Thesis (Ph. D.)--Kent State University, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Jan. 21, 2010). Advisor: Ralph Lorenz. Keywords: jazz, music, theory, George Macdonald, ballet, harmony, tertian, harmonics analysis, dissonance, consonance, orchestra. Includes bibliographical references (p. 130-140).

Thesis (MMus (Music))--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / In this thesis, an attempt is made to create an aesthetically pleasing musical scale based on the ratio of phi. Precedents for the application of phi in aesthetic fields exist; noteworthy is Le Corbusier’s architectural works, the measurements of which are based on phi. A brief discussion of the unique mathematical properties of phi is given, followed by a discussion of the manifestations of phi in the physical ratios as they appear in animal and plant life. Specific scales which have found an application in art music are discussed, and the properties to which their success is attributable are identified. Consequently, during the design of the phi scale, these characteristics are incorporated. The design of the phi scale is facilitated by the use of the most sophisticated modern computer software in the field of psychacoustics. During the scale’s design process, particular emphasis is placed on the requirement of obtaining maximal sensory consonance. For this reason, an in-depth discussion of the theories regarding consonance perception is undertaken. During this discussion, the reader’s attention is drawn to the difference between musical and perceptual consonance, and a discussion of the developmental history of musical consonance is given. Lastly, the scale is tested to see whether it complies with the requirements for successful scales.

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Video games' capacity for player choice makes them an excellent medium for expressing ethical dilemmas and developing the ethical thinking of players. However, translating complex ethical dilemmas to procedural games is challenging, particularly when the game creator intends to convey specific arguments in their work. This paper contains a close reading of ethical dilemmas in Fallout: New Vegas, Disco Elysium, and Frostpunk and applies Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) concept of stratification as a means of understanding the process of collapsing the semantics of an ethical dilemma into the procedures of a digital game. It introduces the concept of consonance to refer to the consistency between procedural and semantic logic, and argues that the development of mechanics which maintain or enhance consonance is an important factor in creating persuasive procedural rhetoric about ethical topics.

This study explores the development of a Western firm's subsidiary in the Ukraine and sets out to contribute to the theoretical development about the managing of subsidiaries in the Post-Soviet market. The cross-institutional approach to analyse the subsidiary has been adopted to explore influence from the institutional setting of the parent firm and from local institutions. In the theoretical framework, special attention is directed to studies analysing the challenges that Western firms encounter when operating in the Post-Soviet market. Institutional theory therefore serves as a framework for theories on market entries, networks and management transfers.The empirical study is based on a case study conducted in connection to a training project for local employees of a Western firm's subsidiary operating in the Ukraine. Besides being a source of inspiration, the training project provided good access to respondents and insights about the challenges that the subsidiary faced.The analysis shows that the introduction of the Western firm's management in the subsidiary reflects in the local employees' forming of identities. A clear pattern is that local employees' development of identities in line with the Western firm's norms is supported by socialisation in settings dominated by the Western firm. A setting dominated by conflicts between Western and local norms, in contrast, resulted in developments of conflict identities. The analysis of the subsidiary's managing of influences from the local institutional setting indicates that this concerned filtering. Striking was that the subsidiary was successful in managing influences when the filtering conditions were characterised by consonance. Looking into aspects making the filtering of external influences difficult, the analysis points out barter trade and local actors' boundary spanning towards authorities in the Ukrainian society as aspects creating dissonances and vacuum. Thus, influences characterised by dissonance and/or vacuum made it particularly difficult for the subsidiary to manage these influences.One of the major contributions of this thesis is the cross-institutional approach to analyse developments in a subsidiary in the Post-Soviet market. By applying this approach the study suggests that the managing of a cross-institutional setting concerns both internal and external boundary spanning. Of vital importance for the internal boundary spanning are issues influencing local employees' forming of a 'we' with the Western firm's representatives. The standpoint is that this concerns local employees' identity identification, which is a new perspective on management transfers towards a subsidiary in the Post-Soviet market. Concerning the managing of external boundary spanning, the study points towards the importance of observing local actors' ways of dealing with dissonances and vacuum in local networks. / digitalisering@umu

Bringing together current research strands stemming from the Festinger tradition of failed prophecy, and by observing a recent case of a prophetic group dealing with disconfirming events under a period of 210 days, I theorize on what roles cognitive dissonance, rituals and continuous prophetic adaptation play in the management of prophetic groups’ alternative world views. The traditional conception of dissonance management is reinterpreted as a process of maximizing mental desirability, which is contingent on the level of cognitive dissonance as well as cognitive activity. Through the use of rituals, prophetic groups maintain a certain mental network of categories (world) that invalidates the judgement standards of the mainstream society in favor of the prophet. Finally, prophecy itself is considered to be a device that regulates the collective level of cognitive dissonance and activity in order to maintain an ideal state of collective mental desirability; it is a tool to organize the present, rather than a prediction to be judged based on its accuracy. This sociological study is an assessment of the research on prophecy stemming from Festinger and makes the contribution of synthesizing it under the single logic of world management through the study of an empirical case.

This study contributes to the understanding of cultural forms, inspired by Cassirer’s notion of a general function manifesting in the many particular expressions of human culture. The special case of cybersemiotics (a newly established scientific discipline) is studied as a social system to make sense of how it operates as a viable cultural form. The study uses citation network analysis to map out the boundaries and communications of the cybersemiotic discipline, and then delves into its contents to qualitatively investigate selected parts of the network structure. A framework for studying and comparing cultural forms is developed.