This C-essay is a qualitative study designed to create a basis for understanding how managers involved in school affairs perceive the impact of merit points on students’ chances to continue on to higher education and how this will affect individuals' life chances. The study is based on three interviews with managers involved in school affairs. In this paper grades, merit points and socioeconomic class differences are discussed. The aim of this paper is to answer the following questions:  What impact does merit points in language studies and the way different languages are valued, in the system, have for the individual and for society?  Who are the winners in the new grading system and who are the losers; how are different socioeconomic groups affected? The material was interpreted with the help of a report written by Ingrid Nordqvist and Monica Langerth Zetterman called "Secondary School competition field-a regional perspective", a paper written by Helen Raven who did a study on grades, national tests and social reproduction and the Frenchman Pierre Bourdieu's theories. The results show that class differences will increase and that it will be difficult to rise in the social hierarchy in the future.

Elever i Eskilstuna kommuns förmåga att prestera i grundskolan är påverkad av vilket symboliskt kapital elever innehar. En uppväxt i en miljö som hedrar samma värden som skolan ger eleven ett habitus som i högre grad samstämmer med skolans och ökar därför elevens möjligheter. Ett motsatt förhållande kan ses hos elevgrupper med ett lågt symboliskt kapital. Elevers förmåga att prestera är även påverkad av hur elevsammansättningen ser ut. Denna effekt kan verka både i positiv och i negativ riktning. En hög andel elever med ett starkt kapital ger en positiv effekt på alla elevkategorier medan en hög andel med svagt kapital ger en negativ effekt. Genom en snedfördelad tilldelning av resurser försöker Eskilstuna kommun skapa mer likvärdiga förutsättningar mellan de olika elevgrupperna. Kommunens pengar når de elevgrupper som behöver dem men det återstår att säga om resurserna är tillräckliga och om de omsätts på ett effektivt sätt. Den tröghet som finns i den sociala strukturen gör relationen mellan missgynnade elevers habitus och skolans kapital naturligt problematisk och svår att överbrygga. Resultatet är framtaget genom regressioner och korrelationer mellan skolresultat, social bakgrund och pedagogiska incitament som sedan är analyserade utifrån Bourdieus teori om social reproduktion. / The performance in primary education of students in the municipality of Eskilstuna is affected by the symbolic capital that students possesses. A student growing up in an environment that treasures the same values as the school does is given a habitus that better corresponds with the habitus of the school and therefore has better prospects. The performance of students is also affected by the composition of students. The effect of the composition of students may result in both positive and negative outcomes.  A high share of students with strong capital results in a positive effect on all categories of students while a high share of students with weak capital results in a negative effect. The municipality of Eskilstuna is trying to create more equal conditions between the different categories of students by applying an unequal allocation of resources. The funds handed out by the municipality do reach the categories of students in need of them but whether the resources are sufficient and whether they are efficiently converted remains to be seen.  As inertia is inherent to the social structure, the relationship between the habitus of disadvantaged students and the capital of the school is innately problematic and hard to bridge. The results were retrieved through regression analyses and correlations between results in school, social background, and pedagogical incentives. They were then analyzed on the basis of Bourdieus’ theory on social reproduction.

This study is based upon the idea that foreign language (FL) classrooms exist apart from their target language communities. While historically, this has been a geographic truth, divides between FL learners and native speakers may also reflect symbolic social distance. Given the symbolic, if not geographic, isolation of the FL classroom from the real world, this study presumes that a challenge inherent to the endeavor of FL education is that the authentic, real-world language and culture under study are, by definition, not naturally present in the FL classroom. This study considers how this challenge, referred to as the challenge of authenticity, is managed in one FL classroom. Seven eighth-grade students and their teacher comprise Classroom 204, a beginning Spanish FL classroom at a private school in the southwest U.S. This qualitative case study uses classroom observations, audio-recordings, classroom artifacts, and participant interviews as data to consider not only how authenticity is imported, imagined, and conjured by participants in Classroom 204, but how authenticity is assigned value therein. Data is analyzed largely with discourse analysis of transcripts of classroom talk about (and classroom talk that constituted) various facets of authenticity, value, and the real world. Ecology theory serves as a broad theoretical lens through which to understand (and accept) the complexity inherent to the social phenomena being researched. Benedict Anderson's (1991) theory of imagined communities is adopted to understand the boundaries that delineate the inside of the FL classroom from the outside, and Bourdieu's (1992) notion of symbolic capital is used to understand the ways by which authenticity becomes valuable (and, conversely, how that which is valuable becomes authentic). Findings suggest that, while participants are largely oriented to real-world manifestations of Spanish language and culture, authenticity is not most present in Classroom 204 in the form of stuff imported from elsewhere. Rather, authenticity emerges out of the highly local, socially-immediate interactions and value systems unique to Classroom 204. Suggestions for both pedagogy and future research focus on approaches that acknowledge and capitalize on the power of local authenticity in the FL classroom, as cultivated by local social actors. / text

Physiotherapy in Sweden has developed from a practical, hands-on, assistant job predominantly taught at college level to a university-based academic discipline emphasising evidence-based practice and research. Women are in majority although an increasing number of men have entered the profession. Women and men physiotherapists tend to undertake different career paths. The overall aim of the present thesis was to use a gender perspective to describe and analyse attitudes to the professional role, health care work and the development of the profession among actors engaged in physiotherapy education. A questionnaire was distributed in 1997 to all Swedish physiotherapy students in the second semester of the education (n=273). The same cohort was investigated in 1999 at the completion of the education. The response rate was 93 percent at both occasions. For an international comparison, the same questionnaire was distributed in 1997 and in 1999 to a group of Canadian physiotherapy students in their first and last semesters (n=60). Qualitative research interviews were conducted with 8 novices in physiotherapy and with 14 women educators in academia. Five focus group discussions with clinical supervisors were conducted (10 women and 5 men). Methods used were Grounded theory, factor analysis, logistic regression and path analysis. Feminist theories and Bourdieu's theory of culture constituted a theoretical framework Four ideal types were identified among the novices representing attitudes to the professional role. The Treater and The Supervisor were attitudes found among the women, whereas The Coach and The Entrepreneur were attitudes among the men. Type of health care facility was important for their positioning in the organisational hierarchy. Swedish students favour future employment in private practice. Sports medicine clinics and fitness centres are health care facilities highly endorsed, as is health promotion. Neither care of elderly nor hospital work are preferable fields of practice. Research is not favoured. Men students are more likely to have chosen the profession because of their interest in physical activity and sports. They are also more likely to prefer owning a private clinic and working with alternative approaches such as fitness training in sports medicine clinics. Women students are more likely to prefer an employment in private practice. The Canadian men students favour private practice whereas the women prefer the public sector of health care. The academic educators experience a gap between theory and practice which causes conflicting messages to students. Competing professions, emergent societal change and a conservative clinical practice constitute threats to the profession. The uniqueness of professional competency, theoretical development and new arenas such as home rehabilitation, consulting and research constitute a vision for future development of the profession. Masculinity is highly valued for status and power whereas femininity symbolises empathy and caring. The clinical supervisors update their theoretical knowledge base through supervision of students, but claim that students lack hands-on skills. Stress at work, unequal power relations in the hierarchy and restructuring of health care are factors that influence work satisfaction negatively. To conclude, gendered habitus, different symbolic capital and different attitudes towards health care work and development of the profession were found in the sub-fields of physiotherapy. / digitalisering@umu

This doctoral thesis examines how modernisation affects and is affected by existing local culture and identity. It is about the relation between the social and mental barriers experienced, expressed and manifested in the social culture of local community, and modernisation’s dynamic powers over time. The thesis deals with different time periods from the 1800’s until today with regard to expressions and consequences of modernity. People during the societal transformation of Sweden in the 19th and 20th centuries are culturally depicted from a micro-perspective. An overall perspective for the analysis of modernity uses the concepts of basal and variable modernity, borrowed from the historian of ideas Sven-Eric Liedman. The perspective makes possible the separation between on the one hand the structural modernisation within the fields of economy, technology and natural sciences, and on the other hand the cultural modernity manifested in conceptions of the world, politics, existential viewpoints, aesthetic expressions and social culture. Within the first-mentioned fields, where basal modernity dominates, a uniform and cumulative developmental pattern emerges as well as an almost self-propelled continuity toward the next innovation or stage of development. Within the latter fields, however, a non-uniform pattern emerges, where modernisation is constantly the object of alternative interpretations and attitudes. This variable modernity is characterised by a cultural struggle between conflicting ideologies and strategies in relation to ongoing modernisation. Different individuals and groups position themselves between acceptance and resistance, progressiveness and the critique of civilisation, the preservation of traditions and the will to change. In this course of events new affinities and identifications, but also new dissociations and antagonisms are created in local social contexts. Modernity leads both to the obliteration of boundaries and to the emergence of new social and mental boundaries. This process can also lead to existing geographical borders being charged with a new ideological content so their importance is revitalised.

An important premise for the study is the pedagogic importance of sports, that children and youth via sports and its leaders consciously and unconsciously incorporate and teach themselves skills, habits and knowledge as well as norms and values. Another premise is that sports leaders, like other teachers and leaders, work in a time where new conditions prevail for children’s upbringing and for the role as a leader. What should be conveyed to children today is not obvious but seems to be dependent on the individual fosterer’s idea on what the role should mean. This is truer for sports leaders, for example, than teachers since the sports movement does not have a prescribed curriculum. The perspective of the study is cultural-sociological and gender-theoretical. In the analyses, Pierre Bourdieu’s key concepts, habitus, capital and field, performed the functions of research tools. A descriptive purpose of the study was to increase the knowledge of who the children and youth leaders of the sports movement are and their views of and valuation of sports, the task and the children. Through studying what the sports leaders are bearers of in terms of personified and symbolic capital, the purpose of the study was also to analyse what was encouraged in the sports environment where many children and young people spend a great deal of their leisure. The analyses were based on an empirical material consisting of questionnaire replies from 525 sport leaders and in-depth interviews with 18 leaders. In addition, more than 1,600 future teachers and youth recreation leaders replied to a questionnaire form. Who the sport movement’s child and youth leaders are cannot be generally answered. It is partly dependent on which sport it is, partly which gender the leader has. The sport leaders’ attitudes to differing aspects of the children’s sports activity varied and various leader groups confronted each other. The leaders primarily appreciated the relations with the children. However, they did not appreciate the parental intervention, children and youths who did not behave themselves and the high demands which leadership signifies. Through sports the leaders primarily wanted to give the children physical and social upbringing. They wanted to educate children to be creative and independent individuals but emphasized at the same time a conscientious ideal. The study showed that differing types of symbolic capital dominate in children and youth’s sports activity and that different leader groups emphasize various values. What is understood as valuable seemed more to be related to the logic of different sports than to gender and the fact that the activities were for children. It is not possible to tell in general how children are fostered and influenced through sports. The results indicate, however, that seriousness dominated over playfulness and that success and achievement are highly valued.

The objekt of the study is the title of rector. In Sweden this title was introduced during the Middle Ages together with the first catehedral schools. The same title is being caried into the 21st Century by all local heads of every Swedish primery and secondary school. A summery of he earliest uses of the tittle is presented but the real focus of the thesis commences in 1829 and streches out throught´ten chapters to 1993. Using concepts formulated by Bourdieu -- symbolic capital, cultural capital, habitus, etos, social field -- av chronological inteprentaion is given of how he conferrers, holders and prenders of the title have in different ways contrubuted to the redefinition of the title of rector from an exclusively male title with clear references to State Secondary Schools to a title common to all schoool forms, held primarily by women. The emerical base of the study consists of a comparative study of the profeessional journals that have represented the title hoöders and the pretenders ever since the close of the 19th Century. The closing four chapters of the thesis eal with the central themes og authoruty. masculinity, the nation-sate and the vision of future that through te ages have been a mark og the struggles around the title of rector.

OF PROPER CONDUCT: PRIVATE TUTORS IN STOCKHOLM AND ITS ENVIRONS 1793–1795 This paper studies private tutors in Stockholm and its environs 1793-1795 by examining work advertisements written by said tutors. It is in part a continuation of a previous study of the education market in Stockholm 1798. It utilizes Yvonne Hirdman ’s gender theory and Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts of symbolic capital to analyze differences in what male and female tutors offered to teach, how they portrayed themselves and if any social groups could be ascertained. Both qualitative and quantitative methods are used, where the quantitative method is partly influenced by the verb oriented-method from the Gender and Work (GaW) project and the qualitative method is influenced by hermeneutics. The study shows that most of the tutors were men, and of those men a majority were students, priests, educated men and officials. The female tutors did not use titles overall, but the subjects they offered to teach suggests most were in the mid- to upper mid layer of society. The French salon culture was dominating among the nobles at the end of the 18th century. This study argues that the salon culture was the cultural capital by which the tutors measured themselves. Because of their academic merits, men tended to use institutionalized cultural capital while women used only partly embodied cultural capital through their knowledge of the French language. Where men tended to use formal merits, women used a wider array of strategies. There were however a number of men who used strategies of weakness when faced with financial difficulties. Women taught mainly needlework and French, where female tutors offering to teach how to sew of clothes showed a shift from male professional tailors to female seamstresses. It is argued that Hirdman’s principle of segregation between men and women both affected the subjects the tutors were able to offer as well as the subjects they did offer.

In this paper I critically discuss the concept of religious knowledge. My aim, based on texts by the religious realists Anders Jeffner, Mikael Stenmark and John Polkinghorne, is to try and find answers to three questions: 1. What do they mean by religious knowledge? 2. What do they mean religious knowledge gives us knowledge of? 3. With which arguments and discursive and rhetorical strategies do they defend their answers to the above questions? I conclude that Jeffner, Stenmark and Polkinghorne have similar ontological and epistemo- logical perspectives. According to them, reality is not one, but consists of different layers or dimensions. Science is only suited to study the dimension of reality that we have access to through our senses. The study of divine or transcendent reality requires other forms of investigations, resulting in another form of knowledge, often called religious knowledge. The topics in religious knowledge are ethics, esthetics, values, meaning, purpose and spirituality. The relation between truth and religious knowledge is that religious knowledge is supposed to be epistemically true and, unlike scientific knowledge, true in the respect of guiding the believer successfully through life. Jeffner, Stenmark and Polkinghorne use different strategies and arguments to defend their positions. Some are philosophically grounded, and others are of a more rhetorical character. Some of the defense mechanisms are integral parts of their religious worldview, and others can be seen as various immunizing strategies. According to my interpretation I have labeled their different strategies:” reality stratified”,” the shortcomings of science”,” to choose worldview”, ”straw men”, ”the ignorant opponent”, “religious experiences”, ”different but still similar” and “the use of concepts”. As far as    I´m concerned, Jeffner, Stenmark and Polkinghorne haven´t, in view of their religious realism, successfully argued for the claim that there actually exists a form of knowledge that ought to be called religious knowledge. They have not, to my mind, more than as a logical possibility, shown examples of this kind of religious knowledge and successfully argued for its kinship to knowledge as true, justified belief. With a little help from Bourdieu, I have also tried to show that Jeffner, Stenmark and Polkinghorne are participants in a discursive apologetic battle, where the combatants are armed with different forms of symbolic capital.

Magister Artium - MA / The black middle class of South Africa has been the subject of academic and media fascination since the democratisation of South Africa almost 30 years ago. However, this attention tends to portray a one-dimensional and homogenous image of the black middle class. The homogenising of this group often involves derogatory stereotypes and framing the group as shallow, and prone to especially excessive conspicuous consumption and vulgar displays of wealth and material possessions. Implicitly or overtly, the black middle class is therefore not seen as a bona fide middle class, i.e. entrepreneurial, zealous, dynamic and enterprising in demanding social recognition. Through the lens of food and food culture (which uses Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of class and capital distinction), this thesis undertakes a phenomenological exploration of a group that is not only heterogeneous but also very energetically rebuilding a sense of self and dignity in the face of power relations, racism and stereotypes linked to colonialism, apartheid and post-colonial politics. The findings of this thesis reveal that black middle-class South Africans are determined to (a) affirm their belonging in society, (b) confirm their class standing and access to capital, and, (c) establish their individual identities as well as an individualised group identity. In the face of continuing inequality, unequal power relations and tense social relations, this group has developed strategies to mitigate and navigate these challenges. This thesis identified two key strategies that are employed by black consumers both online and in the field: ‘eating without food’ and the ‘cultured palate’ (my terms). These two strategies empower practitioners to navigate foodscapes and social spaces as well as demonstrate their class belonging.