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Karlstad is one of the places that offers a chance for a secondary education. One of them has been at the real school at the educational institution and at the girl school. The purpose of the assignment was to study the education at both the real school and the girl school in Karlstad during two school years. The first school year that was in 1906–1907, after the real school was opened. The second school year was 1939–1940, after real exams were available for girls in Karlstad. The goal has been to see how gender segregation and the male norm affected the education. The sources that were used were the annual reports for both schools, which above all contain information about the education that was imparted. The method used was a comparative analysis of the sources with an implement of a quantitative method. This was done by looking at the content of the courses, timetables and textbooks. The result has been that during the school year 1906–1907, the real school provided a more advanced education, especially in mathematics and science, while the girls focused more on the language subjects. Art history and hand work were subjects that were only studied at the girl school. The timetable and number of textbooks were higher at the real school, even though they had fewer grades. In the school year 1939–1940, however, the contents in the education of the girl school and the real school would have more similar character, and mathematics seemed to be more advanced at the girl school. The subjects that only the girl school had at this time were home economics, psychology, economics and art history. The time table and the number of textbooks were higher at the girl school this time. The girl school's real school programme would mostly have the same education as the real school at the educational institution, and mostly without subjects that suited a housewife more. In hand work, however, the boys in the real school would work with woodwork while the girls would work with needlework.

This thesis offers critical perspectives on a history syllabus for vocational education and training (VET) tracks in Swedish upper secondary schools and adds to our knowledge and understanding of the educative function of history education for the individual and for society. The overall aim of this thesis is to critically investigate discourses that are voiced in different fields about the construction and reproduction of the history curriculum in VET tracks. A general question addressed is how vertical (critical and theoretical) and horizontal knowledge is articulated by the discourses in terms of the meaning of history in a VET context. The following four research questions were the focus of the four different studies in this thesis: How were non-vocational subjects discussed on a policy level during the post-war period, and what meanings were ascribed to history education? What aspects of history as a field of knowledge are recontextualised into a pedagogic discourse for the VET curriculum? How do teachers perceive the history syllabus? What do the students express concerning the history syllabus and history education? The results of these studies are reported in separate papers, and the aggregated results are analysed in this thesis. The data consisted of government bills and committee reports, material from the National Agency of Education archives, and interview data gathered through interviews with 5 teachers and 46 students. The major theoretical inspiration comes from Basil Bernstein whose theories of classification and framing, pedagogic discourse, pedagogic code, and vertical and horizontal discourses are used in the analysis. With the aid of these concepts, the content and meaning of history education for VET are connected to macro levels of education, and the way in which education reproduces social order when certain forms of knowledge are distributed to different groups in society is discussed. Three major conclusions are drawn. First, history as a pedagogic discourse comes forward as versatile and contradictory when the results from the studies are aggregated. There is, however, a shared understanding that the meaning of history in VET is to educate the students to become democratic and active citizens. Secondly, the investigated discourses ascribe history education with the potential to distribute critical and powerful knowledge. The students see a value for history education in their future as citizens and for giving them access the public conversation of society. A final conclusion is that the pedagogic code, embedded in the history curriculum, can be interpreted in two different ways. The emphasis on competencies and the focus on the last two hundred years can be interpreted as (A) an expression of a wish for immediate utility and thus an instrumental view of education or (B) the recontextualisation of scientific theories, concepts, and practices into a pedagogic discourse as a means to give students access to disciplinary (powerful) knowledge.