The purpose of this study was to examine how accessibility is handled by the public library managers in selected rural municipalities. We investigated how the concept of accessibility is perceived by library managers in these municipalities and their opinions on local conditions for and solutions to accessibility problems in rural areas. Semistructured interviews were carried out with library managers in six rural municipalities. The results were analyzed using a theoretical model of accessibility. The model consists of five dimensions; physical, social, psychological, organizational and economic accessibility. The study revealed that the library managers perceived accessibility as a complex concept and were of the opinion that circumstances for libraries in rural municipalities are special. Circumstances related primarily to the physical dimension of accessibility, such as distance, and the economic dimension, such as lack of resources. Furthermore, they described the different approaches used to increase accessibility to the users and the analysis revealed that measures had been taken within all the five dimensions. An important finding was that cooperation within the local community and with nearby municipalities was considered crucial by the library managers for providing a high standard of library service in a small community.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine how acquisition of film for children and young adults in public libraries is carried out. The aim is to investigate why the librarians think a library should have film, if the librarians are bound by acquisition policies and where they retrieve information about films. We also want to know where the films are bought, how the distributors are perceived and how the librarians see their own sphere of competence. The thesis is a qualitative study and is based on interviews with children’s librarians in six public libraries. The interviews were analyzed with the help of three phases established by George Rehrauer and four key words presented by Svensk Biblioteksförening. The results show that the librarians considered it a matter of course that their library should have films. It was their obligation to be up to date with new technology. Although most of the libraries had no official acquisition policy they often had an unofficial one that was implemented by staff media meetings. The librarians searched for suitable films by reviews in newspapers, magazines and on the Internet. Suggestions from patrons were also highly regarded. The distributors were seen as having improved, but still had not a satisfactory range of films. Only one of the librarians had had education about film acquisition. The others referred to lack of time. They felt, however, that their own sphere of competence was big enough.

The aim of this bachelor thesis is to find out how young adults experience the library and the space that they have access to. I used semi-structured interviews to find out about this and interviewed eight youths between the ages of 15 and 18 in a medium sized city in the province of Västra Götaland in Sweden. I then analyzed the material with the help of Goffman’s theory about front stage and back stage. I also did a small comparison with results from previous studies.The result showed that the youths generally liked the library and the staff but they had opinions on some issues. Several of the youths missed comfortable furniture in the adult section and enjoyed the furniture in the children and youth section. However, several of the young adults experienced that the volume of sound was disturbing in that section. All of them wanted there to be some form of youth room or youth section in the library. My analysis with Goffman’s theory showed that the youths overall saw the library as a front stage area and therefor tended to use it in that way, however, they tended to use the children and youth section more as a back stage area. The way the youths described how a youth room could be like made me realize that they wanted a place with both front and backstage qualities after their own needs. The results also had several things in common with previous studies. / Program: Bibliotekarie

The aim of this thesis is to examine how public library work is described in Swedish newspaper debates concerning the public library, Swedish Parliament motions and Swedish public library policies during the period 2015–2017. In Swedish newspapers the two main questions debated were the question of a noisy public library which includes the question of the public library user and the question of weeding.  In the motions as well as in the library policies one of the main subjects are reading and literacy. These documents are also highly concerned with the mission of providing knowledge. Furthermore, a view of the public library as an institution associated with change emerges.  In the source material there are two different ways of defining library work, one is the traditional view of the work that mainly involves reading and handling of the physical books and the other one is more concerned with information and change or evolving of the library and the task assignments.

The aim of this study was to examine to what extent, and how, multilingual information is made accessible on the websites of Swedish municipal libraries. In particular, wefocused on assessing access to foreign languages on the websites, and on identifying the criteria used when choosing these languages. The thesis also aimed to outline which problems, if any, that arise when providing multilingual information on these websites. The analysis was based on theories concerning websites and multilingualism. We analysed the responses to the survey through the concepts of assimilation and diversity. The method used was aquantitative web-based survey addressed to webmasters at 43 Swedish public libraries, in municipalities with a high percentage of foreign-born citizens. The study indicates that economic resources, time, the websites’ design and the lack of language skills among library staff limit the development of multilingual websites. The findings show that a majority of the libraries only to a certain extent map their targetaudience. The webmasters base their work on the principle of every citizen’s equal right to participation. The main finding is that the websites are generally not accessible to non-Swedish speakers, including speakers of the national minority languages. This contradicts the principle of everybody’s equal right of access to public libraries and the information they provide.

Syftet med denna uppsats har varit att undersöka folkbibliotekens arbete för de nationella minoriteterna, samt om den nya bibliotekslagen som gjort de nationella minoriteterna till en prioriterad grupp förändrat folkbibliotekens arbete i denna fråga. De övergripande frågeställningarna berörde hur folkbiblioteken arbetar med denna fråga idag, om den nya bibliotekslagen förändrat arbetet för de nationella minoriteterna på folkbiblioteken, samt om folkbiblioteken upplever några särskilda problem i sitt arbete för de nationella minoriteterna. Den teoretiska utgångspunkten har varit att se på hur minoriteters ställning och behandling i majoritetssamhället historisk påverkar deras ställning än idag. En utgångspunkt har även varit att minoriteter behöver särskilda rättigheter inom majoritetssamhället för att bevara och behålla sin kultur. För att få en bredd i studien gjordes en kvantitativ undersökning i form av en enkät till bibliotekschefer på folkbibliotek runt om i Sverige. Resultaten av enkätundersökningen visade att bibliotekens verksamhet riktad till de nationella minoriteterna är begränsad. Biblioteken har inte heller fått extra resurser eller nya riktlinjer för denna verksamhet. Resultatet visar även att bibliotekslagens nya skrivning inte haft någon större inverkan på bibliotekens verksamhet gentemot de nationella minoriteterna.

This thesis is the result of a questionnaire survey amongsmall businesses in the municipality of Övertorneå. Smallbusinesses need access to many different kinds of informationduring day-to-day operations. Since small businesses oftenlack resources like time, staff and money, the public librarycould provide small businesses with information.The aim of this thesis is to study information needs amongsmall businesses in Övertorneå. The study also aims to suggestwhat kind of service the library could provide accordingto the information needs and the most valued informationsources of the businesses. / Uppsatsnivå: C

The purpose of this bachelor’s thesis is to evaluate how the marketing campaign “Låna dig rik” has been received by the residents of Kalmar. A series of questions are asked: was the campaign noticed by the residents of Kalmar? Through which marketing channels has it been noticed? Is the residents’ opinion of the library in line with the marketing message? Is the campaign moving in the desired direction?The study was done through a questionnaire that was handed out to a number of people in Kalmar. The residents were asked to answer if they had noticed the campaign, where they had noticed it and what their opinion of the library was. The thesis’ analysis section discusses correlations between the respondents' opinions about the campaign and the library with the respondents' age, sex, number of visits to the library and the general attitude towards marketing. Just over half had noticed the campaign. Most of the respondents had seen the campaign at the library and on billboards and posters. No respondent indicated that the campaign had prompted them to visit the library more often. Nearly all respondents thought it was positive that the library dedicated resources to market itself. The most common opinion among residents was that the library is a place of knowledge, culture and a place where everyone is treated equally. Not many residents thought of the library as a place to search for information, a social meeting place or a place for new experiences.

The aim of this two-year masters thesis is to look for the Swedish public library´s core business, using theories about competence. The approach is qualitative. It is done by studying the Unesco Public Library Manifesto, the Swedish library legislation, the education in library and information science, two important Swedish library related journals and by asking public librarians about their work and point of view regarding competence. The research shows mainly two sides of the core competence of public librarians: information technology competence and literature knowledge. The conclusion is that the two meet in the idea of mass education, which could therefore be called the Swedish public library´s core business.

The aim of this essay is to investigate how to work in a projectwhen to reach a new audience. We have seen that a large part oflibrarywork can not be measured using numbers and statistics, andconsider that this work should be recognized. The essay startingpoint is a project run by the City of Malmö, the Ida Project. Theproject approached a new target group for the library with the focuson non-instrumental activities, where the project's goal was to workwith empowerment, proximity and information. Thus, we see aninterest in studying the lessons learned here. To answer the aim ofthe essay we pose three questions;Did the projects location have any significance for theimplementation of the project?Did the project promote any meetings within the group?How did the libraries work to include the target group in society?We have used qualitative interviews and four libraries wereinterviewed. We use the model developed by Casper HvnegaardRasmussen, Henrik Jochumsen and Dorte Skot-Hansen (2011) asan analytical tool to see how the Ida Project has worked to reachtheir target audience. Our conclusion is that the project contributeda more flexible library that could operate outside traditionalboundaries. The project strengthened the library's non-judgmentaland secure environment. The project promoted various meetings inan inclusive environment and contributed to creative alliances onseveral different levels.