätten där barn engagerar sig med semiotiska resurser under designade dansaktiviteterna. Studien utforskar hur förskolebarn i åldrarna fyra till fem år använder semiotiska resurser under dansaktiviteter. Syftet är att undersöka barnens användning av symboliska uttryck och de kommunikativa dynamikerna som är involverade. Förankrad i social semiotisk teori, med fokus på meningsskapande och transduktion, använder denna studieobservation som metod för att samla kvalitativa data från en utvald grupp av barndeltagare. Analysen, förankrad i social semiotisk analys, avslöjar att barn skapar mening genom olika semiotiska resurser, vilket innefattar olika tecken och symboler. Dessa kan ta formen av fysiska uttryck där barns kreativitet, fantasi, känslouttryck och sociala interaktion är grunden. Resultaten visar att genom de tre designade dansaktiviteterna använde barn främst semiotiska resurser som gester, blickar, ljud, ansiktsuttryck och verbala uttryck för att skapa mening. Genom att utforska de semiotiska resurser som används och deras tillämpning i dessa interaktioner kan det bidra till forskningen och man kan få en djupare förståelse för barns kommunikativa och symboliska uttryck under dansaktiviteterna. Studien har potentiella implikationer för utbildningsstrategier som kan främja barns sociala och kognitiva förmåga.

The ever-changing landscape of social media coupled with today’s competitive political environment, means that small parties need to use all the tools at their disposal to distinguish themselves from the crowd. The Christian Democrats, a conservative party in the Swedish parliament, has been trying to do exactly that. In recent years, they have changed their party leader and their logo in an effort to move in a more modern direction and set themselves apart. That raises the question how this change has been reflected in what they post on social media. The overall purpose of this study is to compare Facebook posts published by the Christian Democrats at two different points in time, the Swedish general elections in 2014 and in 2022. It seeks to identify how the portrayal of two different party leaders differ, respectively Göran Hägglund in 2014 and Ebba Busch in 2022. We formulate research questions targeting if and how any potential differences in the presentation of the party leader manifest. To do so, we gather six posts from each year (from the month before the election) and analyse them with a multimodal semiotic method. We employ the theories of personalisation and personal branding, drawing conclusions within the framework of social semiotics (a sub-branch of semiotics). Finally, we answer the research questions by drawing several conclusions about key differences in presentation. We find that: personalisation has increased from 2014 to 2022, that the priorities for the desired form of personal branding has changed from 2014 to 2022, and that the professionalisation of the marketing material has increased from 2014 to 2022. We argue that the study expands the research within the realm of Swedish political communication, and contributes to filling a void of longitudinal and comparative studies within that same realm.

The purpose of this study was to examine how male and female celebrities are represented on the 24 covers of e+, a weekly entertainment magazine that was published by Dubai-based Al Nisr Publishing. This cross-sectional, exploratory study used a qualitative visual semiotic analysis and quantitative content analysis to examine how male and female celebrities are constructed and represented on covers published between October 2010 and September 2011. In addition, the study explored whether the myths and ideologies found on the covers made an impression on the perceptions and tastes of teenagers living in the UAE. A subsequent self-administered questionnaire was completed by 30 teenagers living in the UAE aged between 16 and 19 with the purpose of determining how teenagers experienced representations of celebrities. Furthermore, to gain a deeper understanding of how teenagers experienced celebrity culture, three focus-group interviews, each comprising of six participants, are conducted. The study found that both male and female celebrities were represented in gender stereotypical roles. Results showed that male celebrities were represented as active, strong, decisive and dominant. Male celebrities were associated with success, fast cars and dangerous weapons. On the other hand, female celebrities were predominantly represented as submissive. The representations of female celebrities focused on beauty and fashion. The survey and focus-group results revealed that celebrity culture does have an influence on teenagers. Participants reported that they bought products that they saw celebrities wearing or using, emulated the celebrities’ behaviour and copied hairstyles and make-up looks. However, the study found that, in addition to celebrity culture, teenagers’ perceptions are also shaped by their peers, parents and other people they interact with such as teachers. / Communication Science / M.A. (Communication Science)

The main question of this study was: How and in what way can a multimodal semiotic visual analysis model be developed and used for contributing to the analysis and understanding of the manner in which the Men’s Health (South Africa) magazine – as a case study – represents and constructs masculinities in South Africa? The following three subsidiary research questions were formulated to address this topic: • What is the literature revealing with reference to the media as producers of meaning in relation to masculinity and visual texts? • How and in which way can a semiotic visual analysis multimodal model be developed with the purpose of contributing to the analysis of visual texts? • What is the outcome of the visual analysis multimodal model with reference to the case study about the representation and construction of masculinities in visual texts in MH? The first aim of this research was to establish an overview of masculinities and to explore the visual representation of masculinity with reference to mediation, reality, and ideology in the media. With reference to the media as producers of meaning in relation to masculinity and visual texts, a semiotic visual analysis and social semiotics were used to unpack culture as a site of the production of meanings. The media is one of the main sources from which men receive their entertainment and information about the world. In this sense, the media makes sense of the world. Mass media plays a key role in discourse and constructing the relationships between reality and ideology. During this construction, the media reflects on existing opinions and attitudes in society. A quantitative content analysis and a qualitative semiotic multimodal visual analysis were conducted on 27 visual texts purposively selected from MH to include editions from July 2010 to June 2011. This population covered 12 front covers, 12 editorials and three flip covers. The developed visual multimodal model was tested qualitatively on nine visual texts since these texts included the front covers, flip covers and editorials of the three editions with flip covers. v A second major aim of the study was to establish the way in which a semiotic visual analysis multimodal model needed to be developed and used for analysing visual texts, as well as for analysing the visual texts according to the multimodal model in order to understand how the multimodality and social semiotic resources were applied in MH to represent and construct masculinities. The rationale for the development and design of this model was based on the premise that a basic understanding of semiotics and visual language was needed. Without such an understanding, the vast amounts of visual messages that confront the reader would remain incomprehensible. Consequently, a productive dialogue in relation to visual communication cannot take place. The multimodal model developed in this thesis highlights visual text layout, in conjunction with language-in-use, that does not occur in isolation and that is deeply reliant on other forms of making meaning. The heptagon multimodal model consists of concept maps of the six functions of the designed hexagon model. This multimodality approach includes analysing simultaneously occurring semiotics and their various roles in conjunction with detailed, all-inclusive discourses. In the quantitative content analysis and the qualitative multimodal semiotic analysis, the six components of the developed heptagon model (visual grammar, positioning, typography, colour, modality, and iconography) are illustrated. The quantitative research supported the main research design, i.e. the qualitative multimodal semiotic analysis. It is envisaged that the development and construction of a multimodal semiotic model will make a contribution to the scholarly field of semiotic analysis. By discussing the fluidity of the variations of masculinities and male identities, by giving a brief overview of the role of the media in constructing masculinities, and by focusing on the discourses that took place in MH, the researcher creates an awareness of the inherited patriarchal masculinities by recommending envisioned masculinities to be inclusive as a component of the solution. This approach is illustrated by the use and findings of the multimodal semiotic visual analysis. / Communication Science / D. Litt. et. Phil

Thesis (MPhil)--Stellenbosch University, 2012. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis presents an analysis of ‘township typography’ as a complex visual dialect generated by various economic and historical factors within the South African social landscape. A combination of specific tools, skills-sets and applications has produced a body of typographic letterforms that can be visually distinguished from standardised letterforms found in mainstream typography. Due to the origin of these letterforms, as well as their distinct appearance, ‘township typography’ has the capacity to evoke specific social, cultural or demographic structures in systems of communication. This study reveals that typographic features from ‘township typography’ are drawn into mainstream cultural production, particularly in the field of local advertising, as the result of a complex process of incorporation and institutional consecration. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie tesis bied ‘n analise van ‘township tipografie’ as ‘n komplekse visuele dialek wat gegenereer word deur verskeie ekonomiese en historiese faktore eie aan die Suid- Afrikaanse sosiale landskap. Die spesifieke kombinasie van gereedskap, vaardighede en aanwendings lei tot ‘n liggaam van lettertipes wat visueel onderskei kan word van die standaard wat in hoofstroom tipografie voorkom. Vanweë hierdie dialek se oorsprong, asook die kenmerkende voorkoms daarvan, het ‘township tipografie’ die vermoë om spesifieke sosiale, kulturele en demografiese strukture in kommunikasie op te roep. Hierdie studie toon hoe eienskappe eie aan ‘township tipografie’ weens ‘n komplekse proses van inkorporasie en institusionele inseëning in hoofstroom kulturele produksie opgeneem word, veral op die gebied van plaaslike advertensiewese.

Den här studien undersöker utifrån ett multimodalt, designteoretiskt perspektiv den didaktiska designen i läromedlet Bibeläventyret Gamla testamentet. Syftet med studien är att visa de teckensystem som används i designen för lärande i Bibeläventyret Gamla testamentet och den mening som deras semiotiska resurser erbjuder i lärandet. Dessutom tar studien upp det engagemang som eleverna visar, som ett tecken på transformation. Med transformation menas hur eleverna börjar bearbeta den erbjudna meningen och formar den till kunskap. Undersökningen är genomförd i en åk 4 på en svensk grundskola med hjälp av videoobservationer, lektionsanteckningar samt själva läromedlets utrustning. Resultatet blev att Bibeläventyret Gamlas testamentet fungerar multimodalt med många olika teckensystem och artefakter, där vissa är bärande och andra stöttande. Klassrummets spatiala möjligheter, instruktörens muntliga berättande med stöd av intonation, gester, blickar, kroppsspråk och förflyttningar, samt elevernas deltagande i meningsskapandet används om vartannat. Studien tyder på att den multimodala designen erbjuder stor mening och i det engagemang som eleverna visar finns en början till transformation och formation till ny kunskap. Tidigare forskning har kommit fram till att det finns signifikanta tecken på lärande i multimodala miljöer, ofta med inslag av digitala medier. Där bidrar studien till att visa att många fler teckensystem än vad som ofta används multimodalt kan kombineras och utöka möjligheten till lärande, särskilt i undervisningen av Bibeläventyret Gamla testamentet. / This study analyses, from a multimodal, design theoretical perspective, the design for learning in the educational material Bibeläventyret Gamla testamentet (The Bible Adventure – The Old Testament). The aim is to display the modes that are used in the design for learning in Bibeläventyret Gamla testamentet and the meaning that is offered in learning by semiotic resources of these modes. The study also presents the involvement that the students show, as a sign of transformation. Transformation refers to how the students start to process offered meaning and form it into knowledge. The study was conducted in 4th grade classes in a Swedish compulsory school and is based on video observations of two hours of teaching, field notes and the analysis of the teaching material. The study shows that teaching Bibeläventyret Gamla testamentet is multimodally conducted with many different modes and artefacts, where some bear more meaning and others are more supportive. The spatial opportunities of the classroom, the oral narrative of the instructor, including prosody in talk, body movements, gesture and gaze, as well as the students’ involvement in meaning making are used variously. The study shows that the multimodal design offers a significant meaning for learning and the involvement of the students shows how they make an initial transformation and formation of new knowledge. Previous research points to major signs of learning in multimodal environments, where digital media is often included. This study contributes to previous research in showing that many more modes can be used and combined multimodally at the same time compared to what is usually done and so extend the learning possibility particularly in teaching Bibeläventyret Gamla testamentet.

The aim of this thesis is to make a contribution to the field of design oriented theory, regarding young children and their way to digital competence. My research question is: How can a preschool with a certain pedagogical ICT-design give the children affordances for media play and for developing a digital competence? The European Parliament points out digital literacy as one of the Key Competences for life long learning. A digital competence is built on basic ICT (Information and Communication technology) skills. Skills you can develop any time during life, weather you are young or old. Recent Swedish research on young children and digital competence points out the preschool teacher’s insecurity regarding the use of ICT in the preschool´s daily activities (Ljung- Djärf, Klerfelt).   There are an amount of new social and cultural gaps in our modern society regarding illiteracies and learning. Fear for the digital gap, or divide, is confirmed by researchers such as Buckingham and Kress. Briefly, if one doesn’t possess digital literacy, the risk of society divides is impending. This could be built on factors such as gender, ethnicity, class, generational and geographical divides, but also about dichotomies in the capacity of learning in a digitalized milieu.   Today’s children are the first generation to grow up in a society characterized by digital media. They are born into it. They are the Digital Natives and they take the new technology for granted. The rest of us are Digital Immigrants and we try to adapt to the new society. Prensky highlights the possibilities of changes in young persons’ brains, or at least in their thinking, as a result of their nursery in the digital world. Where does that leave the teachers of the pre-digital age? The true risk of a digital divide can perhaps be found in the daily melting pot between “the natives” and “the immigrants”.  The act of arranging meaningful communicative meetings could be one education’s most important responsibilities.   From the view of a design orientated perspective, built on a socio-cultural theoretical framework, key words like design, setting and affordance become important in my study. Didactic design is a theoretical perspective which elaborates understanding of learning from semiotic activities. Learning is to be seen as meaning making in social contexts. These contexts are in pedagogical milieus called institutional settings. The teacher and /or the child can be designers of and actors in the setting.   Through the design and settings, the children at the preschool in my study, achieved consistent possibilities for media play and for developing digital competence. They got the opportunity to develop different kinds of literacy. One of the important findings of my study was that the preschool teachers developed digital competence and confidence much in the same way as the children did. Collaborative learning processes, elaboration, curiosity and playfulness stood up as affordances for learning. There have to be milieus designed for flexibility and elaborations and there have to be preschool teachers deliberately setting these kind of designs.   The study confirms previous research at one hand in the area young children and digital competence and on the other hand in research connected to design oriented theories. This study has merged the two fields together.   Further research is to be seen in a wide spread field. An interesting continuation is to study the preschool teachers education. Questions of learning and intertextuality are other important issues.   Key words: Didactic design, digital competence, digital divides, literacy, media play, affordances, settings, tools, preschool, ICT, multimodality, social semiotics, meaningmaking. / Syftet med min uppsats är att bidra till förståelse för hur valet av design och iscensättning i förskolepedagogiska miljöer erbjuder medielek och möjliggör utvecklandet av en digital kompetens. Jag har utgått från frågan: Hur kan en specialdesignad förskolemiljö bidra till utvecklingen av barns medielek och digitala kompetens? En digital kompetens bygger på grundläggande IKT-färdigheter[1]. Det innebär bland annat att man kan hämta fram, bedöma, lagra, producera och kommunicera med och genom digitala medier. Tidigare forskning visar på förskollärares oro för den digitala tekniken. Förutom den rent konkreta osäkerheten vid användningen av de digitala verktygen ges också uttryck för en osäkerhet för hur man balanserar förskoleverksamheten med ny teknologin. Detta kan belysa vad som inom medieforskning beskrivs som digital divides, något som i sin tur kan förstärka klyftor i samhället. Frågan om bruk av IKT i förskolan diskuteras ofta ur ett framåtsyftande nyttoperspektiv. Man talar om inlärningsaspekten, arbetslivsaspekten och demokratiaspekten. Barnen på förskolan i min studie har genom den didaktiska designen möjligheter att få del av dessa tre aspekter.  Men man har dessutom skapat en miljö som erbjuder barnen – och de vuxna – möjligheter för medielek och därigenom utvecklandet av en digital kompetens. I studien blir det tydligt hur vuxna och barn svarar upp mot de förutsättningar som designats och erbjuds. Lärprocesserna sker i en institutionell inramning, där läraren (och barnen) är aktörer och iscensättare. Pedagogen, likväl som barnet, kan aktivt välja vilka teckensystem och vilken gestaltningsform som ska användas.   I den undersökta verksamheten finns även en underliggande kulturell affordance, meningserbjudande, en idé om att IKT är bra för barn, att vuxna kan både leka och lära samtidigt, samt att det är tillåtet att experimentera, för att finna något som man varken vet frågan eller svaret på. Det här skulle ur ett socialsemiotiskt perspektiv, vara tecken på lärande, eftersom en lärandeprocess utmärks av en ökad förmåga att använda skilda teckensystem, eller domäner. Barnen utvecklar sin litteracitet och sin medielitteracitet. De utökar också sin kognitiva, kommunikativa och kulturella och estetiska kompetens. Vi skulle här kunna tala om en multilitteracitet, eftersom de meningsskapande processer som barnen befinner sig i under arbetet med de digitala verktygen, inte bara inbegriper lingvistiska utan också visuella, auditiva och spatiala processer. Min studie visar att design och iscensättning på den undersökta förskolan är betydelsefulla för erbjudandet av medielek och utvecklandet av barnens och de vuxnas digitala kompetens. De vuxna är trygga i sina roller och där fanns en naturlig balansgång mellan de mer traditionella och de digitala verktygen. En avslutande reflektion är att det inte längre är frågan om att diskutera om IKT och medier ska användas i förskolan, det är mer frågan om hur. Det är inte heller längre tid att diskutera om barn och vuxna ska utveckla en digital kompetens i förskolan, snarare hur det ska ske. En fortsatt forskning på området kan handla om en fördjupning i sådant som berör lärande, kommunikativ kompetens, intertextualitet eller textrörlighet. Andra viktiga frågor kan röra sig om hur lärarutbildningen lever upp till kraven på en digital kompetens.