Publikationer från Stockholms universitet
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Representation of gender and female identityin Iranian society : an analysis of the novels I Turn off The Lights and We’ll Get Used to It by Zoya Pirzad
No full textThis thesis examines the representation of gender and female identity in contemporary Iranian society through the analysis of Zoya Pirzad’s novels I Turn Off the Lights and We’ll Get Used to It. Employing feminist narratology and thematic analysis, this study investigates the intricate interplay between traditional roles, patriarchal norms, and personal struggles in the formation of women’s identities. The protagonists, Clarice and Arezoo in two different novels, navigate societal expectations as mothers, wives, and individuals while striving for self-fulfillment within oppressive structures. The analysis emphasizes recurring themes such as relational identity, internal and external conflicts, attire and appearance, and women's silent resistance to patriarchal expectations. Pirzad’s portrayal of female agency, generational tensions, and power dynamics challenges conventional narratives, providing valuable insights into the evolving roles of women in Iran. This study contributes to the broader discourse on gender, identity, and cultural constraints within Middle Eastern literature
Sous les pavés, Gaza-Rivera! : Fascist spectacles and their domination over the Palestinians
No full textThis thesis investigates how Donald Trump’s 2025 discourse on Gaza can be understood as a fascist spectacle that legitimizes the US-Israeli domination over the Palestinian people. Drawing on Guy Debord’s theory of the spectacle and Federico Caprotti’s characteristics of fascist spectacle, the study applies John B. Thompson’s method of depth hermeneutics to five press events and one viral video. The analysis identifies four symbolic characteristics -myth of the leader, aestheticization of politics, militarized peace, and depoliticized displacement as central features of Trump’s fascist spectacle. The results show that Trump constructs himself as a singular redeemer of Gaza, reimagines occupied land as real estate fantasy, recasts military occupation as care, and frames Palestinian displacement as humanitarian relocation. The findings demonstrate that these narratives function ideologically by erasing Palestinian agency and reframing control as moral necessity. The thesis contributes to situationist critique of Trumpism. It extends Caprotti’s framework beyond its original historical context and shows how Debord’s concept of ideology materialized applies to the spectacle of contemporary foreign policy discourse. The study concludes that Trump’s vision of Gaza is not merely a proposal but a symbolic act of power. A vision where domination is rendered beautiful, inevitable, and unquestionable through the spectacle’s logic
The Great Retail Escape: Catching Runaway Customers with Machine Learning - A Study on Customer Churn Prediction in the Retail Sector
No full textIntroduction: This thesis aims to address the challenge of accurately predicting customer churn in a highly competitive and digitized retail environment. As customer loss can lead to significant financial consequences, the aim is to support businesses in identifying at-risk customers early, enabling more effective retention strategies and reducing the risk of customers switching to competitors. Specifically, the thesis explores how interpretable machine learning models can be leveraged to uncover behavioral patterns predicting churn, evaluate the effectiveness of predictive models, and estimate customer lifetime value in order to assist in better resource allocation strategies for companies. Research question: The research questions of this thesis are: 1. What customer behavior patterns are the most significant indicators of churn in a non-contractual retail setting? 2. What machine learning model provides higher predictive accuracy in identifying customer churn in a non-contractual retail setting? 3. How can machine learning models be applied to estimate customer lifetime value in a non-contractual setting? Method: The research strategy employed in this thesis is experimental in nature, as it aims to systematically explore and evaluate the performance of machine learning models. It takes a quantitative approach, using supervised machine learning models to analyze patterns in customer behavior and predict churn. By applying the quantitative methods of logistic regression, decision trees and random forest, the thesis aims to uncover key predictors of churn, determine the best model and estimate customer lifetime value. The data analyzed in this thesis is the synthetic dataset called Online Retail Customer Churn Dataset and was retrieved from the Kaggle platform. Results: The results showed that decision trees outperformed logistic regression and random forest in terms of identifying churners. The analysis of feature importance highlighted transactional patterns and engagement behavior as the most important predictors of churn. To estimate customer lifetime value with machine learning a binary variable was needed to enable classification. The strongest predictors of high or low customer lifetime value across all models were spending behavior and marketing response variables, and the random forest model achieved the best F1-score on the better predicted class. Discussion: The findings suggest that customers’ transactional patterns and engagement behavior are more reliable signals of future churn than who they are demographically. From a business perspective, this insight could be valuable for targeting retention efforts. The decision tree outperformed the other models in detecting churners, which is often the primary focus in churn prediction. Ultimately, the choice of model should be guided by the specific objectives of the churn management strategy and the relative costs of false positives and false negatives. Additionally, the findings suggest that in non-contractual settings, customer lifetime value estimation with the help of machine learning is best approached through modeling with behavioral and demographic features. Some limitations of the study are reproducibility, concerning the code, validity, concerning the historic customer lifetime value approach, and generalizability, due to the relatively small dataset. Further research could explore why transaction amount consistently emerges as a strong predictor in churn, why the number of returns stood out as the most important feature in the decision tree, and study customer lifetime value on a deeper level to predict monetary values and to either corroborate or refute identified predictors
”You need to be thick-skinned” : A qualitative study about women in a male-dominated field
No full textSyftet med denna studie var att synliggöra kvinnors erfarenheter av att arbeta i en mansdominerad bransch och förstå hur hinder och möjligheter påverkar deras yrkesroller. Detta undersöktes med hjälp av semistrukturerade intervjuer där nio kvinnor deltog, som alla arbetar på samma mansdominerade företag, där datan sedan analyserades tematiskt. Resultatet består av fem teman som beskriver kvinnornas upplevda egenskaper, arbetsplatskultur, utmaningar, möjligheter och faktorer som påverkar beslutet att stanna. Detta inkluderade beskrivningar av mjuka och hårda egenskaper, erfarenheter av jargong och samarbete, olika hinder och gynnsamma förhållanden, samt motivationer för att fortsätta i branschen. Slutsatsen var att kvinnor anpassar sig till en manlig normerad miljö, behöver bevisa sin kompetens, men ser också möjligheter och använder sina egenskaper som styrkor. Viktiga faktorer för att stanna är kollegialitet, frihet, stöd från chefer och utvecklingsmöjligheter. Studien visar att kvinnorna fungerar som aktiva förändringsaktörer och omformar könsnormer inifrån.This study aimed to highlight women’s experiences of working in male-dominated industry and to understand how barriers and opportunities affect their professional roles. This was investigated using semi-structured interviews with nine women, all of whom work at the same male-dominated company, where the data was then analyzed thematically. The results consist of five themes that describe women’s percived characteristics, workplace culture, challenges, opportunities and factors that influence the decision to stay. This included descriptions of soft and hard characteristics, experiences of jargon and collaboration, various barriers and favorable conditions, and motivations for continuing in the industry. The conclusion was that women adapt to a male-dominated enviroment, need to prove their competence, but also see opportunities and use characteristics as strengths. Impotant factors for staying are collegiality, freedom, support from managers and development opportunities. The study shows that women are active change agents and reshape gender norms from within
Mathematics teachers’ collegial learning as didactic praxeologies : Conditions and constraints from the perspectives of teachers and principals
No full textA credit card fraud detection approach based on ensemble machine learning classifier with hybrid data sampling
No full textThe existing fraud detection methods present limitations such as imbalanced data, incorrect identification of fraudulent cases, limited applicability to different scenarios, and difficulties processing data in real-time. This paper proposes an ensemble machine-learning model for detecting fraud in credit card transactions. It also integrates the Synthetic Minority Oversampling Technique (SMOTE) with Edited Nearest Neighbor (ENN) to address the problem of the imbalanced datasets. The experimental results show that our approach performs better than the existing methods. Therefore, it will establish an essential framework for the ongoing investigations in developing more robust and flexible systems for fraud detection
The Circumstantial View of Life : Narrative and the Novelistic Peripeteia
No full textThis article proposes a reconceptualization of the narrative form that Ian Watt saw as constitutive of the novel as it emerged in the eighteenth century: its “circumstantial view of life.” Elaborating on the structural similarity between the Aristotelian peripeteia and Roland Barthes's, Paul Ricœur's, and Frank Kermode's theory of narrative as an operation that transforms chance into destiny, the article argues that the circumstantial view of life is what constitutes the narrative peripeteia in the novel. The author explores what this means for our understanding of the function of narrative transformations in the novel through examples from the eighteenth-century German novel and the theoretical discussion surrounding it
Betydelsen av utbildning, behandling och arbete under fängelsetiden för arbetsmarknadsanknytning
No full textIt is well-known that individuals incarcerated in prisons often have poor connections to the labour market. This article examines whether education, treatment, and work during incarceration influence labour market attachment after release. The dataset consists of 12,127 individuals who were incarcerated in Swedish prisons between 2012 and 2015. Data were collected from the Swedish Prison and Pro-bation Service, Statistics Sweden, and the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention. Regression analysis indicates that education, treatment, and work all have an impact on labour market attachment. However, when additional variables are included in the analysis, prior attachment to the labour market emerges as the most significant factor. Gender, age, and substance abuse also influence connection to the labour market. The findings are discussed with reference to the concepts of turning points and hooks for change
Mobilising Sweden’s past to prepare for war : gendered military heritagization and ‘security truths’
No full textThis article combines feminist international relations theory with critical heritage studies to theorise how gender and sexualities shape heritage as a national security resource. By analysing the mobilisation of gender in military memory initiatives coproduced by Swedish heritage and security actors, we expand the literature on populist ‘illiberal memory-making’ and demonstrate that situations of insecurity may prompt gender-conservative and militarised memory-making also in stable liberal democracies. In response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Swedish cultural heritage has been framed as part of the national defence and a means to prepare citizens for war. By examining this novel heritagization, we reveal how today’s security politics appear to emanate naturally from history. Associations between territory and heterosexuality communicate nativist versions of history and delineate who is entitled to protection. The mobilisation of gender in heritagization makes the nation seem transcendental and supports military violence as a precondition of national security and survival. In relation to contemporary security policy, values and emotions connected to femininities and masculinities both delegitimise earlier security doctrines and pave the way for rearmament and militarisation. Gendered military heritagization contributes to shaping violence as a ‘security truth’ and restricts alternative perspectives and democratic conversations.Kulturarvets förändrade betydelse i tider av osäkerhet och militär beredska
Teaching and Pedagogical Content Knowledge in school-age educare : The interaction between child-led, situation-led, and goal-led teaching
No full textThe purpose of this thesis is to explore teaching and pedagogical content knowledge in school-age educare. The following research questions were constructed in relation to this purpose: In what ways can the knowledge categories subject matter knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, contextual knowledge and curricular knowledge be expressed in teaching in school-age educare?, How can PCK as a theoretical framework be used as a tool for analysing teaching in school-age educare?, and How is children's active participation and agency enabled in school-age educare? This thesis uses the theoretical framework Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK). PCK is used to articulate the pedagogical content knowledge of school-age educare teachers. The studies in the thesis focus on analyses of school-age educare teachers’ teaching representations, descriptions of children's active participation and agency in previous PCK studies, and school-age educare teachers’ formulations in written educational plans. The methods used in the studies include observation, document analysis and text analysis. Using the analytical concepts from the theoretical framework of PCK, the analyses have focused on school-age educare teachers' subject matter knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, contextual knowledge and curricular knowledge and how these knowledge categories are interwoven and transformed into teaching. The analyses considered how these representations are implemented in interactions with children and how teachers in school-age educare plan for teaching. To problematise and discuss the PCK theoretical framework for studies regarding school-age educare teachers’ PCK, the analysis concepts of children's active participation and agency were added. The overall results of the thesis revealed three prominent forms of teaching in the school-age educare: child-led teaching, situation-led teaching and goal-led teaching. Thus, the thesis demonstrates how school-age educare teachers possess knowledge to control teaching situations and enable children to do the same. The thesis also demonstrates how teaching situations can be initiated in a variety of ways not previously mentioned in studies. Another finding is simultaneity, which shows how teachers in the school-age educare setting organise multiple different teaching situations simultaneously. Readiness for action and co-creation are also results that show how teachers in school-age educare carry out teaching. Another central aspect of the conceptual basis of teaching in school-age educare could be whether teaching enables children's agency or not. This demonstrates the need for concepts to help us understand and visualise teaching in a school-age educare setting, ensuring it is not confused with teaching in other forms of schooling. This thesis also contributes to further development of the scientific basis for analysing school-age educare teachers’ teaching using PCK as a theoretical framework, thereby offering an innovative way of describing the teaching of school-age educare teachers and their pedagogical content knowledge.Avhandlingens övergripande syfte är att utforska undervisning och undervisningskunskap i fritidshem. Forskningsfrågorna riktar sig mot kunskapskategorierna formulerade inom det teoretiska ramverket Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) och hur de kan användas som analysverktyg i forskning om undervisning och undervisningskunskap i fritidshem samt hur barns aktiva deltagande och aktörskap möjliggörs i fritidshem. Följande forskningsfrågor ställs i avhandlingen: På vilka sätt kan kunskapskategorierna ämneskunskap, pedagogisk kunskap, kontextuell kunskap och läroplanskunskap komma till uttryck i undervisning i fritidshem?, Hur kan det teoretiska ramverket PCK användas som verktyg för analys av undervisning i fritidshem? och Hur möjliggörs barns aktiva deltagande och aktörskap i undervisning i fritidshem? PCK är utformad för att skapa förståelse för och sätta ord på lärares undervisningskunskap. Det är ett för fritidshemmet nyskapande sätt att konstruera analyser och benämna undervisning och undervisningskunskap. Avhandlingens delstudier fokuserar på analyser av lärare i fritidshems undervisningshandlingar i interaktion med barn, beskrivningar av barns aktiva deltagande och aktörskap i tidigare PCK-studier samt lärare i fritidshems formuleringar i skriftliga pedagogiska planeringar. Metoderna som använts i delstudierna är observationer, dokumentanalys och textanalys. Genom analysbegreppen från det teoretiska ramverket för avhandlingen PCK har analyserna fokuserat på lärare i fritidshems ämneskunskap, pedagogiska kunskap, kontextuella kunskap och läroplanskunskap samt hur dessa kunskapskategorier vävs samman och transformeras till undervisning. Detta analyserades både utifrån hur undervisningshandlingar praktiskt genomförs i interaktion med barn och hur lärare i fritidshem planerar för undervisning i fritidshem. Som komplement till detta och för att kunna problematisera samt diskutera det teoretiska ramverket PCK för studier avseende lärare i fritidshems undervisningskunskap adderades analysbegreppen barns aktiva deltagande och aktörskap. Utifrån resultaten i delstudierna har ett övergripande resultat för avhandlingen formulerats där tre teman utkristalliserats: barnstyrd, situationsstyrd och målstyrd undervisning. I avhandlingen visas hur lärare i fritidshem har kunskap om att styra undervisningssituationer samt kunskap om att möjliggöra för barn att styra undervisningssituationer. Ett annat resultat i lärarnas undervisningskunskap är samtidighet där de studerade lärarna visar hur de kan organisera flera olika undervisningssituationer samtidigt i fritidshemsmiljön där barn möjliggörs aktörskap att ingå i dessa undervisningssituationer utifrån egna val. Andra resultat som visats i avhandlingen kan formuleras i termer av medskapande och handlingsberedskap där lärarna i fritidshem ses kunna utföra undervisning tillsammans med barn. Lärarna kan även ses ha en handlingsberedskap genom att kunna genomföra undervisning i den omedelbara situationen utifrån barns initiativ eller lärarnas initiativ. Denna avhandling bidrar även till att vidareutveckla den vetenskapliga grunden för att analysera lärare i fritidshems undervisning utifrån PCK som teoretiskt ramverk och genom detta erbjuda ett nydanande sätt för att beskriva undervisning och undervisningskunskap i fritidshem