IDENTITETSSKAPANDE I STUDENTFÖRENINGEN ULRIKA ... - DiVA

I D E N T I T E T S S K A P A N D E I S T U D E N T F Ö R E N I N G E N
What meanings are associated with the ideal identity? Who represent the
‘others’, and how do the members distinguish themselves from them?
In what ways do the members try to be in accord with, represent or re-negotiate
the ideal identity?
What symbolic capital do the members try to gain in the society and how does
this manifest the ideal identity?
How is the ideal identity manifested as an intersection of class and gender and
what does this mean to individual members in terms of ideological dilemmas?
Methodological considerations and issues
The main data was collected form interviews with members of the board of
three student societies. The interviews were based on an interview guide in
which the informants were asked to describe, explain and take a stand on various
issues related to their background, education, view of the future and involvement
in the students’ society. The informants were asked to describe the
members of the board, the other members of the society and their fellow students,
and to reflect on the university environment. They were also asked to
comment on some pictures and texts taken from the union’s homepages.
A total of 29 board members were interviewed. They represented three different
students’ societies, belonging to the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Technology,
the Faculty of the Social Sciences, and the Faculty of Medicine respectively.
In the text the three societies are called the NATEK, SAM and MED
society respectively. The three societies are linked to a specific education programme
in the sense that they recruit students attending the same course. They
are located at the ‘grass root level’ of the student union hierarchy. The interviews
have been transcribed as carefully as possible.
Furthermore, texts and pictures from the societies’ homepages have been examined.
In addition, the four available issues of the SAM society’s journal were
analysed. This data consists of both written texts and pictorial language, and
they are regarded as parts of the members’ own joint narrative about themselves
and hence as a manifestation of the ideal identity.
In the analysis I looked for both recurrent themes and more unusual thought
patterns, and a large amount of data was summarised in this process. From the
logic of the informants’ ways of representing the world and themselves, fundamental
elements of their ideal identity could be described. Some narratives
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