The aim of this diploma thesis is a qualitative analysis of a media dialogical network's extract regarding chemical attack in Syria on 21st August 2013. In spite of the fact that main social participant in the subsequent international conflict, representatives of United States of America and Syria, president Obama, Secretary of State Kerry on one side and president Assad on the other side, have never actually met face to face, mass media interconnected their reactions into a coherent dialogue between west and east civilization and they accepted it as a part of intercultural negotiation of different meanings and interpretations of reality within a global mass media discourse. Methodological apparatus of conversation analysis and membership categorization analysis provides a tool to observe sequential and categorization aspects of a dynamic intertextual process of specification and respecification of the core cultural and political values in context. Thanks to the term structured immediacy it was also possible to consider sequential ordering of antecendents of the event in historical continuum. This analysis is based on ethnomethodological research of social interaction in mass media and is inspired by articles of J. Nekvapil und I. Leudar, which were dedicated to the analysis of intercultural...

This diploma thesis deals with a crystallization of the political affair in Czech Social Democratic Party concerning lying of the politician M. Hašek and his colleagues about their meeting with the president after parliamentary election in autumn 2013. The qualitative analysis of mass media texts is based on the term media dialogical network, which was developed by J. Nekvapil and I. Leudar. In their latest publications they combined it with the apparatus of membership categorization analysis and the term structured immediacy. The membership categorization analysis enables me to take into consideration besides sequential aspects of social interaction also participants' categorization practices and thank to the term structured immediacy I could focus on how participants treat historical meanings in their statements. The second important aim of this thesis is to innovate the term media dialogical network as a viable approach to the intertextuality analysis of mass media communication in the new media environment. The fact, that the call for resignation of party's leader was linked to the secret meeting with the president after the election, resulted in the interpretation of the event as a coup against party's leader B. Sobotka. The politicians accused of coup organization defended themselves against...

Syftet med denna studie är att visa hur skolorganisation, skolledning och skolledaridentiteter produceras, formas och omformas i samtalad interaktion samt att visa vilka diskursiva metoder som de samtalande använder för att bygga upp sina begrepp och kategorier och samtidigt göra dem socialt acceptabla i sitt sammanhang. Jag har tagit teoretisk och analytisk utgångspunkt i etnometodologi, socialkonstruktionism och kategoriseringsanalys. Det empiriska materialet består av inspelade ledningsgruppsmöten, som transkriberats noggrant, från en grundskola och två gymnasieskolor, samt intervjuer med tre skolledare. De empiriska studierna presenteras i fyra delstudier, där delstudie I visar hur intervjuare och intervjuad gemensamt bygger upp relevanta ategorier med hjälp av bland annat tidsbegrepp. I delstudie II analyseras hur skolledare i ett arbetslagsledarmöte gemensamt skapar den lokalt producerade organisationen-i-handling. Delstudie III fokuserar hur citeringar av sig själv och andra används i mötessamtal för att forma kategorier och delstudie IV inriktas mot att se hur deltagarna i de probleminriktade samtalen orienterar emot teamet och hur ’vi’ som grupp formas. I samtliga delstudier fokuseras hur kategoriserandet samtidigt är identitetsskapande. De samtalande framställer sig själva som bland annat problemlösare, nytänkare, förändrare och annorlunda än ’de andra’. Kategoriseringsarbete har visat sig ha stor betydelse för interaktionen och identitetsarbete är en viktig del av det som sker i mötessamtal. Skolledning framstår som bland annat gemensamt producerat och inte enbart som ett heroiskt ensamarbete. Tal och samtal kan beskrivas som en viktig del av och i ledningsarbetet. / The aim of this study is to show how school organization, school leadership and school leader identities are produced, formulated and transformed in talkin-interaction, and to show methods members use to build concepts and categories making them socially acceptable, in situ. My theoretical points of departure and analytical tools are ethnomethodology, social constructionism and membership categorization analysis. The empirical material consists of recorded talk sequences at regular meetings of school management teams, transcribed in detail, at one primary school and two secondary schools, and interviews with three assistant principals. The analysis of the empirical material is presented in four studies. tudy I shows how the interviewer and interviewee jointly construct relevant categories, using temporal terms as well as other resources. Study II analyzes how school leaders at a team meeting collectively create the organization-in-action. The focus of study III is on how team members use reported speech to produce categories, while study IV is oriented towards how we as a team is produced. All studies focus on categorization work as identity work. The team members and the interviewees give attributes to and make categorizations of themselves and others in order to produce themselves as problem-solvers, innovative, progressive and different. Categorization work has proven highly significant in the interaction, and identity work is an important component of the actions accomplished in the analyzed meetings. School leadership is not produced as a lone heroic effort, but rather as something created by members in interaction. Talk-in-interaction can be described as an important part of and in leadership work.

Over the past twenty years, the idea that planning and development practices should be ‘sustainable’ has become a key tenet of discourses characterising the field of planning and development. As part of the agenda to balance and integrate economic, environmental and social interests, democratic participatory governance arrangements are frequently purported to be necessary to achieve ‘sustainable development’ at both local and global levels. Despite the theoretical disjuncture between ideas of democratic civic participation, on the one hand, and civic participation as a means to achieve pre-determined sustainability goals on the other, notions of civic participation for sustainability have become integral features of sustainable development discourses. Underpinned by a conceptual and methodological intent to perform an epistemological ‘break’ with notions of civic participation for sustainability, this thesis explicates how citizens are enrolled in the sustainable development agenda in the discourse of policy. More specifically, it examines how assumptions about civic participation in sustainable development policy discourses operate, and unpacks some discursive strategies through which policy language ‘enrols’ citizens in the same set of assumptions around their normative requirement for participation in sustainable development. Focussing in on a case study sustainable development policy document – a draft regional plan representing a case of ‘enrolling the citizen in sustainability’ - it employs three sociological perspectives/methods that progressively highlight some of the ways that the policy language enjoins citizens as active participants in ‘sustainable’ regional planning. As a thesis-by-publication, the application of each perspective/method is reported in the form of an article prepared for publication in an academic journal. In a departure from common-sense understandings of civic participation for sustainability, the first article examines the governmentality of sustainable development policy. Specifically, this article explores how civic community – particularly community rights and responsibilities – are deployed in the policy discourse as techniques of government that shape and regulate the conduct of subjects. In this respect, rather than seeing civic community as a specific ‘thing’ and participation as corresponding to particular types of ‘activities’, this paper demonstrates how notions of civic participation are constructed and mobilised in the language of sustainable development policy in ways that facilitate government ‘at a distance’. The second article begs another kind of question of the policy – one concerned more specifically with how the everyday practices of subjects become aligned with the principles of sustainable development. This paper, therefore, investigates the role of pedagogy in establishing governance relations in which citizens are called to participate as part of the problematic of sustainability. The analysis suggests that viewing the case study policy in terms of relationships of informal pedagogy provided insights into the positioning of the citizen as an ‘acquirer’ of sustainability principles. In this instance, the pedagogic values of the text provide for low levels of discretion in how citizens could position themselves in the moral order of the discourse. This results in a strong injunction for citizens to subscribe to sustainability principles in a participatory spirit coupled with the requirement for citizens to delegate to the experts to carry out these principles. The third article represents a further breakdown of the ways in which citizens become enrolled in ‘sustainable’ regional planning within the language of the case study policy. Applying an ethnomethodological perspective, specifically Membership Categorization Analysis, this article examines the way ‘the citizen’ and ‘civic values and obligations’ are produced in the interactional context of the text. This study shows how the generation of a substantive moral order that ties the citizen to sustainable values and obligations with respect to the region, is underpinned by a normative morality associated with the production of orderliness in ‘text-in-interaction’. As such, it demonstrates how the production and positioning of ‘the citizen’ in relation to the institutional authors of the policy, and the region more generally, are practical accomplishments that orient the reader to identify him/herself as a ‘citizen’ and embrace the ‘civic values and obligations’ to which he/she is bound. Together, the different conceptual and methodological approaches applied in the thesis provide a more holistic picture of the different ways in which citizens are discursively enrolled in the sustainability agenda. At the substantive level, each analysis reveals a different dimension of how the active citizen is mobilised as a responsible agent for sustainable development. In this respect, civic participation for sustainability is actualised and reproduced through the realms of language, not necessarily through applied occasions of civic participation in the ‘taken-for-granted’ sense. Furthermore, at the conceptual and methodological level, the thesis makes a significant contribution to sociological inquiry into relationships of governance. Rather than residing within the boundaries of a specific sociological perspective, it shows how different approaches that would traditionally be applied in a mutually exclusive manner, can complement each other to advance understanding of how governance discourses operate. In this respect, it provides a rigorous conceptual and methodological platform for further investigations into how citizens become enrolled in programmes of government.

This thesis studies how sick leave legitimacy is managed in interaction and develops an empirically driven conceptualization of ‘legitimacy work’. The thesis applies an ethnomethodological framework that draws on conversation analysis, discursive psychology, and membership categorization analysis. Naturally occurring interaction is examined in two settings: (1) multi-party meetings at the Swedish Social Insurance Agency, in which participants assess and discuss the ‘status’ of the sick leave and plan for work rehabilitation; (2) peer-based online text-in-interaction in a Swedish forum thread that gathers people on sick leave. The thesis shows how mental states, activities and alternative categories function as resources for legitimacy work. However, such invocations are no straight-forward matter, but impose additional contingencies. It is thus crucial how they are invoked. By detailed analyses of the interaction, with attention to aspects such as lexicality and delivery, the thesis identifies a range of discursive features that manage sick leave legitimacy. Deployed resources are also subtle enough to be deniable as legitimacy work, that is, they also manage the risk of an utterance being seen as invested or biased. While legitimate sick leave is a core concern for Swedish policy-making, administration, and public debate on sick leave, previous research has for the most part been explanatory in orientation, minding legitimacy rather than studying it in its own right. By providing detailed knowledge about the legitimacy work that people on long-term sick leave do as part of both institutional and mundane encounters, the thesis contributes not only new empirical knowledge, but a new kind of empirical knowledge, shedding light on how the complexities of sick leave play out in real-life situations. Traditional sociological approaches have to a significant extent treated legitimacy as an entity with beginnings and ends that in more or less direct ways relate to external norms and cognitive states, or that focus on institutions, authority or government. By contrast, the herein emerging concept ‘legitimacy work’ understands legitimacy as a locally contingent practicality – a collaborative categorially oriented accomplishment that is integral to the interactional situation.

Länge har det funnits en föreställning om att den rasism som riktas mot öst- och sydostasiater är en ”positiv” sådan, eller så har asiater helt enkelt varit frånvarande i anti-rasistiska diskurser. I samband med covid-19 eskalerade hatbrott mot asiater, vilket synliggjorde anti-asiatisk rasism som ett aktuellt samhällsproblem som alltid funnits. I denna uppsats undersöks hur öst- och sydostasiater representeras diskursivt i det svenska internetforumet Flashback i syfte att öka medvetenhet om rasism mot asiater och vidare bidra till att motarbeta de kvarstående ojämlikheterna mellan olika etniska grupper. Studien tar avstamp i ett konstruktivistiskt perspektiv på språk och diskriminering och den kritiska diskursanalysen (CDA) som övergripande analysramverk. Sammanlagt 22 diskussionstrådar som behandlar ämnen som Asien, asiat och de östasiatiska nationerna har analyserats med hjälp av Membership Categorization Analysis (MCA) och den diskurshistoriska analysen (DHA).   Undersökningen utgörs av tre delstudier som ska belysa tre olika aspekter av diskriminering av asiater: 1) kategorisering av asiater; 2) de diskursiva strategier som används av skribenterna för att förneka och rättfärdiga nedsättande kommentarer; 3) diskussioner om den så kallade ”guling-humorn”, det vill säga de rasstereotypiska framställningarna av asiater som präglas av humor och komik. Resultatet visar bland annat hur kategorin asiat tillskrivs högst motsägelsefulla egenskaper och förväntningar, och att kontexten spelar en avgörande roll för att interaktionsdeltagarna ska kunna välja ut de mest relevanta föreställningarna om asiater. Detta påvisar att diskrimineringen av asiater inte enbart är ”positiv” utan kategorin kan ofta förknippas med tydligt negativa värderingar i olika sammanhang. Den andra delstudien har sedan belyst att olika diskursiva strategier kan användas beroende på två sammanhang: när rasism som sådan förnekas och när de enskilda nedvärderande kommentarerna riktade mot asiater rättfärdigas. Förnekandet av rasism förekommer främst i de diskussionsämne som har direkt koppling till det svenska samhället såsom mångkulturalism och invandring, medan nedsättande kommentarer om östasiater framträder mer frekvent i de trådar där de enskilda östasiatiska nationerna står i fokus. I den sista delstudien identifieras de olika diskursiva strategier som skribenterna använder för att förneka den kränkande aspekten hos ”humoristiska” karikatyrer av östasiater, vilket bidrar till att bevara Sveriges positiva självbild som världens mest toleranta och antirasistiska samhälle.

Denna uppsats bidrar till forskningen om social och språklig kategorisering i interaktion genom att undersöka kategoriseringsmetoder i serviceinteraktioner. Uppsatsen undersöker vilka metoder personal, kunder och personal och kunder tillsammans använder sig av för att identifiera kunderna som pensionärer i samband med rabatt, samt vilka metoder som används för att hantera aspekter av kategoriseringen pensionär som inte har med serviceärendet i sig att göra. Teoretiskt och metodologiskt bygger undersökningen på Conversation Analysis (CA), Membership Categorization Analysis (MCA) och multimodal interaktionsanalys. Studiens data består av 18 videoinspelade, transkriberade samtal vid teaterkassor. I studien identifieras och analyseras tre metoder för kategorisering: alternativa kategorier, överlämnande självkategorisering och retrospektiv nyansering. Analysen av metoderna visar bland annat att olika typer av deltagare behandlar olika aspekter av kategoriseringen som olika känsliga och olika relevanta, att deltagarna orienterar sig mot kategoriseringen som ett gemensamt projekt och att det vid vissa skeden i de i för övrigt målfokuserade servicesamtalen finns utrymme för kunder som kategoriserats som pensionärer att ge uttryck för personliga nyanseringar och positioneringar i förhållande till kategorin pensionär.

Le travail identitaire (TI) réfère aux actions par lesquelles des personnes (re)créent, présentent, précisent et préservent les constructions qui donnent un sens cohérent et distinct au soi. À cet égard, notre objectif de recherche était d’exposer les nuances de ce travail discursif à l’œuvre dans la conversation in situ, considérant que cela est encore aujourd’hui un des « chaînons manquants » à la littérature sur le TI. La dynamique conversationnelle qui a trop souvent été négligée lors de l’étude du TI est ici mise en exergue. Nous y portons une attention particulière grâce à notre approche basée sur la théorie sociale de George Herbert Mead et les concepts de l’analyse de conversation mobilisés pour l’observation des discussions guidées du Programme de leadership intermédiaire des Forces armées canadiennes (FAC). L’approche de recherche que nous privilégions nous a permis d’illustrer empiriquement différents aspects du TI dans la conversation in situ. Nous avons noté un TI tacite (non verbal) au fil des échanges entre leaders seniors des FAC, à savoir entre les personnes qui prenaient part aux discussions guidées que nous avons analysées. Nous avons surtout examiné leur TI verbal et explicite par l’entremise de leurs prises de parole. Notre examen montre que le conformisme du « moi » prévaut lors du TI, sans toutefois totalement éclipser la part d’individualité aussi à l’œuvre lors de ce travail. Malgré la forte identification à l’institution des FAC, nos analyses donnent à voir que ses membres profitent d’un certain espace discursif où ils peuvent mettre en valeur leurs particularités. Notre analyse le met en lumière et montre de plus qu’il y a un travail collectif qui s’opère à l’égard du TI comme leader et stagiaire. C’est à travers la convergence et la divergence des orientations que cet aspect collectif du TI a pu être observé, un travail collectif favorisant une certaine conscience de soi. / Identity work refers to actions by which people (re)create, present, specify and sustain constructions that are productive of a coherent and distinct sense of self. In this regard, our aim was to display the nuances of this discursive work within naturally occurring conversations, considering this is still one of the “blind spot” of the literature on identity work. Conversation dynamics, which have too often been overlooked in studies of identity work, were therefore closely examined. Our approach combines George Herbert Mead’s theory and conversation analysis concepts in the review of guided discussions held during the Intermediate leadership program of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF). This combination actually enabled us to empirically describe various aspects of identity work in exchanges between senior CAF leaders. Tacit (nonverbal) identity work, as we have coined it, was certainly occurring throughout the guided discussions we studied. However, given our approach, we mainly examined the verbal and explicit identity work, through talk-in-action. In terms of actions, including what was invoked, our analysis shows that the “Me” and its conventions, as Mead conceived it, prevailed during our participants’ identity work. It did not totally overshadow the part of individuality, or the “I”, also at play during their work. Despite their strong identification with the CAF institution, the participants negociated a discursive space where they could highlight their particularities. Our analysis underlines it and shows that there was a collective work taking place in their identity work as leaders. It is through converging and diverging orientations that the collective aspect of their work was made visible, a collective work which also promoted self-consciousness.

Fans and fandoms are ever more salient aspects of our everyday lives offline and linked to the Internet's growing influence also online, particularly on social media. While fans have generally been pathologized via mass media but also early academic representations especially prior to the founding of the interdisciplinary Fan Studies in the 1970s/1980s, which sought to actively counter negative fan representations and foreground fans' creative productivity, nowadays, even though many types of fans have been 'mainstreamed' and are generally accepted, specific fan types are still systematically discriminated against - even within Fan Studies - along the lines of socio-demographic variables. These marginalised fans are predominantly female, young, queer and non-white. Moreover, even though Fan Studies define fan identity as one of their focal concerns, linguistic research on fan identity, particularly regarding its narrative and interactive construction, has widely been neglected. However, as narrative interaction and specifically small stories (as propsed within the small story paradigm by Bamberg & Georgakopoulou, 2007/8) have been found to play a very important role in the construction of identity, the investigation of how fan identity is constructed via small stories and - given the centrality of collective fandoms for fans - specifically shared (group) stories can severely contribute to fan (identity) research. Thus, combining decidedly linguistic research on narrative fan identity construction and the inclusion of previously marginalised fan communities, this thesis focuses on the construction of fan identity of Taylor Swift fans (Swifties) - a predominantly female and young fandom that has been ridiculed by mass media and dominant discourses - via shared stories. More specifically this study analyses the construction of Swiftie fan identity via shared stories both online in nicknames on Tumblr and Twitter and face to face in the form of a positioning analysis investigating the interactions of a Zoom focus group made up of five German Swifties. This research finds that within Swiftie nicknames Swiftie fan identity is centrally constructed by means of variously highly condensed, combined and/or personalised references (to shared stories of the overarching Swiftie community). The focus group interactions then reveal various positioning practices that are strongly intertwined with (often) more elaborate shared stories, which are 'shared' by the Swiftie participants both with regards to experiences on the story level and their interactive co-construction on the level of interaction. Despite their diverging local manifestations both within the investigated Swiftie nicknames and focus group interactions shared stories are centrally utilised to construct and communicate Swiftie fan identity as a particularly collectively experienced and defined ingroup identity that confers belonging and further functions as a shield against outgroup discrimination. Further research should then enlarge the present investigative focus to include also other online platforms and fan communicative acts, supplementary and also offline implemented focus groups and field studies, more heterogenous participants with regard to often neglected socio-demographic variables (next to age and gender) as well as other (marginalised) fandoms outside of the Swiftie community.