The aim of this study is to situate the locus of the Swedish branch of freemasonry, Svenska Frimurare Orden, in the contemporary religious landscape. The research questions are as follows: On what grounds can the Swedish branch of freemasonry be considered religious? If the Swedish branch of freemasonry is considered religious, how does it fit into the contemporary society among the plethora of new religious movements? In regard to the first question, a definition of religion is required, thus Bruce Lincoln’s theory with four domains of religion is used to decide to what extent the Swedish branch of freemasonry can be described as a religion or a religious movement. To be able to answer the second research question the four sociological narratives as presented by Meredith B. McGuire are used to analyze the results of our study.

The results are reached through examination of the common laws of the Swedish branch of freemasonry and the data found on their official website, combined with hermeneutic interpretation. Our conclusion is that the Swedish branch of freemasonry through its explicit connection to Christianity, in addition to its esoteric and occult practices both fits into a historical continuity regarding religion in Sweden, as well as with contemporary societal currents regarding new religious movements.

This study is about the so called Islamic States’ use of Islamic religious traditions in their propaganda magazine Dabiq. The purpose of the study is to find out how ISIS use history as a blueprint to perceive and interpret current events and occurrences. The theories of sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, Capital, and sociopsychologist Hjalmar Sundén’s Role theory is used to analyze how the different religious traditions and stories are used by ISIS and what these represent in the Muslim’s religious frame of perception. The results of this study show that the religious traditions are being used in order to legitimize, justify and establish their so-called Caliphate according to the stories of old. The results also show that not only religious matters are used to emphasize their claim in the Middle East but profane examples as well. 

Denna studie utforskar elevers diskurser kring begreppen religiös fundamentalism och religiöst motiverad terror. Mer specifikt undersökt elevers diskurs utifrån frågeställningarna: (1.) Vilken diskurs har eleverna kring begreppen fundamentalism och terrorism? (2.) Om, och på vilka sätt berörs begreppen fundamentalism och terrorism i skolan? Och (3.). Om, och på vilket sätt skiljer sig utlärningen av begreppen fundamentalism och terrorism åt mellan de deltagande skolorna? Studiens metod bestod av en enkät distribuerad till elever i 2 högstadieskolor och en gymnasieskola. Totalt deltog 114 elever.

Enkäten bestod av såväl kvantitativa som kvalitativa frågor. Studien tog teoretisk utgångpunkt i diskursanalys samt postkolonial teoribildning med särskild tyngdpunkt på orientalism (Said 2003). Vidare antog och testade studien hypotesen om att eleverna, utifrån förekomsten av islamofobisk diskurs i västvärlden (DO, 2013; Romelin, 2018), i sin diskurs sammanblandar och sammankopplar begreppen religiös fundamentalism och religiöst motiverad terrorism. Den huvudsakliga analysen genomfördes genom granskning av elevsvar, givna i en enkät strukturerad specifikt efter studiens syfte. Teorin som ligger till grund för arbetet är grundad teori, där teman sorteras och läggs till grund för tolkningar mot teorin. I detta fall kommer en tematisk innehållsanalys ligga till grund för granskningen av de kvalitativa enkätsvar som framkommit.

Resultatet av studien visade att eleverna, i stor utsträckning, antingen sammankopplar begreppen med varandra alternativt har en vag uppfattning om begreppen fundamentalism. Dessa begrepp kopplas även till religionen Islam såväl som Mellanöstern. Islams bild i media och kända terroristers islamska ursprung kan tänkas ligga bakom sammankopplingen av islam till terrorism och fundamentalism. Dessa resultat kan sägas bekräfta den postkoloniala teoribildningen vilken beskriver occidenten och orienten i termer av Orientalism.

Med utgångspunkt i postkolonial teoribildning och diskursteori, diskuteras studiens resultat i förhållande till grund- respektive gymnasieskolans styrdokument, skillnader och likheter mellan skolorna samt sammanblandningen mellan begreppen. Slutligen presenteras studiens slutsatser samt praktiska implikationen till lärare hur de, med stöd utav skolans styrdokument kan undervisa om fundamentalism och terrorism för sina elever.

Historical research, especially research without clear genealogical bonds to contemporary world religions seems to be on the way out of the national curricula in Sweden, both in secondary school and at the universities. The new national guidelines for the secondary school, decided by the government 2010, show this clearly. This situation diverges greatly from the curriculums just 30-40 years ago where the proportions have been nearly the opposite. This study aims to investigate this difference to “former times” more closely.

Material for this study is selected textbooks for the secondary school and the national curriculums from different époques. The method is both qualitative and quantitative. How much space takes the past compared to the present? Which past is represented, what are the main themes? Is there an argument for the selection? Are the past and the people of the past treated differently than present religions? The theoretical point of departure is inspired from anthropological research about race, ethnicity and religion, looking for implicit and explicit valuations of religions and peoples from former times, trying to outline the differences over time.

The analysis of the national curricula raises questions of education politics and the role of past religions within it. Have there been power-shifts of minority and majority groups? This would be interesting for further investigations both in comparison to other countries as to other objects like the department of history.

This paper aims to investigate the tensions between “religion at home”, local cults and Empire religion with a starting point of the cult of the matrons - figurines located both in domestic and public contexts. The material used are altar stone reliefs and terracotta figurines of the matrons from the northwestern Roman provinces during the Empire period focusing on terracotta figurines in order to illuminate the domestic contexts. The sources are connected to temples, roads and houses; most of them in urban regions; in spite of the multipresence in practice there is no evidence in any written literature though. Public altar stone reliefs are most often treated as dedications, sometimes as “do ut des- magic” with its problems of the old fashioned evolutionary approach. What about the domestic contexts? In what way may interpretations of the domestic ritual actions help us to reevaluate the complex and multifaceted cult of the matrons looking at sources as an entity? Connecting public and domestic acts of ritualization hopefully contributes to a more appropriate analysis both of the diversity and the consistency of the imaginative knowledge. Theories and methods of the paper are inspired by visual arts as part of a material culture highlighting socio-cultural dimensions of the Empire time trying to look beyond concepts of deities as the main matter of religious encounters.