Ongoing global health inequities have been amplified since the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent social movements. Such inequities have resulted in increased literature critiquing the historical roots and current practices in global health. From this literature, questions have emerged about the future of global health and Canada’s role in this future. However, there is little research consolidating existing critiques and, based on these critiques, exploring adolescent sexual and reproductive health (ASRH) research and the role of Canadian funding for ASRH. The aim of this dissertation is to consolidate contemporary critiques of global health to develop a conceptual framework for one potential imagined future for global health. It then explores the conceptual framework for an imagined future through an example of global health research, policy, and practice, as it relates to ASRH in Eastern sub-Saharan Africa, to consider the opportunities and challenges of achieving this new potential vision. In this dissertation, I present four unique contributions. The first article presents the conceptual framework for an imagined future that will be used to explore ASRH research, policy, and practice. The second article presents findings from a scoping review on adolescent engagement in ASRH research. The third article presents a review of Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy (FIAP) and examines the development of the policy in relation to an imagined future. The fourth article presents a qualitative description of stakeholder perspectives who are implementing ASRH projects with Canadian funding and discusses these perspectives in relation to an imagined future. Conclusions suggest that language to support changes towards an imagined future in global health exists although there is continued opportunity to operationalize the changes. Further research is encouraged to engage local actors and consider practical ways to shift towards equity and justice in Canadian funding for ASRH. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / There is growing controversy in the field of global health and it is not yet clear how the field will respond and evolve. As the number of critiques grow, responding with new ideas for the future of global health becomes more urgent and yet more difficult. This thesis aimed to address this challenge by examining what an imagined future for global health research, policy, and practice might be, and how it might be achieved. This research focuses on the future of global health and Canada’s role in it, particularly regarding adolescent sexual and reproductive health (ASRH) in Eastern sub-Saharan Africa. By reviewing documents and conducting qualitative interviews, this study explores adolescent involvement in ASRH research, Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy (FIAP) and stakeholder experiences implementing ASRH projects with Canadian funding. Findings emphasize the need for concrete actions to implement the changes proposed by scholars. Further research is encouraged to engage local actors and consider practical ways forward for shifts towards equity and justice in Canadian funding.

Idag finns en oro för att människor som spelar och pratar med andra online är ensamma och att det hämmar deras sociala liv. För att utforska detta undersöker denna studie hur de människor själv ser på den tid de spenderar online och de människor de möter där. Hur gemenskap skapas online på kommunikationsplattformen Discord och vilken roll den gemenskapen spelar i medlemmarnas sociala liv. De teoretiska verktygen som används för att besvara detta är Andersons imagined communities (2016) samt Faraj och Johnssons teorier om reciprocitet online (2011). Empirin samlades in genom etnografiska metoder som netnografi, deltagande observation och semistrukturerade intervjuer med medlemmar i en Discordserver. Resultaten visar att gemenskaper online möjliggörs och skapas genom medlemmars reciprocitet och skapande av sociala band, teknikens utveckling och aktiva medlemmar somhåller samman gruppen.

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This dissertation argues that in the 1960s and 1970s, a variety of Americans, including television and film producers, journalists, rock `n' roll fans, novelists, counterculturists, presidential candidates, and George Wallace supporters, looked to an imagined rural white South as a repository of supposedly discarded values. In the shadow of the civil rights movement and the South's increasing modernization, these individuals often perceived such "southern" traits as family-centeredness, closeness to the land, common-sense thinking, manliness, pre-modernity, and authenticity as both a welcome refuge from and an antidote to concerns about "rootlessness" in U.S. society. This sense of rootlessness was grounded in the vague belief that Americans had lost touch with cultural traditionalism. It combined contemporary anxieties about social unrest and government deceit with longer standing worries about suburban blandness, the shift from producerism to consumerism, social anomie, and the increasingly technocratic nature of modern America. My work traces the allure of the rural white South by detailing the region during the 1960s civil rights movement; country-rock music and the South in the countercultural consciousness; the Masculine South(s) of George Wallace, the novel and film Deliverance (1970, 1972), and the film Walking Tall (1973); the contrasting southernness of Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Allman Brothers Band; and the appeal of Jimmy Carter's "healing" southernness during the 1976 presidential campaign. This study expands the scope of historians' recent investigations into the South's burgeoning influence in national politics and culture. It directs a much-needed focus to Americans' perceptions of rural white southernness, and more specifically, to how they formed and utilized these understandings, and what this information reveals about U.S. society and culture. In addition to emphasizing the malleability of race and the southland's image in national discussions, this dissertation underscores the imagined South's role as a safe area of contemplation in which Americans could address their conflicted thinking about a variety of national trends, from changing gender roles to evolving family structures to consumer culture, without ever having to resolve any incongruities. Finally, this work employs a new angle for integrating southern history into the national narrative while paying attention to the ways in which post-World War II Americans continued to cling to the idea of southern distinctiveness. / History

Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka hur bibliotekarier upplever tryggheten på sin arbetsplats och hur eventuell otrygghet kan påverka dem. Det är en kvalitativ intervjustudie bestående av semistrukturerade intervjuer för att komma så nära bibliotekariernas personliga erfarenhet som möjligt. Intervjuerna analyseras sedan tematiskt med grund i teorier om imagined victimisation och psykologisk trygghet. Studien visar att bibliotekarierna känner sig trygga, men att det ibland sker händelser som gör dem osäkra och otrygga. Det upptäcks också att det finns viss osäkerhet kring handlingsplaner och vilka åtgärder som kan vidtas vid otrygga händelser.

This paper examines the Army Community Covenant, a formal document intended to strengthen the official and unofficial relationships between U.S. Army posts in the United States with their surrounding civilian communities. Critical Discourse Analysis is applied to trace the genealogy of the verbal and visual constructs and semiotics of the document, from the rhetoric of George Washington that acculturated the Continental Army to the present day, and considering the perspectives of nationalism and familial relationships in the deliberate selection of key terminologies. This research concludes with the recognition of the documents' potential effects, both positive and negative, upon its intended participants and audience, and proposes extensions for further research in the areas of the U.S. Army and army families, as well as the perceptions of identity and struggles for representation that exist. / Master of Arts

This study explores the complexities of public sector communication in Region Stockholm, focusing on the reasons for the communicative decisions made to reach the public. Through qualitative interviews with communication professionals in the organisation, the study investigates the conditions they face, how they conceptualise their audiences (the public), and how this affects their communicative decisions, as well as what the consequences are following these communicative decisions. The study utilises a theoretical framework drawn from the concepts of the Montreal School’s perspective on the communicative constitution of organisation (CCO) and strategic communication, both through the theoretical lens of actor-network theory (ANT). Furthermore, these perspectives are combined with the concept of imagined audience.  This study identifies several conditions that influence both communication professionals’ communicative choices and their conceptualisation of the public. These include organisational structure, economic resources and digital affordances. This in turn shapes a dual perception of the public; as a homogeneous majority public conceptualised in relation to the organisation, possessing attributes such as Swedish-speaking and digital literacy, as well as diverse minority publics requiring tailored communication strategies outside ordinary day-to-day communication activities. Due to limited economic and structural resources, the organisation’s communication professionals tend to prioritise known groups (the general and homogeneous public) leading to the exclusion of the less familiar publics, which can be seen as problematic from a democratic perspective. This study contributes to the understanding of public sector communication through a novel perspective, highlighting the need to understand communication professionals’ perceptions of the public and the conditions in which they operate, with an emphasis on the democratic implications of inclusion and exclusion that follow.

Title: The (imagined) audience of cultural journalism – who’s there? This thesis examines how Swedish cultural journalists imagine their audience and the influence this has on their journalistic content. In light of a digitized media landscape, where new digital platforms have transformed media consumption patterns and increased competition, the audience plays an increasingly important role. In recent years, these developments have sparked debate within the cultural journalistic field in Sweden, regarding its implications on cultural journalism. Drawing upon the field theory of Pierre Bourdieu and commercialization, as well as the theoretical concept of imagined audiences, the study aims to identify the forces shaping the cultural journalists’ imaginaries of their audience and to what extent that influences the content being published in media. Methodologically, the research relies on semi-structured interviews with nine Swedish cultural journalists, to gain insight into how they articulate their imaginaries of their audiences. The findings of the study unveil various imaginaries within the field of cultural journalism in Sweden. While journalists envision culturally interested individuals as their primary audience, there is an aspiration to democratize culture and make their work accessible to all. Some strive for inclusivity, others emphasize the importance of maintaining cultural journalistic ideals. The results indicate that increased demands for commercialization has an impact on the imaginaries of the journalists’ and their content. Moreover, the study offers insight into some of the values, norms and ideals shaping the field of cultural journalism in Sweden.