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Through a conversation analytic approach, we investigate the emergence of accounts provided by autistic children in small-group discussions. Nine Finnish children (7-10 years old) attending school with special support participated in a five-month-duration pedagogical practice purposefully designed to enhance children's participation in groups. We analyzed videos of sharing circles where children discussed their ideas and interests. Our data show three different account structures, which created different modes of children's participation and gradually changed how they positioned themselves in the group. Results show how accounts can create different focuses of attention; reveal children's reflections on what is relevant to them, and how to promote the exchange of ideas within a small group. Implications for the development of educational practices are discussed.

This paper aims to interrogate the design studio conversations between teachers and students in order to explore the indicators regarding empathy. To investigate design conversations occurring between design teachers and design students, participant observation studies were conducted at two universities in Finland and Turkey. As an empathic indicator, we addressed (1) how design teachers take the perspective of other agencies and (2) what deliveries are utilised for empathic perspective-taking. It was understood that design teachers identify themselves with both human and non-human agencies as design students, users and materials. Moreover, deliveries leading to the identification of design teachers with these agencies included both discursive and performative means.

Practicum periods are an essential part of early childhood education and care (ECEC) teacher training. To support a student's learning, they need supervision by an expert ECEC teacher to process and analyse information, and supervisory discussions are key forums for that. The aim of this study is to examine the cultural scripts that are identifiable through discourse analysis of supervisory discussions between an ECEC student teacher and a supervising ECEC teacher. In the analysis we focused on the practical cultural script, phases of the supervisory discussions and the structure of the supervisory relationship. The data comprised recorded supervisory discussions. Three discursive phases can be identified in supervisory discussions: (1) the Launching phase, (2) the Reflective phase and (3) the Closing phase. The supervising ECEC teacher is responsible for conducting the discussion and for extending the topics of supervisory discussion. The results of our study show that practices in the ECEC centre dominate supervisory discussions and the role of educational theory remains at the margins. The results further highlight the need to develop collaboration between universities and ECEC centres.

Purpose: This study aims to explore the range of sustainability-related discourses by the stakeholders within a particular Finnish Higher Education Institution (HEI); interaction between the discourses and the context of the HEI; and the extent to which different understandings of sustainability cause challenges for the implementation of the university strategy for sustainability. Specifically, the paper explores how the employees within the HEI make sense of sustainability in their teaching, research and daily life and the extent to which sustainability-related discourses are aligned with the university strategy. Design/methodology/approach: This research draws upon collected qualitative and quantitative data. It focuses on individual discourses by executives, teaching and research staff within an HEI regarding their understandings of sustainability and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Findings: This paper illustrates the key challenges of sustainability and SDG implementation that may emerge in HEIs due to varied understandings. The results indicate a need for efficient HEI strategic vision communication and consideration of the stakeholders' multiplicity of sustainability values. Originality/value: This paper sheds light on the challenges involved in seeking to enhance sustainable development in an academic setting with multiple disciplines and categories of staff guided by academic freedom. The analysis thus advances the understanding of academic sustainability-related discourses and framings as well as mechanisms through which the implementation of sustainability-related efforts can be enhanced in such a context.

This article presents findings from an empirical study in which we investigated Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) students' linguistic resources in the L2 (English) to convey different Cognitive Discourse Functions (Dalton-Puffer 2013; 2016)--"Describe, Compare (Categorize), Report, Evaluate" and "Explore"--in two different contexts. The participants were primary school students (grade 6) participating in CLIL programs in Finland and Spain. To allow comparison, two sets of data were obtained by asking the students to write in response to a similar prompt in the area of social science (History in the Spanish context and Geography in the Finnish context). We compared the frequency of the Cognitive Discourse Functions (CDFs) produced, and the fluency and complexity of students' realizations of CDFs, using tools of Systemic Functional Linguistics. The results reveal similarities across contexts in the frequency and extension of some of the CDFs produced, and differences in terms of CDF complexity, measured in students' use of clause complexes, "Appraisal" resources and complex nominal groups to express different CDFs.

In this article, we examine how policymakers from three Nordic countries, Finland, Iceland and Sweden, reflect on the future at 2 different points in time: just before the first PISA study (1998-1999) and more than 15 years later (2015-2017). The empirical data consist of interviews (N = 37) with national policymakers, collected in two comparative Nordic education policy research projects. As a result of this study, we identified three common themes according to which Nordic policymakers discussed the future: (a) school, work, and social equality in a changing society; (b) policies and practices of education governance; and (c) the future of the teaching profession and teacher education. Whereas these themes constitute a shared semantic basis for envisioning the future of Nordic education, contrasting policymakers' future reflections across time and space also reveals differences, contradictions and changes in ways of thinking about the future.

The reformed Finnish vocational education and training (VET) system is a competence-based, customer-oriented educational programme with two overarching aims: to develop a skilled labour force and to promote social inclusion. Support and guidance have become increasingly important in Finnish VET in recent decades. This study focuses on how linguistic constructions of support and guidance for VET students with special educational needs are constructed in the dynamics between institutional ideas and the language use of VET staff. Data were collected through focus group discussions among different categories of staff. Through a psychological discourse analysis, three different linguistic constructions emerged: a package of support measures, a structure falling apart and dialogue as a bridge builder. Tensions and contradictions were identified between the different constructions. The results point to the need for balance between institutional structures and the possibilities of staff that daily interact with the student to provide holistic support measures.

Finland has repeatedly been presented as a "success story" of equality and education, promoter of human rights and included equality and human rights as part of national curricula. However, research has shown the slow progress of integrating topics of equality and human rights in teacher education despite hundreds of project-based interventions during the past 50 years. We used historically informed discursive reading drawing from the existent literature, human rights and equality policy documents, and data from student teachers (n = 311) about their perceptions. The theoretical framework in this article is grounded in critical and feminist theories. The aim is to analyse why student teachers still report receiving too little education in human rights and equality despite the improvements in human rights and equality education law and policy. We argue that Finnish teacher education has an ambivalent role of representing itself as "exceptional" while reproducing inequalities. Furthermore, this alleged "exceptionalism" does not enable a focus on equality and human rights policies goals. We constructed a general theoretical frame to re-examine critically the role of ambivalence, ignorance, and "innocence", which reproduce inequalities. Our analysis describes several discursive realities of public narratives and student teachers' experiences concerning equality and human rights education. This article provides a novel interpretation frame for the persisting inequalities in education in a country that profiles itself as a champion of human rights and equality. Based on our results, we suggest critical self-reflection for educational policy to advance continuous measures to affect structural inequalities.

The development of videoconferencing technology has enabled new modes of combining in-person and remote teaching. In this article, we investigate interactional practices in hybrid language classrooms that combine on-site and remote participation by way of telepresence technology. Telepresence robots are videoconferencing tools that can be remotely controlled and moved in the 'local' space during video-mediated interaction. In our video-based study, we investigate recordings from university-level foreign language classes (Finnish, German, Swedish and English) involving robot-mediated participants as part of an otherwise on-site classroom student cohort. We draw on multimodal conversation analysis (CA) and analyse a selection of data extracts with a focus on how participants use the robot's mobility as an interactional resource in moments of transition between whole-class and group-based activities. The analysis explores how moving the robot enables the remote student to demonstrate competent participation and to contribute to the progression of the activity transition. We also analyse how teachers make sense of the remote students' engagements by monitoring the positioning and movements of the robot, and how they individually support the remote students in moments that can potentially be interactionally challenging in hybrid environments. These findings expand CALL literature by demonstrating how telepresence robots can enhance the multimodal range of meaning-making resources of remote students within everyday classroom practices in hybrid language teaching. As practical implications, we outline some ways in which social interaction provides both a rich resource base for participants and a site in which many pedagogical questions relevant to hybrid education play out.

Finnish queer teachers work in an esteemed profession but also belong to a marginalized minority group. This article analyses interview data focusing on non-heterosexual teachers' understanding of their language use in schools, drawing from sociolinguistic research with queer linguistics. Methodologically, Critical Discourse Analysis is applied to the data to explore the influence of heteronormativity shaping the way queer teachers understand their language use, resting on the knowledge that language use constructs social meanings and establishes discourses. The analysis provides discourses of safety, incompatibility and resistance that demonstrate the construction of social meanings to the understanding of language use, suggesting the main issues in heteronormative schools are connected to safety and experiencing incompatibility as a teacher. Queer teachers are also compelled to resist heteronormativity in many ways. The article concludes that there are heteronormative power settings specific to educational contexts, information that could be utilized for initiating change.

This qualitative study explores teaching and learning cultures in the context of a community-oriented pedagogical development process initiated during Finnish-Palestinian transnational cooperation. Research data include focus group interviews and texts produced during a pedagogical training program with Palestinian university instructors. The study examines teaching and learning cultures as constructed by discourses in and around the Palestinian university. A poststructuralist discourse analysis identified five discourses of teaching and learning: disciplinary differences, traditional and modern education, improving education, sociocultural and religious context, and political and economic circumstances. The study shows that teaching and learning cultures are dynamic and fragmented as they are constructed by the contrasting discourses. The findings suggest that pedagogical development initiatives need to provide spaces for discursive transformation, especially in the transnational context that introduces additional alternative discourses into the institutional cultural meaning-making.

We present the analysis of an episode of mathematical problem solving in a group, where data came from multiple advanced recorders, including multiple video cameras, Smartpen recorders, and mobile eye tracking glasses. Analysis focused on a particular group that was ineffective in their problem-solving process. Relying on the commognitive theory of learning on the one hand, and on quantitative descriptors of eye-tracking data on the other hand, we ask how do the interpretations of the discourse analysis and gaze data complement each other in understanding the obstacles to problem-solving in this episode. The setting included four Finnish 9th grade students solving a geometrical problem in the students' authentic mathematics classroom. The commognitive analysis revealed intensive social communication (subjectifying) along with the mathematical one (mathematizing), which seemed to interfere with the problem-solving process. Specifically, it masked the differences in students' interpretation of the tasks, and did not allow explication of meta-rules according to which students endorsed mathematical claims. Diagrams of quantified gaze data enabled a more macro-level picture of the full 15 min interaction, revealing differential loci of attention of the group members and thus triangulating the micro-analysis.

The doctoral defence is the oral examination of the doctoral thesis. While it is a major milestone for doctoral candidates, this event is often shrouded in mystery. In this article, I explore the doctoral defence from an international perspective. I have studied the format of the defence based on written testimonies as well as the literature on this topic. From this analysis, I distinguish four main elements of the defence format: (1) timing of the defence with respect to thesis publication, (2) number of steps in the defence, (3) public or private defence, and (4) the timeline of the defence itself. I then use these building blocks of the doctoral defence format to discuss differences and similarities between the formats, and finally to categorize defence formats used internationally by analysing the format of 26 countries, 24 of which use an oral defence format. The result is a deeper understanding of the defence format, which is valuable for candidates, committee members, supervisors, and administrators, and which can also serve the current discussions within the European Union on a standard format for the doctoral defence. Ultimately, understanding the defence format removes the mystery surrounding the defence.

External privatisation of public education has emerged in Finland in the admission to higher education. A field analysis of thematic interviews (N = 22) with powerful actors in the private educational market and middle-class young people applying for places at universities in the highly competitive disciplines of medicine and law was conducted. The research task was to examine the discourses that construct the limits of the public and private fields, and the kind of homology that emerges. Four discourses were identified: support, business, social responsibility, and personal responsibility. The private field distinguished itself from the public fields through the discourse of business and attached itself to it through the discourse of support. The dominance of the symbolic power of transformed economic capital in the private field mobilised in the public field was misrecognised during the admission process as 'motivation'. The homology between the two fields was strong yet hidden.

In market-oriented higher education (HE) systems, fee-paying students are positioned as customers, and studying is juxtaposed with service use. In this study, we investigate how students position themselves in relation to the student-as-customer discourse in Finnish HE, in which only students coming from outside the EU and EEA areas are charged tuition fees. We investigate the construction of the student-as-customer discourse in the narrative environment of Finnish HE through interviews with both international fee-liable and Finnish non-fee-paying master's degree students (n = 34). In addition, we analyse social differences that are constructed between fee-liable and non-fee-paying students in relation to the student-as-customer discourse. We argue that fee liability creates unequal positions for some international students and thus challenges the equality principles embedded in Finnish HE. Paradoxically, it was also found that the fee-liable student-customers have less freedom and fewer options than the non-fee-paying students.

Background: Although the contexts, structures and administrations of early childhood education (ECE) may differ internationally, effective pedagogical leadership remains an essential component in supporting young children's development and learning. This paper reports on a comparative study which considered ECE in two different settings, Finland and Florida, providing insight into teachers' perspectives on the characteristics of pedagogical leadership. Purpose: This study sought to investigate and compare the perspectives of ECE teachers and directors in Finland and Florida via their discourses about teachers' pedagogical leadership. The goal was to provide an overview of the ECE teachers' and directors' discourses in each location, in order to allow comparison and a better understanding of the influence of aspects including locational contexts, curricular guidelines and teacher preparation on the ECE teachers' and directors' perspectives. Method: A comparative case study design was used. The data consisted of semi-structured focus group interviews and individual interviews with ECE teachers and centre directors in Finland and in Florida. Data from the two locations were first analysed separately to identify the main discourses; secondly, discourses were compared collectively to reveal major themes. Findings: The analysis indicated a similar conceptualisation of distributed pedagogical leadership. However, differences were identified in teachers' expectations of independence in instructional decisions, and the extension of pedagogical leadership practices within and beyond the ECE centres. The analysis of discourses led to the identification of three major themes, which generated implications for teacher preparation, curriculum development and implementation, and ECE programme directions. Conclusion: The study enables a more comprehensible conceptualisation of teachers' pedagogical leadership as it emerged from teachers' and directors' discourses across two locations. Pedagogical leadership is recognised as an indicator of high-quality pedagogy in early childhood education and the findings highlight the need to continuously support and strengthen teachers' pedagogical leadership.

As governments and international organisations have pressured universities to demonstrate the value and effectiveness of tertiary education, universities have started to highlight graduate employability as a key driver and measure of university outcomes. This paper contributes to the underutilised "processual" employability studies by applying the framework of critical discursive psychology to analyse university students' employability construction. Following this framework, employability is something students "do" rather than something they "have." The empirical study was based on interviews of Finnish students of social science. Analysis of the interviews demonstrated notable variation in the ways in which university students talk about their employability. While some students constructed their employability by positioning themselves as traditional bureaucrats, others constructed their employability by positioning themselves as entrepreneurial agents. Nevertheless, the central point is that some students related ambiguously to both positions and tried to manage the ideological dilemma between stability and security of the bureaucrat position, and variability and risk of the entrepreneurial position. The study calls for better understanding of ways in which students and graduates deal with the dilemmatic nature and requirements of the labour market.

Previous research has shown that the importance of education for sustainability is acknowledged in Finnish early childhood education and care but not systematically put into practice. At present, curricula require considering social, cultural, economic and ecological sustainability in all activities. In this research, discourse analysis was used to examine Finnish personnel's views on the ways in which social and cultural sustainability are taken into account and implemented in work with children. The participants consisted of 53 ECEC teams. The data were gathered through the Assessment tool for Promotion of Sustainability in ECEC (PROSUS). Based on the analysis, three constructions emerged which describe the sustainability work with children under 6 years old. Findings revealed the challenging nature of integrating social justice issues into pedagogy. The implications of this research point the necessity of strengthening personnel's knowledge and understanding of social justice and emphasising children's own agentative role in promoting sustainability work.

The paper explores the "in situ" negotiation of in/exclusion in and through language in a multilingual professional setting, paying special attention to the relationship between language and space. We argue that multilingual practices and material space are co-constitutive; individuals enact group membership and professional roles spatiolinguistically and re/produce in/visible social and material boundaries. Despite the well-established literature on in/exclusion, the ways in which it is negotiated in asymmetrical, emplaced, workplace encounters is still underexplored. We introduce a "topographies of practice" framework and show how professional asymmetries are enacted in and through language choice and language use in the multilingual workplace. We take an Interactional Sociolinguistic approach and report on the analysis of 23 h of interactional data and 42 h of ethnographic observations from a professional, multilingual kitchen in Finland. We show patterns that are un/marked in the data and constitute the norms in this particular workplace. We argue that topographies of practice are topographies of in/exclusion enacted in and through situated encounters; we pay special attention to the role of employees who are legitimised to cross visible and invisible boundaries and we close the paper with recommendations for future research.

Internationalization at home (IaH) policies in higher education institutions (HEIs) are rarely negotiated with and by students. Therefore, students' takes on such policies could be missed opportunities for HEIs. This qualitative study investigates international and local students' negotiations and meaning-making of integration and IaH as stated by institutional policies. The data consist of online forum entries and reports from small group discussions between 40 students in English medium master's programs in Finland (Europe). The key concepts of ideology and imaginary serve as entries into data analysis, which consists of enunciative discourse analysis. The findings indicate a perceived hierarchy of mutual but not equal integration between university staff, local and international students. Furthermore, the categories of 'international as guests' and 'local students as hosts' are challenged by the participants. Local students are considered as 'guests with more privilege' and international students as 'guests with less opportunities'. The responsibility to achieve IaH goals is perceived to be unequally distributed among these actors. Practical implications include reconsidering the categories of 'international' and 'local' students and how IaH policies could share the responsibilities to achieve their goals more equally among students and staff.

This article explores university students' approaches to and positions with regard to making the most of their study time. The article discusses how various normative societal expectations around students' use and management of time feature in their talk about how they organise their everyday lives. The research is based on thematic interviews (n = 28) that focused in detail on students' day-to-day activities that were generated with students from two sets of generalist study fields in three regional Finnish universities. The results of a discursive analysis of students' positionings reveal three discursive positions that represent of a variety in students' approaches to make sense of the temporal organisation of their everyday lives as students. The identified discursive positions draw on broader societal discourses and ideals about fast completion of studies, significance of academic immersion in becoming an expert, and optimising one's time use to enhance employability.

Adopting the methods of multimodal conversation analysis, this study demonstrates that adult second language (L2) users with emergent literacy formulate requests as 'complex multimodal Gestalts' consisting prototypically of deictic or depictive gestures combined with gaze, situationally relevant material, and vocal or linguistic resources. The data obtained for this study are from classroom interactions and out-of-class service encounters that were conducted as part of pedagogical tasks in the context of integration training for adult L2 students with emergent literacy. The analysis shows how co-constructed request sequences typically involve multimodal negotiation in which the co-participants support L2 users to formulate requests that are understandable and that contribute to the progressivity of the interaction. The findings contribute to an understanding of practical requests as multimodal, context-sensitive, collaborative actions and underline the importance of this perspective especially from the view of L2 users with emergent literacy.

Background: Questions about the optimum age for young people to complete their compulsory education, and how this relates to issues of equity, are familiar topics of debate in many jurisdictions. The aim of educational equity has been fundamental in Finnish education, upheld through decades of reforms. A recent reform has extended compulsory education in Finland to the age of 18. As part of gaining insight into its implications, more needs to be understood about how it is perceived by young people in education settings. Purpose: This study sought to explore young people's perceptions of extended compulsory education in the context of the recent reform in Finland. Methods: A total of 19 focus group interviews were carried out with 56 15-to-16-year-olds who were among the first cohort of young people experiencing the extension to compulsory education. Data were analysed qualitatively, using a discourse-analytical approach. Findings: Three main discourses emerged, which helped illuminate the young people's views: (i) grade discourse, (ii) potential equity discourse and (iii) part-of-the-system discourse. Goals and pressure to succeed were emphasised through grade discourse; the extension was also discussed in terms of equity around provision of accessible information and access to education. While most participants deemed completing secondary education self-evident, doubts arose about the system's flexibility and whether it might hinder choice. Different discourses slightly influenced agency; grade discourse reinforced young people's goal-oriented stance. Conclusion: This study highlights how certain 'ideal' positions may be favoured among young people considering various educational and career paths. While effective for those with clear goals, it could discourage deviation from peers' choices. The findings draw attention more broadly to the need for quality study guidance and wellbeing prioritisation for all young people as they negotiate transitional points in their individual learning journeys.

This article examines how second language (L2) interactional competence is manifested in students' use of "and"-prefaced turns when doing meaning-focused oral tasks in pairs and small groups. Drawing on video recordings from English-as-a-foreign-language upper-secondary classes recorded in Czechia and Finland, 86 sequences involving "and"-prefaced turns were scrutinized using multimodal conversation analysis, focusing on language, gaze, and material resources. The findings suggest that by producing "and"-prefaced turns, students orient to task progression. These turns have two functions: task managerial and contribution to the emerging task answer. By using task-managerial "and"-prefaced turns, the current speaker invites another student to participate, while in "and"-prefaced contributions to the task answer, a participant adds to, generalizes, or modifies the previous task answer. The analysis shows that students mobilized their L2 interactional competence in producing "and"-prefaced turns in close coordination with embodied resources and with respect to the spatio-material surroundings and the nature of the task. These findings contribute to the multimodal reconceptualization of the grammar-body interface and research on turn-initial particles within L2 interactional competence.

Based on the identification of the discourse of choice in debates on neoliberalism, meritocracy and post-feminism, this article analyses how highly educated mothers position themselves within the discourse of choice and use "choice" as their discursive resource when reflecting on how their demanding careers combine with motherhood. The data come from 26 interviews with mothers employed in research and innovation in Finland. The analysis reveals five ways in which the mothers positioned themselves within the discourse of choice. It appears these ways are all based on, and produce, the moral primacy of individual self-governance. We treat this as a demonstration of how neoliberalism is internalized and lived. Furthermore, the results show that an egalitarian welfare society whose policies support work-childcare reconciliation does not remove the need to use the individualistic discourse of choice. We suggest that this could be changed by voicing the challenges it poses to many women.

This paper examines the roles of different language ideologies--sets of common-sense beliefs about language and its speakers--in students' identity construction and negotiation in the context of internationalizing higher education. Along with the increasing diversity of students as English speakers, language ideologies have been critically examined for potential contribution to inequalities among students. I analyze two focus group discussions of students from international English-medium instruction master's programs at a Finnish university. I explore the students' talk using critical discursive psychology to illuminate possible intersections between language ideologies and students' situated identity construction, paying attention to ideological dilemmas alongside students' identity negotiation. The findings indicate that both emerging and established language ideologies may become relevant to students' identity construction and negotiation. Possibly, turning students' attention towards the multilinguality of every student and the specific purposes and characteristics of academic language might contribute to the discursive sustainability of inclusive interpersonal relationships among students.

Bad student behaviour is argued to be one of the major challenges for schools today. In response to the challenge, there is a strong body of literature aiming at fixing student behaviour. In this paper, we look into professional knowledge discourses regarding 'bad student behaviour,' focusing on one national context, Finland, to explore how disturbing behaviour is discursively established in the professional literature for teachers seeking help with challenging student incidents. We analyse expert sources that are readily available for Finnish teachers (n = 19), looking at what fields of science are represented, whose voice is represented, how the problem is defined, and where it is located. We conclude that the professional discourse about disturbing behaviour in Finland places the problem on the individual child or family while also silencing the individuals in question and portraying them as deficient. Furthermore, the sources produce a decontextualised notion of behaviour and describe it as either acceptable or unacceptable, completely overlooking any societal, historical or cultural aspects of behaviour or other mitigating circumstances. The findings resonate with research findings from other international contexts.

Previous research has indicated that asylum interviewers--contrary to recommendations--use more closed than open questions to elicit information. In the current study, we investigated how information is elicited in asylum interviews by analyzing question-answer pairs in 105 official Finnish asylum interview transcripts. We developed a new coding framework for analyzing the content and characteristics of the answers and used previously collected data on the questions. As predicted, we found that open questions elicited more new information and new key aspects of the asylum claims than other question types. We further extend on previous research by showing that the free recall phases only elicited half of all key aspects of the claims and that mis-matched answers and difficult or unanswerable questions were alarmingly common. Interviewers would benefit from more training in asking open questions, creating and maintaining rapport, resolving misunderstandings, and increasing the efficacy of the free recall phase.

Objective: This article explores the ideological dilemmas of decision making identified in members' and staff's talk in Clubhouse communities. Method: The data are drawn from a corpus of 10 video-recorded focus group interviews with Clubhouse members and staff, which were collected at five Finnish Clubhouses in 2020. The method used is discursive psychology, and the analysis identifies interpretative repertoires and ideological dilemmas. Results: Clubhouse members and staff express diverse opinions regarding decision making at the Clubhouse. We identified six interpretative repertoires and three ideological dilemmas between these repertoires. The first dilemma deals with participation and efficiency, advancing the idea that everybody should be allowed to participate in decision making, but the decision making should be efficient. The second dilemma regards the passivity or activity of the participants, suggesting that decision-makers should be allowed to be themselves, but participation in decision making requires activity. The third dilemma is associated with power structures in decision making, proposing that joint decision making requires active resistance against power structures, but these structures are both inexorable and partially necessary. Conclusions and Implications for Practice: In introducing a discursive perspective to joint decision making in the Clubhouse community, this study makes visible the conflicting ideals of decision making. The acknowledgment of these dilemmas can guide interventions aiming at improving genuinely participatory joint decision-making practices at the Clubhouse. Impact and Implications: The study shows that Clubhouse members and staff have conflicting ideals about joint decision making at the Clubhouse. The staff's views constitute a potential risk, as they highlight the active role of members and associate efficient decision making with the inexorability of power structures. By making the conflicting ideals visible, the study can inform interventions to improve joint decision making in the Clubhouse community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates how four Finnish media outlets, Helsingin Sanomat, YLE, Iltalehti and STT, framed the discussions about austerity policies and their impacts on Finland's national identity from 1998 to 2019. Using historical discourse analysis, the article shows the arc of austerity reporting and how Finland's position and role in the Euro crisis changed during the years. The analysis reveals something about the national self-understanding of Finland, as presented in the media in relation to other European countries. The article addresses three research questions. (1) How did the journalistic treatment of austerity change over time and what were the key turning points? (2) What kinds of perspectives and narratives did journalism construct in the coverage of austerity? (3) How was Finland as a nation represented and compared to other nations in the context of the Euro crisis and austerity? The article shows that the journalistic coverage of austerity evolved from a local issue affecting municipal economies to a global issue linked to the Euro crisis, and that Finland's national identity was constructed through a contrastive comparison with other Northern and Southern European countries. The article contributes to the discussion on media coverage of austerity by providing a longitudinal comparative analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parents' significance in early childhood education and care (ECEC) is emphasized in the research, but primarily from the perspective of ECEC professionals. Drawing on discursive institutionalism, we analysed what parents of young children in Finland constructed as essential in ECEC from the child's point of view in their discussions concerning the forms of ECEC services. We found that parents constructed ECEC through two interconnected frames: enrichment and safety. The frames indicate that an individual child and her well-being here and now are considered essential in ECEC for Finnish parents. Parents' interpretations differ from one of the global discourses of ECEC, which emphasizes children's development for the future. On the other hand, parents' discourses maintain the cultural distinctions traditionally present in the Finnish ECEC institution. Our study underscores the significance of scrutinizing the construction of educational institutions in the discourses of those whose everyday lives these institutions are. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Supporting sustainability requires understanding human–nature relations, which we approached as social constructions that can be studied through nature-related discourses. We examined human–nature relations in Finland by combining approaches from environmental social sciences and arts-based research into a mixed-methods design. A public online survey (n = 726) and post-performance audience interviews (n = 71) portrayed nature positively. Respondents' ideas of nature ranged from natural scientific to philosophical; from dualistic to holistic; and from ecocentric to anthropocentric. A factor analysis revealed discourses focusing on wellbeing, conservation, ecoanxiety, pro-environmentalism, outdoor activity, and enjoying nature. Interviews added spiritual and over-generational aspects and revealed the importance of embodied experiences in nature relations. We identified dimensions that structure the relations, including human–nature positionality, engagement and contact with nature, and conception and thought. The emotional and experiential aspects, and nature-related practices, deserve further research. We demonstrate how a diversity of human–nature relations co-exists and co-evolves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examined how four hunting organizations in Finland and in the UK (The Finnish Wildlife Agency, Finnish Hunters' Association, The British Association for Shooting and Conservation, and Countryside Alliance) describe wild animals on their web pages and what the moral implications of these descriptions are. How do these hunting organizations define animals, and how does this impact the moral regard given to these animals? Using discourse analysis together with philosophical analysis, our examination revealed that the descriptions focus mainly on physical attributes, leaving out the minds of animals. Therefore, hunting organizations take part in dementalization (underestimation or denial of minds) of nonhuman animals, which interlinks with mechanomorphism (the depiction of animals as biological machines). We argue that dementalization and mechanomorphism in the descriptions serve a strategic purpose, as they hinder the possibility of recognizing animal experiences and individuality and keep animal ethical questions out of view. Further, the organizations tend to approach the ethics of hunting through the perspective of human interests only, whilst the interests and inherent value of animals are sidelined. In sum, the way in which hunting organizations depict animals is prone to sidelining ethical issues concerning the killing of animals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), every child has the right to be heard and express their views in matters that concern them. Yet, participation is one of the most debated aspects of the UNCRC. Although children's participation is a statutory requirement of Finnish early childhood education and care (ECEC) and schools, educators are often unfamiliar with how to meet the demands of participation. In this study, we examined what kinds of counter discourses about the realization of children's participation could be differentiated in interviews with present and future education professionals who took part in a study program focusing on knowledge and skills regarding young children's rights and participation. The data, which consisted of individual and group interviews with 31 participants, were analyzed with discourse analysis. Three counter discourses were identified: unrealized, adult-defined, and elusive participation. The discourses illuminated various dilemmas in children's participation. Awareness of such dilemmas enables the development of pedagogical practices that enhance children's wellbeing and rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to explore the discourse construction through the institutional apparatus and technologies within Pyhä-Luosto National Park, one of the first two national parks established in Finland, by analysing visitors’ reviews. This article investigates the causes behind the differing levels of emphasis that tourists of various languages (Finnish and other languages) and cultural backgrounds place on environmental values or physical activities during their visits. By employing a mixed-methods approach, merging quantitative (frequency analysis) and qualitative (discourse analysis) methodologies, the analysis reveals a distinct divergence in the visitor experiences of the national park based on the background of visitors. Finnish-speaking visitors exhibit a stronger preference for landscape, while international visitors emphasize the experiences derived from physical activities. Through a closer field study in PyhäLuosto National Park, it is proposed that these differences originate from distinct cultural contexts and environmental engagements that shape each visitor’s interaction with the natural landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In flexibly scheduled early childhood education and care (ECEC), the timing of care depends on parents' non-standard working hours. Multiple individual schedules and care times in a child group may cause irregularity in a child's daily structures, and a child may miss a standard hour's activities that are led by teachers with a pedagogical education. In this context, the significance and definition of pedagogy is vague and tensional. This study aimed at disclosing discursive tensions related to pedagogy in flexibly scheduled ECEC constructed in interviews by Finnish teachers and childcare nurses (n = 31). The analysis of the interview data followed the principles of discursive psychology. Consequently, three discursive tensions related to pedagogy were found: (1) children's right to learn vs. their need for care, (2) educators' educational background vs. personal strengths as a standpoint for pedagogical work and (3) pedagogy as standardised vs. meeting children's individual needs. As an implication, it appears problematic if we consider education and care as opposites. Instead, they should be viewed from a holistic pedagogical perspective, as each child has the right to high-quality pedagogy despite the timing of care. Moreover, children's individuality should be at the core of planning pedagogical activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This discourse analytical study explores how health professionals (HPs) construct burnout as a form of mental distress in the context of Finnish burnout rehabilitation framed with a particular rehabilitation ethos. Burnout is a fuzzy concept and lacks a disease status. Therefore, it calls for context-specific definition and justification. By highlighting the socially and interactionally produced character of categories of mental distress, the study investigates the kinds of discourses HPs use to formulate "the problem" and its solutions, and how people dealing with burnout are categorized in these discourses. The data consists of field notes from the observation of group discussion sessions in two 1-year burnout rehabilitation courses. As a result of the analysis, five partly overlapping discourses were identified: psychological, evolutionary, healthy lifestyle, biomedical, and welfare. Within these discourses, people who experience burnout were categorized as over-conscientious employees, "good girls," "primitive people," self-responsible rehabilitees, patients, and (aging) employees with social and legal rights. Burnout rehabilitation and HPs' views reproduce a cultural and clinical discourse around burnout in which work-related problems are treated as individual-level problems and individuals are responsibilized for the management of mental distress. Based on the results, it is concluded that the hybrid type of interventions that attempt to influence both individual- and work-related problems behind burnout would help to prevent people dealing with burnout from being over-responsibilized for solving problems at the workplace. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A temporary exhibition called Ingrians--The Forgotten Finns was on display at the National Museum of Finland in 2020. The exhibition presented the ethnic minority of Ingrian Finns, concentrating on their memories of persecution in the Soviet Union, ethnic mobilization, and migration to Finland. By examining the exhibition's meaning potentials across different semiotic modes, the article explores the ways in which it discursively constructed Ingrian Finnishness. The findings suggest that the exhibition strongly argued for the inclusion of Ingrian Finns in the Finnish nation and highlighted cultural features associated with Finnishness, but also presented them as a distinct group. Remembering the difficult past was viewed as the very essence of the collective identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the benefits of contact for positive intergroup relations are widely acknowledged, less is known about how group members construct the agency and responsibility of contact participants in intergroup encounters. Using critical discursive psychology, we analysed the interpretative repertoires that Finnish majority mothers (N = 13) and mothers with an immigrant background (N = 10) used when talking about a hypothetical intergroup encounter among Finnish and immigrant mothers in a 'family café' (a group for mothers and children). Our analysis identified five interpretative repertoires that differed in terms of the levels of categorization used (individual, group, motherhood) and how agency and responsibility for initiating contact were discursively attributed to the parties in the intergroup encounter. Overall, constructing someone as agentic did not automatically result in their being portrayed as more responsible for making contact. Respondents described contact to occur with only two repertoires, in which both agency and responsibility for initiating contact were discursively attributed to the same party. This highlights the need to consider both agency and sense of responsibility as possible factors preceding intergroup contact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although French courtly models spread to Europe, little research has compared the development of politeness in France with more remote European linguacultures. To fill this gap, I examine folk understandings of historical politeness in Finnish and French linguacultures. Concentrating on cultural outsiders' own understandings – that is, French people living in Finland and Finns who live or have lived in France – my study lies within the framework of a discursive approach, and draws upon data from five focus-group discussions and their dialogical discourse analysis. My study shows that the different forms of government, levels of urbanisation and branches of Christianity reportedly influenced differences in Finnish and French politeness. Yet, during participants' stays in these respective countries, an affinity towards politeness was described as stemming from globalisation. Future research should examine if the frames of expectations of politeness in Europe are generally moving closer towards one another. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyses the visual construction of girls and notions surrounding young femininities articulated by 15 contemporary advertisements of Nordic fast fashion companies, available on their public Facebook pages in Finland. A visual discourse analysis identifies some blatantly stereotypical and a few complex visual constructions of girls as heterosexual, caring, innocent, sexy posers, active self-presenters and self-surveyors, carefree and environmental activists. The implications of our findings, particularly in shaping societal notions surrounding girls, are discussed. The study contributes primarily to the research field of visual commercial representation of girls by unpacking how their complex portrayals can create an equivocation that eventually resurrects stereotypes surrounding young femininities. It advances studies on Nordic consumer culture by highlighting that girls' portrayals by Nordic companies may not clearly reflect the values of state feminism. The study can benefit marketers by sensitising them to how the complex visual representations of girls may (re)produce stereotypes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many researchers have drawn attention to the importance of intersectionality and anti-racism in career guidance, but literature thus far contains few practical examples of how to go about dismantling ethnic and racial normativities that shape educational and labour market transitions. The aim of this article is to deepen the understanding of anti-racist and intersectional career guidance by presenting the results of a study which analysed 22 interviews with counsellors, who work among ethnic and/or racialised minorities and recognise a need to tackle societal inequalities. The study gives examples of critical practices as well as underlines the importance of mainstreaming intersectionality and the advocacy on behalf of oppressed minorities in the guidance practices and ethical guidelines of the profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

National identities are an important tool for collective political persuasion and mobilisation among political elites and lay people. Recent research on nationalism has shown that the negotiating of national identities, like any political deliberations and operations, increasingly occur on the Internet. In this study, we contribute to this research by examining the relational construction of Finnish identity online. More specifically, we focus on how the users of the largest discussion forum in Finland constructed Russia as a threat. A massive dataset spanning 12 years enables us to map the recurring patterns and temporal shifts in the discussions. We show that the construction of Russia as a threatening national other was used to both oppose and support Finland's alliance with the West, namely, becoming a member of NATO. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates 20 years of discursive struggles in Nordic medical journals around the process of legitimating and routinising gestational surrogacy and uterus transplantation in Finland and Sweden. The comparative analysis through critical discourse analysis suggests that influential health care professionals have contributed to different levels of legal and cultural adaptation of the methods, prioritising non-commercial gestational surrogacy in Finland and uterus transplantation in Sweden. The article identifies central discursive turning points in the medical journal discussions by interpreting them against the background of medical and policy developments in Finland and Sweden during the analysed twenty-year period. Legitimation and routinisation of surrogacy and uterus transplantation were developed through biomedicalisation by representing them as infertility treatments and emphasising the relational dynamics between donors and recipients—a connection that in the Nordic context is often based on kinship or close relationships. The diagnosis of absolute uterine factor infertility was central to representing women as on the boundary between fertile and infertile, as they may have functioning ovaries. Through the biomedicalised rhetoric of equal opportunities for biogenetic motherhood, the diagnosed women’s ambiguous reproductive status was used to legitimise the two methods as cures for absolute infertility, thereby reinforcing hegemonic family and kinship norms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Three discourses in law-making were uncovered: Control, Welfare and Rights. • The discourses portrayed varying representations of alcohol and drug (AOD) use. • The representations were: risky behaviour, vulnerable status & ambiguous phenomena. • Depending on the representations, the view on right to self-determination varied. • The perspective of AOD users' experience did not emerge in the data. A growing body of research has analysed the representations of alcohol and other drugs (AOD) in policy-making, but few studies have focused on the representations reproduced in law-making processes, especially in the context of the regulation of the rights of social and health care service users. This study examined what kind of representations of AOD use are reproduced in the legislative reform of social and health care service users' rights in Finland. The purpose of the reform is to strengthen social and health care service users' rights to self-determination and to reduce the use of restrictive measures. As its data, the study used a draft of the bill and stakeholder opinions regarding the reform. 'What's the problem represented to be?' approach as a methodological framework. The study discovered three AOD-related discourses: the Control, Welfare, and Rights and Legality discourses. The Control discourse represented people who use AOD as risky individuals and called for ways to manage risks in treatment situations. The Welfare discourse portrayed people who use AOD as a vulnerable group whose problems should be addressed by the welfare system. The Rights and Legality discourse represented the vague legal definitions of AOD use as the main regulatory problem. The discourses differed in terms of their definitions of self-determination. The study illustrated how the right to self-determination as a legal concept is contested and can be interpreted in different ways depending on the representations of AOD use. The differing representations highlight the tensions involved in improving the rights of people who use AOD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines online misogynist discourse related to the Finnish prime minister (PM) Sanna Marin's image published in Trendi magazine in October 2020. The affective‐discursive analysis of online commentaries resulted in the identification of four affective‐discursive practices: an immoral woman, incompetent woman, calculating woman and inferior woman. Misogynist discourse related to the PM Marin took the form of a moral act, drew from stereotypical images of women as less rational than men, appeared as accusations targeted at Marin for playing the gender card as a political tactic, and constructed an image of Marin and female politicians as objects of men's sexual desires and as inferior to men. These affective‐discursive practices mobilized dehumanizing discourse ranging from milder forms of derogation, scorn and other‐condemning practices to harsher forms of belittlement, humiliation and animalistic dehumanization. This study contributes to the current knowledge on the affective‐discursive processes underlying online misogyny against female politicians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: In the implementation of integrated care, the role of managers is important and their mutual collaboration should be addressed more visibly. The purpose of this study was to investigate how cross-boundary collaboration is constructed in the discourse of middle-level managers in health and social care. Design/methodology/approach: The study was based on a discursive approach. Group discussions with three groups of Finnish middle managers (n = 39) were analyzed using discourse analysis. Findings: Five ways of talking about cross-boundary collaboration were identified, labeled "ideal", "structure", "defence", "money" and "support" discourses. In the ideal discourse, cross-boundary collaboration appeared as a "good thing" and is self-evident. Structural discourse defined managers as passive actors in self-sustaining entities. Defensive discourse highlighted the problems of cross-boundary collaboration and the hierarchy within the health and social sectors. Financial discourse constituted the ultimate obstacle to successful cross-boundary collaboration, and both strengthened and explained defensive discourse. Supportive discourse portrayed other managers as partners and as an important resource. Research limitations/implications: Cross-boundary collaboration can be experienced as a resource, helping managers cope with their workload. However, identification of and continuous attention to challenges at macro, meso and micro levels of integrated care is crucial for successful collaboration. Thus, critical discussion of collaboration needs to be given space. Originality/value: The study design and discursive approach highlights the power of language and give voice to middle managers who are key actors when implementing integrated care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to discuss the difficulties that may be encountered by the Saami truth and reconciliation commissions examining abuses against Saami indigenous peoples in Norway, Finland and Sweden. This is a significant and very recent problem, and as such, has hardly been researched in the international academia. There is rich literature on the truth and reconciliation commissions in general as well as on specific cases, but not on the Saami commissions. The research method adopted is that of legal-institutional analysis as well as content analysis of relevant literature (discourse analysis). The article examines general characteristics of truth and reconciliation commissions also from a historical-philosophical perspective supported by the developments of international law, and against this background it analyzes the establishment of Saami truth and reconciliation commissions, their regulations, functions as well as the potential difficulties. Conclusions will indicate potential benefits coming from the Commissions' work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With increasing interest in citizen science, this paper discusses how amateur naturalism, especially amateur entomology, is placed within citizen science discourses. Through a case study of amateur entomology in Finland, the paper discusses amateurs' diverse motivations for engaging with nature. The paper discusses especially the affective and ethical aspects of amateur entomology and its implications for citizen science. The discussion is based on an ethnographic study of an entomologist society. The paper suggests that amateur naturalism cannot be reduced to any single definition of citizen science, but amateur entomologists enact different epistemologies as knowledge producers and active citizens. The amateurs are often motivated by an ethical 'first contract' with nature. The rich amateur culture may democratize and 're-enchant' science, provided the scientist worldview of superior data is not allowed to conceal the diversity of amateur motivations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines Finnish online forum discussions where religion and discourses of 'homosexuality' are connected in various ways. Previous research (e.g. Jantunen 2018a) shows that in Finnish online discussions where sexual minorities are the topic, religion stands out as a significant feature – particularly in discourses on 'homosexuality'. Via corpus-assisted discourse analysis (CADS), the present study adds to previous knowledge on this subject by qualitatively analyzing the occurrences of certain keywords in the Finnish societal context – one in which immigration and the visibility of both Islam and sexual minorities are perceived to have increased. The analysis found four interrelated key discourses in these online discussions: (1) Islamization as an alleged threat to gay people (in the data: 'homosexuals'); (2) the alleged indifference/ignorance of people to Islam's stance against sexual minorities; (3) relativist discourse(s) claiming all fundamentalists to be similar; and (4) othering – including for instance, the verbal stylization of Muslims as being particularly hypersexual. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]