Sveriges mest laddade rum? : En kritisk diskursanalys av biblioteksrummet som gränssnitt mellan användare och uppdrag

Following a rapid change in the way information is shared in our society, we have seen over the last few decades a change in how libraries construct their activities in relation to the library space. Different attitudes and opinions on what should or should not be going on in the library space, and by that extension the library’s purpose in itself, have come and gone, and built on each other in the public debate. Little has been researched as to how the libraries themselves convey their approach to their mission in the actual library space. We are interested in how libraries convey their mission in the library space with the background of existing in a society where cultural institutions are more and more being constituted by their users, as well as being an institution with power to constitute. By using Norman Fairclough's critical discourse analysis as a method and theory we look into how different discourses appear in the physical library rooms as well as in interviews with library directors. In addition to Fairclough's theory, and as means to examine how our results relate to society, we brought Nancy Fraser’s theory of public space and the public sphere into play, developed from Jürgen Habermas theory of the public sphere and bourgeois society. The study centers around what the discourses can say about the relationship between libraries and society and also what priorities and decisions concerning the spatial contents may say about the libraries self-understanding as an institution. In the four interviews and the four observations that we conducted we have been able to discern a number of different discourses in the library space, and a more prominent one is the discourse of the library users as co-creators of the content in the library space. We have also seen that the book discourse that has been dominant in previous decades tend to be somewhat replaced with discourses that promotes a changed attitude among the library’s leadership with respect to what and who should be able to constitute the library’s activities. The limits of the library’s space is however a factor that plays a part in how discourses are constructed in regards to what format, and the activities relating to the format, takes precedence in the discussion on what should constitute the library. We were able to view our results through Fraser’s theoretical lense and discern even more clearly the library’s role in society as an arena for a multi-public sphere, and a public space that is in a constant negotiation over its core missions