<p>This thesis describes how social work language practice circulates around the implementation process of an evidence based structured assessment tool – Savry. The purpose is to examine and understand the social workers language practice in a working group that uses this structured assessment tool in their work with youth. The purpose is also to look for dimensions of identity in terms of discourse. The ontological viewpoint is post-structuralism where language is in focus. The theoretical framework is discourse theory based upon the work of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. This theory is used as a basis of the creation of an analytical toolkit which emphasises the concept chains of equivalence and nodal points. The study is based upon qualitative interviews with social workers in a group in the social services for children and youth, who uses the evidenced based structured assessment tool - Savry. The study concerns the structuring around two identities. Theese identities circulate around the nodal point “knowledge” and defines it in two different ways through chains of equivalence. One of the identities equivalates scientific research to the nodal point knowledge, the other equivalates the unique experience to the same nodal point. Theese identities seames to be the result of a hegemonic strategy articulated by one of the two. The purpose of the strategy seams to be the incorporation of as many discursive elements as possible into one dominating discourse. This is also done through the principal exclusion of certain discursive elements, witch is the characterisation of power in discursive theory. The character of the struggle for dominance is not equal. It is instead characterised by the expansion of the chains of equivalence by the scientific knowledge based identity to incorporate discursive elements form other discourses. This is identified as a hegemonic strategy with the purpose of organising consent around the definition of the concept of knowledge and its consequences for social work practice.</p>

This thesis describes how social work language practice circulates around the implementation process of an evidence based structured assessment tool – Savry. The purpose is to examine and understand the social workers language practice in a working group that uses this structured assessment tool in their work with youth. The purpose is also to look for dimensions of identity in terms of discourse. The ontological viewpoint is post-structuralism where language is in focus. The theoretical framework is discourse theory based upon the work of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. This theory is used as a basis of the creation of an analytical toolkit which emphasises the concept chains of equivalence and nodal points. The study is based upon qualitative interviews with social workers in a group in the social services for children and youth, who uses the evidenced based structured assessment tool - Savry. The study concerns the structuring around two identities. Theese identities circulate around the nodal point “knowledge” and defines it in two different ways through chains of equivalence. One of the identities equivalates scientific research to the nodal point knowledge, the other equivalates the unique experience to the same nodal point. Theese identities seames to be the result of a hegemonic strategy articulated by one of the two. The purpose of the strategy seams to be the incorporation of as many discursive elements as possible into one dominating discourse. This is also done through the principal exclusion of certain discursive elements, witch is the characterisation of power in discursive theory. The character of the struggle for dominance is not equal. It is instead characterised by the expansion of the chains of equivalence by the scientific knowledge based identity to incorporate discursive elements form other discourses. This is identified as a hegemonic strategy with the purpose of organising consent around the definition of the concept of knowledge and its consequences for social work practice.

This study seeks to illuminate which understanding of democracy the written U.S. digital news media propagates to its readers, through the lens of the 2016 presidential election. This is done through discourse theory and analysis inspired by Laclau &amp; Mouffes work on nodal points and discursive webs. Other theories involve polyarchy as a definition of democracy as well as rational models for voter participation. Written digital articles related to the 2016 election, chosen through entering keywords related to democracy and voting, from a broad range of larger media houses are used as material for the study. The study found that the discourse created and mediated by the news articles, when taken as a whole, understands democracy as a contest between different demographical groups. Race or ethnicity are the most commonly referenced groups. The election is a battle between the candidates’ personalities to entice “their” specific groups to get out and vote. Policy or political issues are rarely mentioned in the articles. Voter participation is low according to the discourse, but that might not be such a big problem according to the discourse. A larger problem for democracy is corruption, political elitism and a poorly designed electoral system.

In an era when adversarial politics is condemned for either being archaic or right-wing extremism, proposing that incivility can be used to counter existing hegemonies, despite its potential to incite violence, is proposing an unorthodox project. By rejecting foundationalist approaches to the current incivility crisis, this study sees an opportunity for it to act as a populist rapture that defies simple binary categorisation and deconstructs incivility, at an ontological level, to reveal the deep meanings and concealed causes that contrast the grand narrative of hate speech. After an overview in chapter one, the study continues with a theoretical review of literature on incivility, guided by the works of radical democracy theorists who universalise what seems particular to Kenya. This review is followed by the description of Bakhtin’s concept of carnivalesque as utani, a joking relationship common in East Africa. For its theoretical perspective, the study is guided by Mouffe’s theory of agonistic democracy and a research method developed by transforming Laclau and Mouffe’s (1985) work in Hegemony and Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic, into a method for Discourse Analysis. Various concepts from Laclau and Mouffe’s work are used to innovate an explanation of how political practices in social media, both linguistic and material texts, enhance incivility and the struggle to fix a regime’s preferred meaning. Guided by Laclau and Mouffe’s Discourse Analysis, the study describes how the government is using linguistic tools and physical technologies to repair the dislocation caused by incivility in social media in its attempts to re-create hegemonic practices. Without engaging in naïve reversal of the polarities between acceptable and unacceptable speech, and considering that at the ontological level politics is a friend—enemy relation, the study argues that incivility in social media is part of the return of politics in a post-political era, rather than simple unacceptable speech. While remaining aware of the dangers of extreme speech, but without reinforcing the anti-political rational consensus narrative, incivility is seen as having disruptive counterhegemonic potential, that is, if we consider the powerplay inherent in democracy. It means that binary opposition is blind to the way power produces, and is countered through unacceptable speech. / Communication Science / D. Litt. et Phil. (Communication Science)