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More-opened hours is a fast-growing service at public libraries in Sweden. The aim of this thesis is to examine how this new operations impacts the profession. How are the attitudes of the emplyoees affected? What are the consequences for the daily work of librarians? How may more-opened hours transform the future of the profession? These questions will be adressed by examining public libraries and combined public- and school libraries in the north of Sweden. The theoretical point of departure consists of profession theory, in particular Andrew Abbott’s theories and the notion of ”jurisdiction”. The theoretical framework is supplemented by Anders Ørom’s ideal librarian identities. A mixed method of survey and interview is applied. The data from each approach is analyzed separately and subsequently pooled, by means of applied thematic analysis. The result of the study shows that a vast majority of the librarians hold a positive attitude toward more-opened hours. This is found to be closely related to a user-perspective. Overall, librarians’ work is not dramatically changed, but certain routine tasks like book handling and tidying have increased. A new librarian identity, the Attendant (Funktionären), is suggested for maintanance tasks surrounding the more-opened service. Such a developement risks limiting the librarian’s professional jurisdiction and lead to deprofessionalization. However, the more-opened service may also support professionalization by relocating resources and competence from self-service tasks to more visible and qualified work. Additionally, more-opened hours may generate new areas for professional expansion, such as Library on demand and the field of statistics. Lastly, the results tentatively suggest that more-opened hours might play a part in interprofessional competition and a strenghtening of borders to the school. In conclusion, the impacts are complex but they offer much potential. This is a two years master’s thesis in Library and Information Science.

In this thesis i describe proposals designed to give remaining species a temporary haven until their natural habitat is reestablished.  Designing for decay is about alternative methods for nature conservation, about us working with the forest not against it. Methods based on decaying wood and the reintroduction of fungi into the young boreal forest. Looking at the planetary boundaries as summarized by Stockholm resilience center biosphere integrity is one of the areas where the anthropogenic factors has made the largest impact.

This thesis explores the concept of ‘feral’ while speculating possible futures of more-than-human interactions in urban environments. Feral in this project is described as living and non-living entities that are uncontrollable, unintentional, situated and dethatched from humans. The aim of this thesis to implement more-than-human theory and concepts into design practice to expand the design space of non-anthropocentric design. A speculative design approach is used to question and alter the status quo of power relations within more-than-human interactions through its experimental and critical nature (Bardzell, Bardzell and Koefoed Hansen, 2015; Dunne and Raby, 2013). Further, a series of methods, approaches and speculative fabulations (Haraway, 2016) are proposed that tell stories of possible worlds and act as a catalyst for moving more-than-human theory beyond concepts towards design practice.

Descriptive menu labels are omnipresent elements in restaurant menus. Food service operations often use sensory, nostalgic, and brand descriptions to signal a customer's food-specific perceptions. Extant research has shown links between descriptive menu labels and food taste/enjoyment perceptions. To extend and expand the extant literature, this dissertation proposes that descriptive menu labels can be viewed as an anthropomorphizing factor, leading to different magnitudes of consumption-related attitudes and behavioral intentions in a restaurant. Drawing from metaphoric transfer theory and social impression models, the present research study suggests that descriptive labels in a restaurant transmit metaphors that influence consumers' impending warmth and competence perceptions of a restaurant. This dissertation also investigates the potential inversed magnitudes of anticipated satisfaction and willingness-to-pay-more driven by warmth/competence. In this empirical study, descriptive menu labels were experimentally manipulated. Consumers' warmth-related and competence-related service impressions, anticipated satisfaction, and willingness-to-pay-more more were measured. The empirical investigation comprised two pretests and one main study. The hypotheses were tested in two menu contexts (an entrée menu vs. a dessert menu). Overall, the results suggest that customers view a restaurant with sensory- and nostalgia-triggering descriptions as offering warmer impending services (i.e., with kindness, generosity, and understanding) compared to a restaurant with general descriptions. On the other hand, customers view a restaurant that utilizes brand-related descriptions as providing more competent and skilled impending services than a restaurant that utilizes general descriptions. In addition, the findings suggest that consumers' warmth impressions serve a more important role in their anticipated satisfaction than do their competence impressions; however, regarding willingness-to-pay-more, competence impressions factor more significantly than do warmth impressions. The replications of the results across the two menu contexts showed the robustness of the findings; however, there was a different pattern observed for the effects of sensory labels on consumers' warmth-related impressions in the dessert menu selection context. This dissertation contributes to emerging streams of menu labeling and service management literature. The findings presented in this dissertation have both theoretical and managerial implications for the food service industry. / Ph. D.

in two volumes.

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For the past decade, Sweden has been reinforced as a multicultural society, and immigrant integration policy has been a hotly debated topic. During the election campaigns in 2022, preschool was an important political issue, the government arguing that early interventions can be the key to the successful integration of immigrants. Subsequent amendments to the Education Act, which entered into force on 1 July 2023, require all municipalities to actively promote increased participation in preschool by means of different methods. The municipalities must provide information to parents and legal guardians and offer preschool enrollment to children who need learning Swedish, without the parents or legal guardians applying for it. The outreach activities are aimed at children who are not currently enrolled in preschool but who are entitled to be. The purpose of the present thesis is to investigate the experiences among preschool staff of the requirement to take active measures to offer preschool enrollment to the children of foreign-born parents. Through a qualitative approach with semi-structured interviews and a street level bureaucrats theoretical perspective, the study has focused on two municipalities which have charged preschool staff with the aforementioned task. With the analytical terms street level bureaucrats and discretion, it has been possible to investigate how the policy is implemented and how the preschool staff feels about being a fellow human being as well as an agent for a government authority. The results of the study indicate a consensus among preschool staff that they understand the purpose of, and need for, active measures, and their good intentions and ambitions are visible, despite being insufficiently prepared for the task by their employers.

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No description available.