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This study explores the 'sex-map', a didactic object developed in Sweden. The analysis focuses on teacher guidelines and an animated movie for classroom use and how the sex-map becomes a method for emphasizing students as actors in defining sexuality. Building on Mol's notion of ontonorms, the emphasis is on ways in which the ontology of young sexuality is associated with arguments about what is 'good' in and for sex education. The sex-map incorporates ideal students' experiences, discoveries, and positive feelings. Via students, a critique is mounted against one-path sexuality, underscoring the importance of 'good' non-hierarchical sexuality as exemplary sex education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A theoretical framework for understanding public library development is presented; plural agonistics is used in combination with an approach inspired by posthumanism. The framework is related to examples from a study of two Swedish public libraries. Antagonism is viewed as foundational, and democracy as an ongoing process, the task being to transform antagonism to agonism, with institutions like libraries postulated as important spaces for adversaries to meet in dialogue. Libraries are viewed here as constantly becoming institutions, and the librarian's identity as an ongoing enactment of the library. To underscore the crucial role the library fills in society, it is conceptualized as a verb and a new word is proposed: to librarize. Discussions about the content of libraries are critical for librarians to find ways to perform the library. The ongoing debate is part of the professional performance of librarians. Librarians should, while acknowledging that there may be no single right way, debate over what is the most beneficial way to facilitate libraries' vital role in democracy. Conceptualizing of the library as a verb and its implications for librarianship as a possible active agent for radical change within society are offered as articulations of resistance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study is to review research on poetry reading pedagogy in secondary education from 1990 to 2015. Today there is little research on poetry teaching in Sweden and thus little guidance for secondary teachers. Therefore, this study thematically analyses peer-reviewed articles from English language international journals. Articles were retrieved through a systematic literature review. The results show that many researchers suggest personal response pedagogies mainly developed from Louise M. Rosenblatt’s work. Further, a progression of poetry interpretations seems to require explicit teaching throughout the years of secondary education. Also, current educational politics, heavily influenced by neoliberalism, impose high-stakes examinations that challenge poetry curricula. Teacher education needs to address this issue. Minor themes found were: ontologies in relation to teaching poetry reading, and poetry reading as identity formation/tool for social critique. These could be possible areas for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Aim To make visible the existential character of pregnancy by searching for its health dimensions as it is described in the ontological health model. Method Eight women were interviewed two or three times during their pregnancy and one time shortly after birth. The women have taken part in the routine programme that constitutes maternity care in Sweden. A hermeneutic approach inspired by Gadamer was used to analyse the data. An ontological health model was used to interpret the findings. Findings Nine themes on a rational and a contextual level were clustered to three themes on an existential level: A new life stage, The new life takes shape and Health is jeopardised. Contents of these themes were interpreted together with an ontological health model. Expecting a child means to do, be and become in expectation of the new life. Suffering and health are two different dimensions in a woman's life during pregnancy; they are integrated with one another and ever-present. It is in the meeting with the inevitable, life-changing gravidity and vulnerability that the integrative movement creates the new. Longing is the desire that provides motivation to continue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In today’s health care, participation is acknowledged as important. However, there is limited research on how relatives of patients at risk of suicide experience their opportunities to participate in care during periods when their close ones are subject to inpatient care. The aim of this study was to describe the phenomenon of participation, as experienced by relatives of persons who are subject to inpatient psychiatric care due to a risk of suicide. The study was conducted through a reflective lifeworld research (RLR) approach, based on phenomenological philosophy. Eight relatives of patients receiving care from professionals in a psychiatric specialist health care context in Sweden participated in phenomenon-oriented interviews. Data were analysed to elucidate a meaning structure of the phenomenon. The findings show that the phenomenon of participation was more associated with patients’ recovery processes than with the caring process, and means “being actively involved in a process in which the person regains the desire to live”. The meaning of participation is further described by its meaning constituents: struggling for being able to be present for the person at risk of suicide, being able to share everyday life, and nurturing sources for vitality. These insights into the meaning of participation highlight the importance of allowing supportive relatives to be a part of the patient’s life, while the person is cared for in an inpatient hospital setting. Thus, participation enables relatives to be acknowledged as resourceful human beings in the patient’s recovery process, and thereby facilitates a sense of being able to manage and share life itself together with the person. This means that mental health nurses need to recognize individual variations of relatives’ participation processes, and take on the responsibility of acknowledging relatives’ lifeworlds. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]