Gender equality has long been a part of the curriculum for the Swedish school system. The subject is meant to permeate all aspects of school operation and teachers' education in the classroom. History as a subject is no exception. Although it is part of the school curriculum and practice, there is a lack of studies concerning the topic. Moreover, there is a lack of studies concerning how students perceive and think about these practices and subjects. This study examines how Swedish students experience and express thoughts about gender equality in an historical, contemporary and future perspective. The method in hand has been a content analysis, used on 110 student-answers from the Swedish National test within the history-subject of 2015. Within this method, narrative theories constructed by Jörn Rüsen have been used to study and categorize students' historical consciousness in the form of their temporal orientation. In order to examine how students perceive gender equality, we have primarily made use of the political definition provided by the Swedish government and the separation between quantitative and qualitative gender equality described by Victoria Wahlgren. Results of this study shows that students' attitudes regarding gender equality today are often linked to their identification within the subject of history. The same is also true for their thoughts about the future. Differences between boys and girls are identified, with girls being more nuanced about modern gender equality. This difference underlines the connection and importance of knowledge about the past in order to understand questions at hand. Differences regarding gender can be seen in how students define gender equality. In general, all students seem more focused on quantitative gender equality questions. Nevertheless, girls tend to discuss the subject in a more qualitative way. Finally, there is a discussion of how these results influence history teachers' practices. Aspects such as the consequences these practices may have on students of different genders is also discussed. Furthermore, we want to highlight the need for additional research about gender equality in school operation and historical education.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:mau-60474 |
| Date | January 2023 |
| Creators | Sinclaire, Daniel, Titze, Jacob |
| Publisher | Malmö universitet, Fakulteten för lärande och samhälle (LS) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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