The purpose of this thesis is to examine popular male characters trending on the social media app TikTok under the hashtags “booktok” and “bookboyfriends”, with a focus on understanding the construction of their masculinity and determining the qualities that make them highly appealing to a female audience. This will be done by researching the six most popular male characters on #bookboyfriend. Then by close reading the novels which the characters derive from.  This thesis theoretical framework is a mix between romance research, masculinity studies and a female gaze perspective. The thesis draws upon a variety of studies, including but not limited to the works of Raewyn Connell, Laura Mulvey, Janice Radway and Jonathan Allen. The novels researched in this thesis are all heterosexual, written by women and mostly by American authors. These are: Elle Kennedy’s The Deal (2021), Colleen Hoover’s It Ends with Us (2016), Krista & Becca Ritchie’s Addicted to You (2020), Ali Hazelwood’s Love Hypothesis (2021), and Ana Huang’s Twisted Love (2021) and Twisted Lies (2022).  To analyze the male characters, I divided the analysis into two main parts: physical depiction and sexual content. The book boyfriends are portrayed in a way that is traditional to the romance genre, they are tall, handsome, and rich. However, now they are more extreme in everything, instead of just being tall they are massive. Furthermore, they are also more violent than their predecessors especially in the sexual content of the novels. This is mixed with the inclusion of sexual consent which now exists in all the novels. Lastly, the book boyfriends are all male heroes typical to the romance genre but work as a scale where some behave more as alpha males and others as soft boys.

[pt] A tese trata do estudo de três práticas de leitura coletivas e híbridas da contemporaneidade: as redes sociais, o booktok e o booktube e os Slams. O objetivo principal deste estudo é analisar como jovens e idosos interagem com essas práticas de leitura, observando as diferenças e semelhanças entre esses públicos etários. O método utilizado foi o método da pesquisa qualitativa através de entrevistas semiestruturadas com 40 jovens com idades de 18 a 30 anos e 40 idosos com idades de 60 a 80 anos, ambos os grupos com nível superior completo ou cursando nível superior, moradores do Rio de Janeiro. Essas três práticas de leitura utilizam-se de formatos online e offline, podendo ser realizada uma leitura compartilhada, com possibilidade de trocas e comentários entre os leitores. O virtual e o presencial nas práticas de leitura da contemporaneidade apresentam-se como mais integrados, acumulados, linkados e, por isso, também, emaranhados uns nos outros. Os conteúdos que são lidos continuam sendo diversos, lê-se sobre todos os assuntos, mas o modo de ler contemporâneo recebe nova formas, novas práticas de leitura que se conjugam e aglutinam na contemporaneidade como variadas formas de ler que coexistem. / [en] The thesis deals with the study of three collective and hybrid reading practices of contemporaneity: social networks, booktok and booktube and Slams. The main objective of this study is to analyze how young and old people interact with these reading practices, observing the differences and similarities between these age groups. The method used was the qualitative research method through semi-structured interviews with 40 young people aged between 18 and 30 years and 40 elderly people aged between 60 and 80 years, both groups with complete higher education or attending higher education, residents of Rio de Janeiro. January. These three reading practices use online and offline formats, and a shared reading can be carried out, with the possibility of exchanges and comments between readers. The virtual and the face-to-face in contemporary reading practices are presented as more integrated, accumulated, linked and, therefore, also entangled with each other. The contents that are read continue to be diverse, one reads on all subjects, but the contemporary way of reading receives new forms, new reading practices that are combined and agglutinate in the contemporaneity as different ways of reading that coexist.

Syftet med detta arbete har varit att undersöka hur BookTok används av bokhandlare och bibliotek. Till hjälp har ett teoretiskt ramverk använts bestående av Uses and Gratification,symboliskt kapital samt deltagarkultur. Utifrån detta ramverk har det gjort semistrukturerade intervjuer som analyserats med hjälp av fenomenografiska metoder. Intervjuer gjordes med tre bibliotek och två bokhandlar i södra Sverige under hösten 2023.  I analysen av materialet kunde fyra teman särskiljas utifrån huvudfrågeställningen – hur använder bokhandlare och bibliotek BookTok? Dessa fyra teman är BookTok som arbetsverktyg, kontaktyta, kreativ yta och symboliskt kapital. Analysen av de olika teman ger oss en idé om hur verksamheternas deltagande ser ut på plattformen samt hur bokhandlarna och biblioteken själva ser på deras användning av BookTok. / This study aims to understand how bookstores and libraries make use of  BookTok.  A theoretical framework has been used consisting of the Uses and Gratification theory, symbolic capital theory and participatory culture theory. Along the lines of this theoretical framework, semi structured interviews were designed with the help of a phenomenographic approach. The interviews were held during the autumn of 2023. Three libraries and two bookstores participated. In the analysis, four themes were detected in regards to the question at issue – How do bookshops and libraries make use of BookTok? The four themes are BookTok as a work tool, contact area, creative space and symbolic capital. The analysis of different themes gives us an idea of the operations participation on the grounds of TikTok – as well as their own perception of their BookTok use.

The aim of this Master's thesis is to study what public librarians' literature mediation looks like on Tiktok by exploring some librarians' experiences and perspectives and by mapping posts on the libraries Tiktok accounts to see which patterns emerge. The method for the study is qualitative semi-structured interviews with librarians as well as a quantitative content analysis of Tiktok-posts from the libraries where the interviewed librarians work. Analysis of the empirical material has been conducted within a thematic framework based on Jofrid Karner Smidt's mediation roles (1994). The key findings are that the librarian mostly acts as an educator and as a social anthropologist in the selection of literature, but that the librarian in the posts appears in the librarian's role as an ordinary person who conveys subjective experiences as a reader and tries to participate in the reading community Booktok on Tiktok. There is great possibility of designing videos on Tikok in order to reach users, but this requires knowledge of the aesthetics of the platform.

Den här uppsatsen har undersökt hur förändringsprocessen gick till när folkbibliotek skapade Tiktok-konton och vilka faktorer som spelade roll för kontos upprätthållning. Studien undersökte också hur bibliotekens konton på plattformen har förändrat biblioteksverksamheten enligt folkbibliotekarien. Urvalet till studien var folkbibliotekarier och datainsamlingen skedde genom semistrukturerade intervjuer som sedan analyserades med hjälp av en tematisk analys. Studiens teoretiska ramverk var begreppet förändring samt Lewins förändringsprocessmodell. Analysen visade att alla folkbiblioteken gick igenom en förändringsprocess och följde i stort sett de två första faserna av förändringsprocessmodellen. Faktorer som tidsbrist, motivation och stöd från kollegor och chefer visade sig påverka bibliotekens konton på Tiktok och dess upprätthållning. Analysen visade vidare att folkbibliotekens användning av Tiktok hade en stor påverkan på biblioteksverksamheten där förändringar har skett bland annat på bibliotekens hyllor och deras inköp och utbud. Det har även framkommit att folkbibliotekarierna anser att Tiktok kommer att fortsätta förändra verksamheten fastän de personligen slutar vara aktiva på plattformen.

The aim of this study is to understand upper-secondary school students’ reading habits and what influences them, with a focus on the possible effect of BookTok, a subcommunity on the social media platform TikTok. Data was based on questionnaires collected from students and interviews with a teacher and a librarian, which were analyzed using a thematic analysis. Findings have revealed that the majority of the participating students do not read for pleasure, though many do. The students who read for pleasure are influenced by social media when choosing books to read, including BookTok. Teachers and librarians also influence students’ reading habits. The interviewed teacher had not noticed any increase in reading but rather a negative attitude towards reading. However, the interviewed librarian noticed a slight increase in reading, as well as BookTok’s impact. Students who use BookTok report that this platform affects their reading habits and has increased the number of books they read, both in Swedish and in English. They also report that reading develops their language skills.

This thesis examines readership communities on the social media application TikTok, and more specifically videos published under the hashtag SpicyBooks, where users discuss the literary genre of romance. Together with the closely related #BookTok, #SpicyBooks has had a profound impact on the book market. Correspondingly, the formation of readership communities on the app should be of interest to anyone who wishes to understand the changes of and within literacy among young adults. This study examines the top 130 featured videos under #SpicyBooks, which are thematically divided into categories analysed in three separate chapters. Taking its cue from affect theory, the thesis examines how the affect of shame is produced, represented and mediated in the videos. Furthermore, the study maps the various reader positions conjured by shame, and surveys how the video creators present themselves in the prevailing ideas and norms of aesthetic taste and social gender that circumscribes the literature discussed in the videos. By focusing on how the social media users and readers represent themselves, rather than how libraries and librarians can make themselves visible on social media, the study proposes a methodological shift, which might begin bridging the generational gap between libraries and their potential users.

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