<p>Bilder och kartor ha bekostats av Humanistiska fonden.</p>

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As the title suggests, this essay is a feminist and postcolonial literary analysis of the main character Okonkwo´s downfall and demise in acclaimed author Chinua Achebe´s 1958 novel, Things Fall Apart. A recurrent theme within the narrative is the concept of gender differences and gender roles, in the strict traditional and patriarchal system which serves as the setting of the narrative. Okonkwo, who is a traditional and proud Igbo man, has an aversion toward what is considered to be weak and feminine. Okonkwo is therefore struck with depression when he finds himself in a weak and helpless position, as well as emasculated emotional state of mind. Furthermore, Okonkwo becomes a victim to colonialism in the latter part of the narrative, which consequently adds to his already helpless and emasculated state of mind. The purpose with this essay is therefore to investigate if feelings of emasculation are the cause for Okonkwo´s final decision to end his own life. Based upon the analysis included in this essay, one of the conclusions that could be drawn was that the helplessness and feelings of emasculation Okonkwo experiences within the narrative are too much for him to cope with and therefore cause his downfall and demise.

This essay analyzes poems and deconstructs binary oppositions in William Blake's Songs of Innocence and of Experience. By analyzing a number of poems, the essay exemplifies how Blake not only creates binary oppositions, but how he also deconstructs them. The essay focuses on the central binary opposition of innocence and experience, but also shows different binary oppositions to further show how Blake is setting up and deconstructing binary oppositions. The essay will argue that Blake can be considered an early deconstructionist due to his use of binary oppositions, as well as Blake intentionally creates binary oppositions.

The Swedish school system rests on the same democratic values as the Swedish society. It is also known that the school shall reflect the society and mediate the same values to the student. This means that Swedish schools has an important mission to mediate democratic values through the education. The aim of this study was to analyse if the literary work Niceville by Kathryn Stockett can be discussed in relation to this democratic mission, and if the book’s theme and motifs can be used in the Swedish education to mediate democratic values. Two questions were developed to answer the aim of the study: • What theme and motifs does the literary work Niceville contain and how do they relate to the school’s mission to mediate democratic values? • What didactic inputs are suitable in the aim to, through the literary work, mediate the democratic values to the students? The method I used to answer these questions was close reading. This means that I did a close reading of the literary work to analyse what theme and motifs it contained. I also used the theory intersectional to more easily find out the theme and motifs. My results show that the literary work Niceville can be used in Swedish education to mediate the democratic values of Swedish society. The work gives the student examples of how nondemocratic values affect individuals in a negative way which indicate that democratic values are preferable. Earlier studies show that reading fiction also trains the human in democratic thinking which means that it trains the reader to empathize and understand other people. This however needs to be problematized since teachers serve a significant role in making sure that every student understand the book´s message by its theme and motif. Also, the students motivation can affect the aim to mediate democratic values.

This essay intends to present any differences in upper secondary students’ usage of curse words based on the idea that there are differences between boys and girls in secondary school. Not only on the basis of gender but also age, duration of study and what courses the students are studying. The study’s results are based on surveys conducted in six different classes in an upper secondary school. What emerged from the survey is that all of the students found that it is not acceptable to swear in formal situations, especially in church. In the study no obvious difference between boys and girls can be found. However, the boys believe that they swear more than the girls do although this is not confirmed by the girls. A difference between the theoretical and the practical courses that were studied was that the former does not find the need of profanity in our language. While the more occupational programs felt that they needed the language to express feelings and create a particular tone in our speech. There was however no distinction between Grade 1 students to Grade 3 students inferred from the study. In addition to this it would be interesting to continue the study in this area by increasing the age difference of the students to see if the hypothesis that increased studying leads to less use of profanity stands correct.