The purpose of this thesis is to examine the formation of identity through dress in virtual environments, and to establish connections between identity, fashion, and virtual reality by means of language and semiology. The notion of identity through fashion in virtual environments is examined, with fashion as a factor in identity formation through dress as analysed in structuralist terms. The virtual aspect is used both as a literal field, i.e. the medium of video games and social networks that involve virtual avatars, and as theoretical testing ground from which to derive new results on the nature of dress and many of the aspects of clothing and fashion. The practical outcome of this research, a video game based on dress and narrative, serves as an applied experiment of the three main themes in this thesis and the relations and interactions between them, as well as a testing tool with which to challenge in a practical way the theories and speculations formed in the thesis. My methodology is based on structuralism and post-structuralism in the fields of linguistics, psychology and anthropology, with particular application to the visual media and virtual reality. I am using a post-structuralist approach as it has been the most dominant discourse of replacing economic and social (power) relations with codes and the interplay between signifiers and signifieds. This, I find, is the most appropriate method for analysing both virtual systems and fashion, because, on an atomic level, they both depend on variables such as words and numbers. The code is therefore the common denominator of both disciplines. Furthermore, both disciplines use narrative for their proper function, video games for their back story and motivation of the player, and fashion for its advertising and promotion, as well as through archetypes and symbols. Fashion in this context works as a catalytic agent between post-structuralist codes in modern media as texts, and video games.

No abstract available. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of Natal, Durban, 2001.

The global media landscape has undergone fundamental changes. South Africa is one of the countries that has been part of the global media revolution, and it is therefore not surprising that the broadcasting and the telecommunications industry in South Africa finds itself in the midst of critical and rapid changes. From a technological and legislative viewpoint, the industry is grappling with the meaning and implications of the convergence of broadcasting (Sentech Annual Report, 2002). Sentech Limited is used as a case study for this dissertation. The present study examines the nature of Sentech's transformation as a service arm within the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) to a fully-fledged, profit driven, state-owned enterprise. The advent of technological convergence and the introduction of new digital technologies afford Sentech exciting new opportunities to expand in the communications arena. The first chapter entails the methods of data collection used, as well as the analysis of data collected from the interviews and surveys. It is worth reviewing the challenges that Sentech faces as it operates independently of SABC, as well as how its transition into a digital oriented enterprise has developed and necessitated the possible access to information. Chapter two discusses and outlines Sentech's history and its structure. The two issues raised guide the reader towards a better understanding of the 'old Sentech', and its transformation to a 'renewed entity'. The history surveys Sentech's establishment from the initial stages when it was a mere division of SABC, focused on technological aspects of analogue terrestrial signal distribution. The new technological revolution introduced and transformed Sentech into a digital transmitter. The 'new Sentech's outfitted with new technological platforms for distribution and transmission. For instance, IP Wireless mobile broadband and other new technological structures contributed to reshaping Sentech into a digitally oriented transmitter. The design of the company tracks different developments in which Sentech has engaged over the past ten years, and are dealt with the following sections. The third chapter deals with Sentech's transformation as an outcome of the liberalization wherein the effects of this process need to be looked at including the role of the government, market structure, issues of competition with Orbicom and Telkom, the new competitive strategies and ICASA's role as a regulator. The fourth chapter covers the concepts and theories that may help inform the discussion in the dissertation. Three theories will be used in the discussion to help to analyze and evaluate the data collected. The theories are very important as they motivate this study. They are concerned with the concept of political economy. Political economy signifies "the production, distribution, and consumption of the more general interest in the process of control and survival in social life" (Mosco, 1996: 17). These will exemplify the opportunities that Sentech faced as an independent commercial enterprise. Furthermore, the section explains technological components. Sentech is a signal distributor, which underwent transformation. Concepts such as 'convergence' produce a vivid explanation of how Sentech was allowed to undertake an aggressive business transformation, from being traditional signal distribution to international telephony and multimedia service. Chapter five entails the performance of Sentech. This part discusses the revenue, public interest on matters relating to access and some of the key challenges. There is also a discussion on globalization, digitization and convergence which Sentech has engaged in. The last chapter will be concerned with a conclusion and will recommend a way forward. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2005.

The thesis deals with the new trends in marketing communication. It shows the importance of new media and new tools of marketing communication mix. It aims to analyze new trends and forms of marketing communication and based on the findings to apply their use in marketing communication of company Direct Parcel Distribution CZ.

Engineers Talk Be it through conversations, meetings, informal discussion, phone calls or E-Mail, Engineering Design Communication is the main tributary for the sharing of knowledge, thoughts and ideas, and therefore, fundamental to Engineering Work. An engineer spends a significant portion of their day communicating as they 'fill in the gaps' left by formal documentation and processes. It is thereby, an inherent source of explicit design rationale that relates to (and very often supplements) Engineering Records and their generation. Engineering Design Communication is not only central for Engineering Work and Records but also offers potential - through aggregation - to reveal underlying features, patterns and signatures that could aid current and future Engineering Project Management. As Engineering Design Communication plays such a pivotal role, it comes as no surprise that there is much extant research. The majority of this is descriptive and has focused on identifying patterns in engineers' communication behaviour as well as analysing the utility of currently employed communication tools/mediums (such as, E-Mail and meetings). However, little prescriptive research - through either a tool or process - has been undertaken. This may be due to the considerable challenges facing research in this field such as the need to maintain a high-level of Engineering Context, ensure the right engineers are able to participate and associate the communication with its respective Engineering Records. All of which, has to be achieved within an Engineering Context where teams are becoming larger, more mobile, multi-disciplinary & distributed, and often performing variant or incremental design. Although, it is argued that Social Media has the potential to militate these challenges through the use of technologies that provide agile development, support for ubiquitous computing and sharing of multimedia. Therefore, this thesis investigates how Social Media can be used to support Engineering Design Communication. This is achieved through the elicitation and synthesis of the requirements for supporting Engineering Design Communication, and consideration of the effective application of the Social Media. This forms the basis from which a Social Media approach to support Engineering Design Communication is created and then instantiated within a tool called PartBook. PartBook has been developed iteratively and involved an industrial study to evaluate and improve functionality. It has since been used within an eleven week Formula Student project involving thirty-four students from multiple engineering disciplines in a distributed working environment. The analysis of which addresses the validation of the requirements that has led to amendments and generation of new requirements as well as evaluation of the Social Media approach that has led to insights into the potential impact such a tool could bring to Engineering Work, Records and Project Management.

This thesis explores online practices of women in Québec, a culturally and historically distinct province in Canada that is undergoing rapid social and technological transformations, and analyses the discourses that emerge. It zeroes in on blogging, as a facilitator for exploring, constructing and challenging gendered identities. It draws on and contributes to a growing body of literature that investigates and legitimises women's online writings, an area that remains under analysed. This online ethnography was accomplished through face-to-face interviews with 23 Frenchspeaking women bloggers, home visits and an analysis of their blogs. Using feminist critical discourse analysis, the thesis analyses how informants locate themselves inside and outside traditional and mainstream discourses of femininities. It first explores how participants discuss their blogs using domestic metaphors, thereby linking their online expressions to ideas and ideals of the home. Second, it reveals how bloggers share a common concern with putting forward a favourable self, emphasising personal qualities such as education, respect, affability, and impressive online networks. Third, it analyses self-improvement narratives in participants' interviews and blog entries, examining recurring discussions of personality, values and views; body size and image; emotional and mental health; and professional and homemaking skills. The last chapter underlines how blogging provides women with opportunities for networking, a place to discuss challenges and with a means to claim time for themselves. The thesis draws out the complex engagements in an activity they find pleasurable despite working within mainstream gender role constraints and still facing a digital divide. In both discourse and practice, participants seem at ease with blogging but remain highly influenced by traditional discourses. This gives rise to a sense of contradiction where they feel like they exist, have a public life and make a contribution but also exhibit a sense of compulsion and regulation. They break out of the limits of normative femininities perhaps – at the same time creating new 'women's worlds' – even as the use of blogging reinstates and produces conservative forms of self-management.

This PhD thesis is an ethnographic investigation into the drinking practices of young people undertaken in the Canterbury (Kent, United Kingdom) night-time economy. This research took place across a series of fieldwork sites, including: pubs, night-clubs, the street, and young people’s houses across the city. The research included an in-depth ethnography which took place in a city-centre pub where I was working as a bartender, which adapted the methodological approach of the Chicago School of Sociology to urban studies in a contemporary context. Specific examples from the research included a case study with two young men in the pub who were drinking after work, and a wide-range of other ethnographic examples taken from scenarios arising through my position at the pub resulting from bar conversations and informal interviews. These were selected from a number of literally thousands of young people who I encountered across the two years of fieldwork in the pub. The licensee of the pub, Andrew, acted as a gatekeeper for the research, as his approach to the pub business corresponded to interaction and the possibility of building ethnographic relationships with young people. Other ethnographic data examples were also taken from the wider Canterbury night-time economy, away from the pub at the centre of the in-depth ethnography. The variety of data sets included participant observation, conversation, informal interviews and the field diary. Drawing from the accounts of participants in the fieldwork and emergent themes in the ethnography, the thesis argues that young people are the subject of a normalization of extreme drinking practices in the night-time economy. This is explored through the adaptation of the model of drug normalization theory, where young people’s experiences of alcohol and extreme drinking practices are examined in relation to specific dimensions of drinking. The media stereotyping of extreme drinking practices by young people is also subject to critique, where it will be argued that the term “binge” drinking is an imprecise and moralistic view of young people’s activities in the night-time economy.

The following thesis examines the impact of social and legacy media on young people’s political engagement as well as on their attitudes to, feelings towards and beliefs about politics. This was accomplished using a three-tiered design which integrated both quantitative and qualitative techniques. The aim of this design was to ensure that young people were afforded a voice in the ongoing debate around youth apathy. To this end, a direct comparison of social and legacy media coverage of various case studies was undertaken. This initial comparison was accompanied by a series of interviews using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009). The interviews focused on individual engagement with politics and social and legacy media, in order to get a sense of each individuals understanding of their role in British politics as well as the feelings and attitudes towards media and politics more widely. The three-tiered design concluded with a quantitative questionnaire assessing governmental trust, political efficacy, self-efficacy, and self-esteem by way of a series of standardised measures. From this mixed-methods approach, two main findings arise. Firstly, that social media such as Twitter hold the potential to facilitate political engagement in young people, beyond what is currently achieved by the British legacy media. The second finding suggests that there has been fundamental paradigmatic shift of youth conceptions of politics from what could be considered traditional political behaviours (such as voting and party membership; Strømsnes, 2009) to lifestyle orientated choices (such as boy/buycotts; Copeland, 2014; Gil de Zúñiga, Copeland & Bimber, 2014), mediated by social media. Overall the results of the thesis foster a dualistic understanding of British young people who are simultaneously engaged with and apathetic toward “politics” dependant on how the term is defined.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2001. / Questionnaire in English and Korean. Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 243-253). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2001. / Questionnaire in English and Korean. Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 243-253). Also available on the Internet.