• Digital Humanities and Cultural Heritage
• 2018-2022close
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The thesis analyzes how a theoretical framework and method can be formulated to make mental illness visible in photographs posted on social media. The aim is to create a basis for further research. The framework is built on time, conversation, and language. Based on Susan Sontag, Roland Barthes and W J T Mitchells thoughts, a timeline is drawn. On it, both emotions and bodies are constantly present. Jon Kabat-Zinns mindfulness method is used to give an insight into how emotions can be handled with inspiration from eastern meditation techniques. The typical “yoga image” is analyzed. It is characterized by a woman doing a yoga pose, often placed in the middle of the image surface in an exotic place. The body ideal is recognized from other fitness contexts. The material is from @kinoyoga which is run by the yoga profile Kino MacGregor. Examining photographs that communicate perfect health puts this thesis questions at the forefront. The study shows that photographs on social media are not static objects but are parts in an ongoing documentation where meaning is not given. Instead meaning keeps transforming and is contently renegotiated. When the boundaries between the physical and digital realities are blurred, it becomes difficult to distinguish the needs of the image from one’s own. The emotional experiences of shortcomings and desires can occur and start to interact. As Instagram's algorithms exploit these emotions, it becomes difficult to break the vicious circle. Instagram users are forced to abide by the app's rules. The responsibility for the ill health generated should be the owners of for-profit companies and political institutions with the power to legislate.

This essay examines the Proto-Indo-European motif of the Divine Twins, as it has been interpreted in Scandinavia during the Bronze and Iron Ages. Because of the difference in opinion between archaeological researchers regarding when the Divine Twins disappeared, an examination of the material culture that has been connected to this motif is undertaken. Duality as a concept is used to discuss the relationship of mythological twins to, on one hand, likeness and closeness, and, on the other, opposing personalities, contrasting aspects and animosity. Based on the analysis of the Scandinavian material culture, it is concluded that the Divine Twins as a motif survived the debated Bronze Age collapse. Furthermore, the inclusion of Nordic ethnographic accounts from the 19th and 20th century may imply that the Divine Twins survived, at least in popular beliefs, well into the 1900s.

Denna uppsats jämför och analyserar källtexter från två inriktningar av den esoteriska idéströmningen kaosmagi. Peter J. Carroll och Genesis Breyer P-Orridge som anses vara förgrundsgestalter inom denna sentida form av esoterisk praktik menade att en individ kan skapa och sätta samman sin egen religion och med den förverkliga sig själv spirituellt och även förändra samhället. Idéströmningen har paralleller med teorier om postmodern spiritualitet och religion där individ, konsumtion och nätverk är några förekommande faktorer. Studien visar att de idéer som lyfts fram av Carroll och Breyer P-Orridge påvisar såväl likheter som skillnader men som har ett gemensamt drag av fokus på individens egen potential och att de ser föregångare i Austin Osman Spare och Aleister Crowley. De två idéströmningarna är även produkter av sin historiska kontext där populärkultur och teknisk innovation har avtryck i det idémässiga innehållet och utförandet.

This essay explores the magazine covers of Hemmets Journal between the years of 1921 and 1990. The first issue of the magazine was released one hundred years ago. The aim of the study is to examine how the motives have changed during the years in composition, color and text. The methods applied to this essay are formal analysis. Heinrich Wölfflin ́s set of five pairs of opposed visual concepts help distinguish when the clearest breakingpoints of the magazine covers occur. A style analysis is applied to the breakingpoints to examine if the contemporary structure of the society is depicted in the magazine covers. The results show for instance that you can spot the society in different ways in the magazine covers depending on what year it is and the most representative motive is women. 

This essay is a comparative study of two sculptures with the same motive and title, The Dance, by Ellen Roosval: a freestanding sculpture created in 1925 and a relief sculpture from 1933. The essay has two objectives: to analyse these works of art and to highlight the artist Ellen Roosval as an example of a female artist in the early 20th century. Roosval’s reworking of the free-standing sculpture into a relief generates multiple transformations. The research questions in the current study are: how the reception of the works relates to the viewer; how typology, site and material affect the design and expression; and how the two sculptures relate to the interwar period aesthetics, dance and the motive. In the analysis of both works aspects of their meaning in relation to the beholder’s experience have been crucial. The applied method of analysis originates from Wolfgang Kemp as developed by Jessica Sjöholm Skrubbe, with particular emphasis on the beholder’s movements, the meaning of the term site-specific and the impact of the base. The study begins with a general background on the situation for female sculptors in the early 20th century, the artist Ellen Roosval, and dance. The dance section also introduces the dance company The Swedish Ballet (1920-25) that the two versions of The Dance were a tribute to. Then follows a contextualized analysis of the works focusing on the formal elements, the different sites, bases and the beholder’s movements. Next follows an analysis of typologies, materials and stylistic expressions as well as the shaping of the human body, nudity and movements. Roosval’s The Dance 1933 is compared both to the relief The Dance by Antoine Bourdelle from 1912 and to the Swedish Ballet performances. The analysis concludes with a discussion of how the site relates to the choice of materials and how aesthetics and dance relate to the period 1920s. The results demonstrate aspects of various transformations in relation to the beholders experience. The final discussion concludes on Roosval’s norm-breaking achievements, which inspired the title of this essay: The Resistance of Time.

Rasism har långtgående konsekvenser för människors livsvillkor och för samhällets demokratiska grund. Samtidigt är rasism inte en naturordning utan ett politiskt problem som kan påverkas och på sikt åtgärdas. För att förändra rasism krävs kunskapsbaserat arbete och ändamålsenliga uppföljningsverktyg. Vi behöver förstå vad rasism är, hur dess mekanismer fungerar och hur den inverkar på den ojämlika fördelningen av status, resurser, möjligheter och sårbarhet på befolkningsnivå.Att mäta rasism utan att reproducera rasism är dock en utmanande uppgift. Rasism refererar till raser, en form av social kategorisering som på vissa plan övergivits men som samtidigt har påtagliga effekter för olika gruppers ojämlika livsvillkor. Som objekt för mätning är raser besvärliga då ras definieras kontextuellt och relationellt och ständigt omförhandlas. Dessutom har raskategoriseringar och rasdifferentierad statistik ett mörkt förflutet som kärnan i den vetenskapliga rasismens och den statliga rashygienens historia. I denna bok undersöks frågan om att mäta rasism från en rad teoretiska och historiska synvinklar. Hur kan rasism definieras? Vad är rasbegreppets historia? Vilken roll har statistik spelat i statliga styrsystem? Är våra identiteter fasta, eller skiftande? Vad hände med försöken att införa jämlikhetsdata på kommunal nivå? Hur långt kan man komma med befintliga metoder för att mäta antisvart rasism på arbetsmarknaden? Boken avslutas med att presentera att konkret förslag på hur rasismens effekter för olika befolkningsgrupper skulle kunna mätas utan att först fastställa och utgå från förbestämda raskategorier: Balingsholmsmodellen. Denna metod kan användas för att återkommande undersöka hur rasism inverkar på människors livsvillkor på nationell och regional nivå. Metodologiska laboratorier – hur skapa etiskt och vetenskapligt hållbara metoder att mäta diskriminering på grund av etnicitet, hudfärg och religion? VR 2016-03663. Edda Manga och Mattias Gardell är både författare till enskilda kapitel och redaktörer för boken.

The aim of this paper is to examine the role of digital textbooks in education of history and how teachers’ reason regarding their usability compared to printed textbooks. Prior studies have shown that teachers’ technical know-how and the amount of support they are given in the initial stages of using digital textbooks affect how well the implementation work. Furthermore, the digital format seems to offer a richer learning material as the digital books contain pedagogical functions beside the text. However, they are also more difficult to use than printed textbooks. Six history teachers were interviewed in this study, using a semi-structured interview method. The theoretical framework TPCK was used to manage the empirical data. This framework identifies three different aspects of the digital textbook that need to work properly and cooperate for the digital textbook to be considered an adequate tool for teaching. According to the informants, the way digital books are designed and the way they are navigated makes them difficult to use compared to the printed textbooks. One nameworthy advantage is that the content of digital textbooks can be updated almost instantly, therefore, the publishers can add information concerning contemporary events that are relevant for history education. Both low quality and a need for educational variation explained the low usage of digital textbooks. Only two of the six informants stated that they use the digital textbook as a point of departure in their teaching. Furthermore, many functions of the digital textbook are redundant. They seem designed to constitute the only teaching material a teacher would need; however few teachers are willing to limit themselves to this. The study shows the need for publishers to improve the navigation and overall design of digital textbooks to make them more user friendly. Furthermore, it is important that the publishers provide educational and customer support for the teachers using the digital textbooks to help them get started as it is crucial that the schools’ routines for implementing digital textbooks work properly.

The aim of this study is to explore heritage processes within contemporary urban planning in Sweden, which is done through a single-case study. The point of departure for the study is the management of Havrekvarnen, an early modernist industrial building within an urban development area of Nacka, Sweden. Through parallel decisions by the County Administrative Board and the local Municipality in 2016, the building was firstly, listed with the strongest legal, cultural, and historical protection available, and secondly, the municipal urban regulations were changed so that the landowner was given permission to pursuit a reconstruction of the building, replicating its original appearance. As such the case constitutes a hitherto unique example of a listed future reconstruction in Sweden. The study examines how the process took place, focusing on actors and critical junctures involved in the execution and how the description of the building's heritage-values changed. The study uses a composite theoretical framework of authorized heritage discourse and actor network theory. To this an explaining-outcome process tracing is applied as method. Through a sequential process of collecting empirical data, in the form of archival records and interviews, the process was mapped through the conceptualization of a causal mechanism. The method had not previously been used in the field of art history and was chosen as such with a tentative approach. The study gives an extensive presentation of the legal and practical framework surrounding heritage processes within urban planning in Sweden, as well as puts the study within a local historical context. The results of the study show that within the observed case, a trade-off situation between authenticity and aesthetic historical values arose, caused by the poor technical condition of the building: the aesthetic values were deemed to take precedence in the assessment. The study also shows how antiquarian consultants have had a decisive influence on the process of legislative enabling of the reconstruction of Havrekvarnen. The research design’s use of process tracing to map heritage processes is thus deemed useful for future enquiries within the field of art history and heritage studies.

This thematic study covers a selection of paintings with origins from Italy during the17th century, all of them depicting Cleopatra as she dies with her breast revealed while holding a snake. A curiosity regarding which role the breast plays in Cleopatra’s story is the motivator of this essay, and to understand the symbolic relations between the breast, snake and the woman. In order to understand the interaction between the three signs question A and B are created: A) What does the breast symbolize? What does the snake symbolize? What does the woman symbolize? What does the breast, sake and woman symbolize together? B) Is it possible to rationalize from the paintings which role Cleopatra played in the 17th century’s art of Italy? This essay is based on a semiotic picture-analysis in which the material consists of 8 different paintings from Italy during the 17th century with their common motive of Cleopatra in her death scene. It begins with a basic iconological picture-analysis of the paintings in which their common visible signs are analysed in a semiotic picture-analysis. Following this, theory based on feminism, orientalism and egyptology is applied to discuss the meaning of the breast, snake and woman.