The school subject social studies in Sweden is a multidisciplinary university subject in , with content from e.g economy, political science, sociology and human geography. University and higher education in Sweden have constructed the school subject social studies in different ways. As a consequence of this today´s students have different education in the school subject social studies depending on where they have studied locally in Sweden. The school subject social studies in Sweden is also different from many similar school subjects in contemporary societies in Europe and northern America. Among the Nordic countries Norway, Denmark and Sweden have constructed the school subject social studies in similar ways but if you compare it to e.g  Great Britain and USA you can see many differences in how the subject is constructed, what the purpose is and what content it has. The knowledge the school subject social studies in Sweden can bring to the students is of vital importance for understanding contemporary societies in Europe and the rest of the world. The teachers in the school subject social studies have a curriculum which they must follow, but how do the professional teachers understand its subject and what consequences does this leads to for the students when it comes to examinations? This thesis investigate how social studies teachers in the upper secondary school in two different regions in the northern Sweden ( Västerbotten and Norrbotten ) advocate its subject and what content they stress. The thesis also investigate how the social studies teachers conception are expressed in their production of written tests and exercises. Another aim for the thesis is to investigate how teachers backgrounds such as gender, class, political ideology, education and years as a professional affects the subject conception.

The present study has analyzed the interviews of teachers which exemplifies different subject conception in the school subject social studies. In this study background factors as e.g gender and class is analyzed for the purpose to present if there is a connection between different background factors and teachers subject conception.  The presentation at the ECER conference will focus on the analysis of the empirical findings of this study.

The starting point is Anthony Giddens theory of structuration which emphasize the connection between the structure of the societies and the individual as an agent. It is complemented by other theories about didactics, subject didactics and identity construction. In a didactical context it is interesting to study if the teacher is affected of different background structures or if they are free from it in their didactical choices.

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