In this study we have looked at medias portrayal of Margot Wallström with the ambition to explore how female polititicans are portrayed in Swedish media. We have done this by a critical discourse analysis on articles from the two biggest daily- and evening papers in Sweden, with a total of 16 articles. We have stood upon the theoretical foundation consisting of gender research, media effects research and discourse research. The gender research has given us explanations and manifestations of the difference between the media portrayal of men and women. The research on media effects has been our way to firmly establish the relevance of our study in a societal perspective. And lastly, the research on discourses has given us the understanding and the tools to go through with our study. To ascertain how gender is portrayed, in the portrayal of Margot Wallström in Swedish media, we developed three analytic themes to apply on our material. Those themes are The Mans Favorite, which focuses on Margot Wallströms private and professional relationships, The Female Self-Thinker, which focuses on her role as a politician, and Politician and Mother, which focuses on her role as a mother. We found that Margot Wallström through her career as a politician has travelled from the role as a mother to the role of a politician. Her family and the matters of her private life has been all over the Swedish press over the years, and her personality has been a big part of the description of her as a politician. Although she is not explicitly mentiones as a female politician more than a few times, she is indeed seen as a woman in politics.

The purpose of the study was firstly to describe the use of news articles from the largest Swedish news agency, TT Nyhetsbyrån, in four Swedish newspapers. Secondly, the purpose was to see if there was a homogenization of which TT-articles that was used. This was carried out by examining articles on the newspapers’ local, domestic and foreign pages. The newspapers that was chosen were Aftonbladet, Dagens Nyheter, Göteborgs-Posten and Nerikes Allehanda. They were chosen due to their size and their coverage area. This was because of a hypothesis that larger newspapers in general have more resources and should therefore not be as dependent on material from news agencies. As for the coverage area, the chosen newspapers were divided into two local and two nationwide, to be easier to compare in those categories. The theoretical premises for the study was first and foremost the normative demands of journalism in a democracy and were based on the theories regarding information value, brought forth by Kent Asp, as well as other theories regarding normative demands. Previous research in the area is somewhat frugal even though there are quite a few previous studies that have examined TT. The study was a quantitative content analysis carried out through a template by own construction. The four chosen newspapers were analyzed between 14-18 October 2013. These dates were determined by a pilot study where Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter had been analyzed throughout the year 2013. The conclusion drawn from the pilot study was that the medium number of TT-articles in the newspapers appeared in October, which is why those dates were chosen. The results of the study showed that 41 percent of the analyzed articles were produced by TT, while 56 percent was produced by the newspaper itself. 3 percent of the articles had no byline. However, on the local pages, the amount of articles from TT was only 9 percent, while the amount on the domestic and foreign pages were 53 and 49 percent. When it comes to the homogenization of articles, it was shown that out of 189 separate TTarticles, 4 occurred in three of the newspapers, 43 occurred in two of the newspapers and the remaining 142 TT-articles were found in one of the newspapers. In conclusion, the study showed that by the study itself it is impossible to determine whether or not the normative demands of journalism were upheld by the newspapers use of TT-material. This was to some extent due to the possibility of different interpretations of the results.

This study examines how the Swedish newspapers Dagens Nyheter and Aftonbladet report about hiv and aids. We start our analysis in the summer of 1987 when the famous designer Sigshten Herrgård reveals that he is hiv-infected, which causes a massive press coverage. To see how the reporting changes over time we compare the articles from that summer with how the epidemic was covered by the press in 1997 and 2007. Totally we have studied 355 articles. We chose the theme partly because of Torka aldrig tårar utan handskar (2012), a Swedish tv-serie about the lives and deaths of young homosexuals in Stockholm in the 80’s. It is based on a book serie written by the author and playwright Jonas Gardell who is critical to how media covered hiv and aids when it first came to Sweden. According to him the reporting was alarming and he refers to an article that described hiv as a punishment for people with an immoral lifestyle – homosexuals, prostitutes and drug addicts. We wanted to see if this really was what the reporting was like in the 80’s and what have changed since then. Our results shows that Dagens Nyheter and Aftonbladet often mention homosexuals, drug addicts and prostitutes in the reporting about hiv and aids. It is most common in 1987 but risky groups can be found in some of the articles from 1997 and 2007 as well. We can also see that the hiv-infected people very seldom get to express their view about the issue, instead it is experts, organizations and authorities that are the main actors as subjects in the reporting. We can determine that journalists often use words with a negative value in the articles about hiv and aids, such as promiscuous, non-human and reckless attitude. There has been an increasing amount of people getting hiv in Sweden, while the amount of articles in Dagens Nyheter and Aftonbladet have decreased.

Title: The World is Calling – A study of international news flow into swedish newspapers Authors: Ida Mikko & Daniel Ågren Level: Bachelor of Journalism Location: University of Gothenburg Language: Swedish Number of pages: 27 This essay aims to investigate the international news flow into Sweden through the key national news agency TT (Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå) and further through four major Swedish newspapers onto the public market. Our chosen method is a quantitative content analysis where we look at the output from TT and aforementioned newspapers with the goal to study and analyze differences. The relevancy of this topic can be explained through agenda setting theory, which shows us that the media has a powerful impact on public opinion and the political agenda. In an increasingly globalized world, no country stands alone. Swedish foreign news stems to a great extent from international news services (gathered through TT or directly by the newspapers themselves). More in detail, our study examines representation in terms of geography, topics, and primary sources in our analyzed media. We have found previous research which suggests that Swedish foreign news reporting strongly corresponds with the large international bureaus. Given the amount of material TT gathers from these agencies, TT gets to act as a primary and important gatekeeper to the Swedish language sphere in many cases. The examined newspapers show many similarities with TT in terms of news selection, however we also discovered some surprising differences which will be discussed in the essay.

Title: Palestinian freelance journalists – self-censorship, customers and role in society Number of pages: 67 Authors: Linnea Fridh and Jens Wingren Mentor: Gabriella Sandstig Course: Bachelor thesis, Journalism studies Period: Spring 2015 University: Faculty of Journalism, Media and Communication (JMG) University of Gothenburg Purpose/ Aim: The aim of the study is to map and analyse the working conditions, possibilities and limitations of Palestinian freelance journalists.. Main results: By analysing the answers of our respondents we have concluded that the main possibility with the working conditions of Palestinian freelance journalists is their flexibility. As long as they are financially safe (for example from working another job) they can be more straightforward and uncompromising in their journalism. Freelance journalists are however limited by the financial scarcity of the Palestinian media that don’t pay them enough and offer lacking support. Feeling excluded from the union is also something that specifically affects the freelance journalists and might make them feel more vulnerable. There is therefore a slight paradox inherent in the situation of the Palestinian freelancer: they have the opportunity to do good and critical journalism, but only if they can support themselves financially in some other way. Another finding of this study is that freelance journalists may alter their implications of professional ideals such as objectivity and neutrality when they work with foreign news desks. Working with this kind of customers also provides a way of expressing oneself with less fear of repercussions from differing factors in Palestinian society that might want to silence dissent.

The purpose of this study is to compare employed journalists’ and freelance journalists’ attitudes to work with information-, communication- and PR-assignments. Our research questions are:

• What are the attitudes to work with information-, communication- and PR-assignments among employed journalists and freelance journalists?

• Why are journalists willing or not willing to work with information-, communication- and PR-assignments?

• What impact has the labour market on the attitude to work with information-, communication- and PR-assignments?

• Has the professional journalistic identity any impact on the attitude to work with information-, communication- and PR-assignments? To answer the questions we used different theories about the labour market and also described the journalistic ideals and the relation between information, communication, PR and journalism. Our intention was to reach general conclusions, and we decided that the best way to answer our questions was to do a quantitative study. Therefore we made an online survey. This was also the most time- and resource-efficient way. It was sent to all reporters who worked at local stations in public service radio or public service TV. It was also sent to all reporters who worked in the daily press in the same towns as mentioned above. The survey was also sent to all the freelancers in the freelance catalogue in the same towns as above.

Our survey was sent to 1158 journalists in Sweden, 566 journalists answered the survey. The results show that freelancers are more positive to work with information-, communication- and PR-assignments than employed journalists, although journalists overall are more positive than negative. The freelancers are positive to these types of assignments mainly because of economic reasons. The employees, on the other hand, have a positive attitude mainly because this kind of business provides more work opportunities.

The different attitudes of the two groups of journalists can be explained with the differentiation on the labour market. Among the employees the jobs are becoming fewer and the freelancers have a harder economic situation. A clear majority of the freelancers are willing to work with these assignments even at the same time as journalistic assignments. Among the employees, on the other hand, most of them are not willing to work with both kinds of assignments simultaneously. Furthermore, the study shows that journalists who have experience of information-, communication- and PR-assignments also are more positive than others. The results show as well that the journalistic ideals that are associated with the profession overall are strong. They are stronger among the employees than among the freelancers. The freelancers are willing to work with information-, communication- and PR-assignments regardless of what ideals they agree with. The employees are more positive to these kinds of jobs if they to a larger extent agree to the ideals that today are less associated with the profession.