This research study takes a multi-disciplinary perspective, using critical discourse theory, transactional communication theory and cross-cultural theory to contribute insight into the experiences of alternative entry students as they strive to access and participate in higher education. The study seeks to determine how these students learn to persevere: how they construct their means of succeeding in the university culture. The methodological structure of the research comprises a collective case study design, encompassing critical ethnography, action research and reflexive approaches to guide a deeper understanding of the experiences of studying at a regional Australian university. The reflexive nature of the research facilitated the development of an original theoretical construct, the ‘deficit-discourse’ shift, which challenges higher education policy and practice, in particular, in relation to academics’ roles in making their discourses explicit and in collaborating with students to facilitate students’ perseverance and success. The research has also generated two models: the Framework for Student Engagement and Mastery and the Model for Student Success at University. The Framework re-conceptualises the university as a dynamic culture made up of a multiplicity of sub-cultures, each with its own literacy or discourse. The Framework recasts the first year experience as a journey, with students’ transition re-conceptualised as the processes of gaining familiarity with and negotiating these new literacies and discourses whereas perseverance is viewed as the processes of mastering and demonstrating them. The Model provides a three step practical strategy (incorporating reflective practice, socio-cultural practice and critical practice) for achieving this engagement: for empowering students to negotiate, master and demonstrate their mastery of the university culture’s multiple discourses. Together, the two models provide students with a means of succeeding in the new university culture.

Female and male managers in crisis - A qualitative study of how daily and evening newspapers produce female and male managers in crisis The purpose of this studie was to investigate how female and male managers are produced in daily and evening newspapers. The newspapers that has been used in this study is Dagens Nyheter, as a representation for daily newspapers, and Aftonbladet, as an representation for evening tabloids. To answer the purpose three issues has been formulated: what are the female and male managers importance in emergency situations in the articles? How are power attributed to women and men in the articles? What similarities and differences are there between the representations from Dagens Nyheter and Aftonbladet? The theories that has been used in this studie are mainly gender theory, critical discourse analysis (CDA). The results of the analysis showed that female managers in subjectivily presented articles reports are produced in a more negative way than male managers. Further could the male managers be interpreted to be attributed more power in the articles than the female managers.

Following thesis investigates the intertwined relationship between the rise of gang-violenceand right-wing populist parties, more specifically the True Finns and the Sweden Democrats. The purpose of this essay being, how the True Finns and the Sweden Democrats usegang-violence to legitimize xenophobia. Analysis are done by using a CDA-approach, the threedimensional model by Norman Fairclough. Materials used in this discourse analysis are material from the parliament, material from the parties websites and public media prior to the general elections in 2022 and 2023. The theoretical tools for analyses in this thesis rely oncombined theories from previous studies in Trygghet as issue ownership and discourses used by the Swedish Democrats and True Finns to legitimize their ideological standpoints. Through combining the theoretical framework and Fairclough’s threedimensional analysis,the empirical findings were analyzed to find which discourses are used when referring to gang violence to legitimize xenophobia. Main results of the analysis found that the parties use similar discourses when talking about gang violence, related to safety, a promised fullness to come and a feared doomsday to legitimize xenophobia. However there were also some culturally bound differences in how the parties legitimized xenophobia when discussing gangviolence. The main conclusion of the study was that some of the findings matched the theoretical framework, while some did not.