The purpose of this master’s thesis is to study the organisational culture of two public libraries managed differently. One of the libraries in my study is run by the local bookstore and the other is run by a staff co-operative. My aim is to elucidate characteristic features in the culture of these two public library organisations. The questions I posed are which types of organisation culture can be identified in the two given examples and what the factors are that may be of importance for these cultures. In my study I use Henning Bang’s definition of organisational culture as a set of common norms, values and comprehensions of the reality formed in an organisation through cooperating within the group and with the outside world. I’ve also used Bang’s division of the concept into content and expression, when I’ve gathered information in my empiric study. The study has contained of texts from and about the chosen libraries, an inquiry answered by all the staff members and interviews with three members from each organisation. I have used Critical Values Framework and Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument as tools for analysing the material. Both libraries in this study can, according to these tools, be characterised as clan oriented. Although the similarities, the organisation culture in the two libraries differs in many ways. My conclusion is that the specific context of history and the driving force of change, are of great importance to the organisation culture. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The aim of this Master’s thesis is to examine how librarians in a Swedish public library view and discuss mediation of fiction. The questions posed in this study are: How do the librarians want to work with mediation of fiction? What type of literature should be provided according to them? How do they express that they relate and should relate to their users? The theoretical starting-points are three categories extracted from Jofrid Karner Smidt’s doctor’s dissertation Mellom elite og publikum: the approach to users, strategies for mediation, and ideals for mediation. The empirical material was gathered through focus group interviews with librarians in a public library. This material was analyzed using the categories above. The results show that the librarians manifest a traditional view on mediation of fiction and the strategies used for mediation. The user group primarily discussed consists of readers of popular literature who are considered in need of help and guidance. The librarians have an ambition to improve the literary preferences of these users to what the librarians consider high quality literature. In contrast, they express a fear to be looked upon as condemning and therefore tend to suppress their personal literary views. The study poses questions about high versus low literary quality and whose needs should be addressed considering mediation of fiction. The result shows that the librarians focus solely on one of many user groups and therefore risk excluding other user groups. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The purpose of this master’s thesis is to examine what needs and expectations the patrons have on the local public library services for adult students. With increased knowledge of these matters the library will be able to support and improve the service for users. The focus is on adult students with immigrant background who study Swedish as second language in a municipal adult education school. The main questions are: How do adult students use the library at present? What do they consider to be most important when using the public library for their studies? How do these expectations correspond to their experience of the library services? Two focusgroups and one in-depth interview were carried out. Bo Edvardsson’s service quality model where four cooperating criteria decide the customers’ total experience of services is used. The model is based on theories in the Service Management research field. The results of the study show that the respondents most of all want staff to be available at all times. They also want staff to be patient, keen on listening, and to take the time to listen for the patrons’ true need and help them find the right media that suit the patrons’ interest and language level. But more urgent for the libraries to develop is assistance to school assignments and language studies, according to the result of the study. The study also shows that formal and informal learning often coexists at this level of studies. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The aim of this master's thesis is to examine whether librarians working in public libraries see fiction as a source of knowledge, and what role this plays in the educational mission of the public library. This investigation, which consists of a literary study and an empirical section, shows that the concept of phronesis denotes practical wisdom and moral thinking, and that it can be applied to that form of knowledge to which reading can contribute. An important issue in this context is the reader's motivation to learn. The interviews show that librarians see literature as a source from which knowledge can be drawn. When they mediate literature, they believe that they are conveying something of value and they set great store in mediating literature which could have a not inconsiderable import to the borrowers. However, they do not naturally consider what they do as mediating knowledge. The literary studies and the empirical research show that there is a strong connection between the concept of adult education and literature, while the term lifelong learning is now used by people working in public libraries instead of adult education. The concept of lifelong learning connects the informants primarily with work that is directed to adults who are studying. This causes uncertainty as to whether they are actually working with adult education at all. However, public librarians mediate in a way that is considered to be a part of the tradition in adult education. They have a down-up perspective that includes respect for and belief in the abilities of the individual. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The main purpose of this Master thesis is to illuminate the understanding of local politicians regarding the public libraries and the librarians. We argue that the local politicians´ opinions regarding public libraries and librarians influence the way they act and react in their roles as politicians.In order to achieve the aim of this thesis we focused on following questions:What are the opinions of the politicians:- regarding themselves in relation to the public library?- concerning public libraries in general and its functions especially in the municipalities of their own?- concerning the librarians and their work in a public function?What are the conclusions to be drawn regarding the politicians´ interest and commitment to public libraries in the politic daily-life of the municipalities? Our empiric material consists of qualitative interviews with six politicians elected in two municipalities in the interior of Västerbotten, a northern sparsely populated district. In order to distinguish the various opinions that emerge from the material, we apply a phenomenographic approach. The analysis result we present in three conceivable categories in order to express the different opinions.In general our study points at a positive and favourable attitude to the public library, and all the respondents assume that the municipality ought to offer this service. In spite of these facts the local politicians show a low commitment to the library service they have the responsibility to decide on. / Uppsatsnivå: D

This thesis is about the bookmobile service in Sweden of today. The purpose is to examine how the staff motivate the existence of the bookmobile. Other purposes are to study the goals of the service, to describe “daily life” of the bookmobile, examine the changes of the service during the years and discuss possible changes in the future. The study is based on interviews with thirteen staff members from six Swedish communities, of both rural and urban character. The chosen theories are based on an organization theory and a theory about different roles of a public library. The study shows that one distinguishing characteristic of the bookmobile service is its social emphasis. It also shows that the bookmobile’s basic function is to give library service in the form of book borrowing. The activity with bookmobiles justifies on the basis of democracy aspects. The goals are usually informal and have been created by the staff members’ specific work procedures that have been established through the years. This organizational culture influences the service of the bookmobile. One conclusion is that it is desirable that the objective of the bookmobile service will be written and also specified in some way. Another conclusion is that in order to secure its future, the bookmobile needs to develop. In the future the bookmobile service possibly will decrease due to changes within the structure of the population or other reasons. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The purpose of this Master’s thesis is to examine and analyze the discourse concerning a new public library in Stockholm. The paper further discusses how this discourse corresponds with what is written about public libraries in a number of national and international documents. To do this I have utilized the discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe. By using some of their instruments I have established the discourse around a number of keywords. I then use these keywords to see if and how they appear in the documents. My conclusion is that this discourse is concerned with the library as a center of knowledge and that the individual user is of particular interest. By comparing the discourse with what is sad in the documents I found many similarities. The documents portray the public library as a center of knowledge as well, but they also put forward there quality as a cultural center. Further the documents do not show the same interest in the individual user. Hence the discourse concerning the new public library in Stockholm points to a somewhat different view on the role of the public library. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The aim of this thesis is to study how the recent introduction of video games in Swedish public libraries compares to past introductions of other medias, namely music records, sequential art, manga (Japanese comics), and films on video. In what ways does the introduction of video games differ from the other examples of introductions and in what ways are they alike? In what manner have the medias been introduced? How does the librarians views on video games differ from their views on other medias? The purpose of doing this is that by investigating how new medias have been evaluated in the past, we might gain an understanding of how the introduction of video games links into that tradition. Theoretically, this thesis is grounded in Sanna Talja’s theory of the interpretative repertoires of the music library. Qualitative interviews have been used as the basic method alongside content analysis. The results show that some of the historical “new” medias were debated for some time at the time of their introduction, whilst others gained more immediate acceptance. The difference seems to lie in whether there previously existed a similar media in the public library. We call the first category “debated introduction” and the second “introduction of similarity”.Video games can be considered as belonging to the second category. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The purpose of this Master’s thesis is to examine what role the new city library in Halmstad has for its users. The questions posed in this study are: What do the users actually do at the library? What roles are the most significant according to the users? Have the politicians succeeded in their intention of realizing a modern library according to the users? The theoretical starting point is Andersson’s and Skot-Hansen’s theory of four different roles of public libraries. In order to extend the model we added a fifth function; the one of aesthetical experience. We used a qualitative method and received 504 questionnaires. The empirical data indicates that the most important role is the one as cultural centre, i.e. traditional use of the library as borrowing of books and other media, reading newspapers and magazines and so forth. The roles of knowledge centre, information centre, social centre and the aesthetical function are also important to the users. Our conclusions are that the original idea of realizing a modern library has been a great success. / Uppsatsnivå: D

The aim of this master’s thesis is to examine how managers in some public libraries are using performance measurements and to what extent decision making is based on the results. The main questions posed are:•What performance measurements and indicators are used in the libraries examined?•What is the attitude towards performance measurements among library managers?•How and to what extent are performance measurements and indicators used in the process of decision making?•What improvement would library managers wish regarding the development of performance measurements in public libraries?The theory is based on a model of evaluation of the public sector in addition to general steps of evaluation of quality and performance measurement results. The investigation is based on qualitative interviews with seven managers of public libraries in Sweden. The analysis has shown that even though the managers consider performance measurements important, they find them problematic to apply. Setting clearly definable goals is difficult. The mission of the library consists of a number of goals that have to be adhered to. Major goals are often vague. Favouring one goal might mean neglecting another. Relevant measures cannot be applied without defined goals, and without measures quality and performance assessment becomes impossible. Consequently, abstract goals have to be split and transformed into manageable goals, and the goals transformed into measurable ones. The measures used by the managers in this study could largely be categorized as measures of input and output, but no measure of outcome is used. To assess to what extent the library contributes to user need and community goals, outcome measurements could be an important and useful tool. / Uppsatsnivå: D